Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Zooble woke up that morning with a sense of dread.

Why wouldn’t they, after all, today was another one of Caine’s personalized adventures, and he was probably not going to let them skip out on it.

They decided to get up and begin picking out their parts for the day. As they started to sift through their parts box, they heard a knock on the door. They figured it was probably Ragatha, reminding them that there was an adventure today, even though they already knew because there was one everyday.

“Coming!” They walked over to the door and opened it.

“Hi Zooble!” It was Gangle. Zooble hadn’t expected that.

Her comedy mask was on this morning, so she was smiling sweetly at Zooble in a way that made their nonexistent heart skip a beat.

“Hi Gangle.” Zooble said, their tone forcefully relaxed. “What’s up?”

“Well I just woke up and I didn’t want to be in my room anymore so I was walking to the tent. And then I heard you moving around and nobody else was awake so I wondered if you wanted to hang out for a bit before the adventure? If not I understand.” Gangle looked a little sad at the end of her rushed question, as if she was anticipating Zooble saying no.

“Of course.” Zooble said. They couldn’t let Gangle look sad, and they wanted the company.

“Okay!” Gangle smiled again. “Can I come in?”

“Oh yeah.” Zooble moved to the side to let Gangle in. “I have to pick out my parts for the day, do you want to help?”

“Help?” Gangle said looking confused. “I mean I’d love to but how could I help you with something like that?”

“Just help me look through the box and if you see something you think I would like, then I’ll try it.” Zooble said.

“Really? Well I’ll do my best!” Gangle walked with Zooble over to the box of parts.

They both kneeled down and sifted through the box of parts. It took a while, but Zooble was able to find the limbs they wanted for today. Gangle had picked out a three fingered claw hand and a purple antenna with a star. Normally they hated this part of their morning, but Gangle’s presence made it a lot better.

After they were done, they both just sat around and talked. They talked about Caine’s shenanigans, Bubbles rampage yesterday, and anything else they could think of.

It was the most relaxing morning Zooble had had in a long time, and she wanted to something like it more often.

But then they heard the others moving out of their rooms for the morning and they knew it was time to go.

“We should probably get going now, huh?” Zooble said, standing up.

“Oh yeah, right.” Gangle said, standing up as well. She looked at the ground before saying. “We should do this more often, I really had a nice time.”

“Of course. I did too.” If Zooble had a mouth they would definitely be smiling ridiculously right now.

“Well let’s go!” Gangle seemed quite excited about Zooble’s response, which only made them feel even better.

They both walked into the hallway, unfortunately seeing Jax right in front of them, walking towards the tent.

He stopped when he saw them, a large grin creeping its way across his face.

“What were you two doing in there hmm? Anything you’d like to share with the group?” He snickered. “I bet y-“

“Can it a&%hole, nobody asked your opinion.” Zooble said, trying not to show any of their embarrassment at being taunted by him.

“Ohh someone is feisty today! I guess I’ll let you two lovebirds be!” He shouted while running off.

“F$%¥ YOU!” Zooble shouted after him. So much for a great morning.

They thought they heard Gangle squeak when Jax had referred to them as ‘lovebirds.’ What an asshole.

“Don’t let him get to you okay.” Zooble said, taking note of the fact that her mask was pointed towards the ground.

“Y-yeah of course.” Gangle said. “Let’s go.”

Zooble guessed that Gangle wasn’t fine, but they didn’t want to push her to share if she didn’t want to. Especially considering it wasn’t something they would appreciate if someone did that to them.

The two walked together out of the hallway and into the tent. As they stood in front of the stage, Caine, the giant spinner wheel with all the cast’s faces on it from yesterday, and Bubble floating in a small iron cage, all appeared.

“HELLO MY MAJESTIC MARIGOLDS!” He shouted giving them all a small startle. He thankfully restrained himself from causing any explosions though. “I KNOW AFTER YESTERDAY YOU MIGHT NOT BE COMPLETELY EXCITED ABOUT YOUR PERSONALIZED ADVENTURES, BUT NO WORRY! BECAUSE I HAVE LOCKED UP OUR LITTLE TROUBLEMAKER SO THAT TODAY’S ADVENTURE CAN GO OFF WITHOUT A HITCH!” He gestured to the cage containing Bubble.

“I’ve been a bad boy~” he said in a very flirtatious tone.

Zooble was beginning to think Bubble did that on purpose to irritate Caine, because boy, did it work.

Caine’s eyes developed a gentle red tint, and steam blew out of the sides of his hat, indicating he was not in a good mood.

“BUBBLE I AM ALREADY QUITE UPSET WITH YOU SO I SUGGEST YOU QUIET YOURSELF BEFORE YOU MAKE IT WORSE.” Caine snapped his fingers and a zipper appeared over Bubble’s mouth, getting rid of his ability to speak.

“ANYWAY LETS SPIN THE WHEEL AND SEE WHO’S ADVENTURE WE PARTICIPATE IN TODAY!” Caine spun the wheel quickly, and Zooble watched in horror as the arrow landed on their picture.

“LOOKS LIKE IT’S ZOOBLES TURN!” He snapped, causing the Bubble cage and the spinner to disappear. In front of the cast was a rainbow colored swirling portal.

Zooble felt the dread from this morning increase exponentially. They didn’t want to deal with whatever strangeness Caine had schemed up with them in mind, especially considering that the last adventure Caine made with them in mind involved possession, ghosts, and biblically accurate angels.

“THIS ADVENTURE IS GOING TO INVOLVE OUR DEAR ZOOBLE IN THEIR PREFERRED HABITAT, WORKING AT A BAR! BUT SINCE YOU ALL KNOW THAT I DON’T LIKE TO REPEAT ADVENTURES, THIS ONE HAS A TWIST! IT TAKES PLACE AT A GRAND PARTY WITH A MURDER MYSTERY! YOU ALL WILL TAKE TURNS WORKING AT THE BAR AND MINGLING AT THE PARTY TO DETERMINE THE KILLER, WITHOUT GETTING KILLED YOURSELVES OF COURSE!” He announced the last part proudly, like he was excited that he had dreamed up a murder scheme. “THE SHIFTS WILL BE DESIGNATED BY ME, AND YOU WILL BE WORKING IN PAIRS! ZOOBLE YOU WILL BE WORKING THE MOST, AS YOU HAVE THE MOST EXPERIENCE! GOOD LUCK MY LITTLE DETECTIVES!”

Zooble wasn’t sure if they would love or hate this adventure. The idea of working at a bar again after their last time was cut short sounded nice, but they didn’t want to deal with some big party. Or a murder mystery.

They reluctantly began to walk toward the portal, not even bothering to argue with Caine anymore.

“ZOOBLE WAIT!” Caine said, before Zooble could walk through. All the others had already gone through, so what did Caine want?

“What?” Zooble asked, putting a deliberate edge into their voice, hoping to dissuade him from saying anything stupid.

“AS I MENTIONED, YOU ALL GET TO WORK IN PAIRS AND I KNOW YOU ARE NOT A FAN OF MY ADVENTURES SO I WANTED TO OFFER A CONSOLATION OF SORTS.” Zooble didn’t anticipate the kind tone in his voice. “I WAS GOING TO PICK THE PARTNERS MYSELF, BUT YOU MAY CHOSE YOUR PARTNER, AS LONG AS YOU DON’T TELL ANYONE ELSE!” He winked at them.

“Uhh.” Zooble took a second to think even though they knew who they wanted. “Can I work with Gangle?”

“OF COURSE! AN EXCELLENT CHOICE! GANGLE’S EXPERIENCE IN FOOD SERVICE MAKES HER AN IDEAL CANDIDATE!” He shouted. “NOW GO ALONG AND HAVE FUN!” He waved his hand, gesturing them into the portal.

They walked into the portal, considering this silver lining to their situation. Even though they had to deal with a ridiculous adventure, at least they had Gangle helping them.

As they walked through, they noticed something. They were now wearing a black suit with a white shirt and a pink tie. They didn’t hate the outfit, but they weren’t sure about the pink tie, but Caine likely put it because it matched the color of their head.

They looked up to see the cast in similarly fancy attire. Kinger had a deep purple suit with a gold tie, Jax had a red suit with a yellow tie, which in Zooble’s opinion could have looked nice but looked ridiculous on him. Ragatha had a sleeveless dress in the same color as her original dress, thankfully minus the patches. Pomni had a red suit jacket and blue pants, accompanied by a gold bow tie. But then there was Gangle.

Zooble was probably biased, but she looked the most beautiful out of everyone. She had a black dress on that was simple in all the right ways. And her mask had a cute little red bow on the corner of it.

Zooble couldn’t help but stare for a second.

Then Jax’s voice snapped her back to reality.

“Hurry up and go work at the bar Zooble! I need a drink.” Jax said.

“F$%¥ you Jax.” They went to do it anyway, knowing they probably should. “Gangle, Caine said you can work with me.”

Gangle nodded and followed after, looking at the floor and not speaking. This made Zooble worried about her for a moment wondering if she didn’t want to work with them. But the two walked through the party to get to the bar at the back, ready to get to work.

Chapter Text

As Gangle and Zooble walked through the employee entrance, black aprons appeared on the two.

“You look nice.” The words fell out of Gangle’s mouth before she could process them.

Not that she hadn’t meant it, because Zooble looked absolutely stunning. The black suit and pink tie looked perfect on them, and Gangle silently thanked as well as cursed Caine for giving her the opportunity to see them in it.

“Oh.” Zooble said and Gangle instantly feared the worst.

“I’m sorry I-“

“You look nice too.” Zooble said, cutting off Gangles hurried apology. Gangle instantly looked away, blushing horribly.

“Thank you.” She mumbled.

“Of course.” Zooble said. But in Gangle’s embarrassment, she missed Zooble looking away and blushing as well.

An awkward pause settled between the two.

“Ribbons, gimme a whiskey sour will ya! I can actually enjoy it this time since I’m not a vegan, thank god” Jax sauntered up to the counter, grinning.

Of course Jax had to mess with them. That was sort of becoming a theme today, Gangle noticed. But since his interjection broke the awkward tension between the two, she couldn’t really complain.

“Um of course Jax!” She was a little wary near him because her comedy mask was still intact, and she wanted to keep it that way.

But as she moved to give him his drink she realized she didn’t know what she was doing. Sure she had experience with food service, but not bartending.

“Uh Zooble, could you help me out? I’ve never really worked in a bar before.” Gangle said nervously.

“Yeah of course! I can show you the ropes!” Zooble said.

“Will you two quit flirting and gimmie my drink already!” Jax shouted.

“After I deal with him.” Zooble said through gritted teeth.

They began digging around the bar quickly whipping up Jax’s drink. When they were done, they slammed it on the counter so hard that they splashed some of it on him.

“What the heck was that for!” He yelled grumpily.

“Being an a€&hole. Now get out before I grab the corn.” Zooble snapped.

Jax reluctantly stomped off, grumbling something to himself.

Gangle laughed slightly as he stomped away.

“What?” Zooble said.

“Just funny you scared him off so easily. Guess I need to keep some corn on me huh?” Gangle joked.

“Not a bad idea.” Zooble said, “Now let’s teach you how to work the bar.”

Chapter Text

Pomni was trying not to stare. She really was.

But Ragatha looked so effortlessly gorgeous she couldn’t help it. She moved through the party expertly, mingling and chatting like she already knew everyone. It helped that she probably did know some of them, because some were npcs from previous adventures.

Because of the frequent number of familiar npcs, Pomni was trying to keep an eye out for Gummigoo, even though he most likely wouldn’t remember her.

But Ragatha kept distracting her. She was so confident, and the direct contrast between her confidence and Pomni’s awkwardness only making the two more obvious.

Sure Ragatha was slightly confident with the rest of the cast, but with the npcs it was entirely different. She was less focused on making everyone happy, and while she still held some of those traits while with npcs, you could tell she was less obsessive in that way around them.

Pomni was curious as to why this was. She couldn’t help but take it slightly personally, wondering if Ragatha didn’t actually like being around the rest of them and was just lying about everything and being with the npcs was a fresh start and-

Woah. She needed to calm down and get some space from Ragatha before her brain tried to explode again.

She wandered across the room towards the bar, as she approached she noticed Jax stomping away from it, holding a glass. She also noticed that he had a splash of something on his suit, and she figured that he had probably gotten in a fight with Zooble.

Good. After yesterday she had zero empathy for him. His treatment of Ragatha had no excuses, not even some hypothetical traumatic backstory that she had originally assumed about when she first started to talk with him.

She walked up to the bar, where Zooble was showing Gangle around, likely teaching her how to work the bar. Pomni realized she might need a tour as well if she was expecting to work at it later.

“Sup Pomni. Can you give us a sec? Trying to show Gangle around.” Zooble called over to her.

“Of course.” Great. This gave her more time alone with her thoughts. But then she heard someone walk up to the bar.

“Hey Pomni! Whatcha up too!” Ragatha had a grin on her face as she sat next to Pomni.

“Just getting something to drink.” Pomni tried to avoid looking at Ragatha, in that beautiful dress that showed off her slightly muscular arms and-

Stop it stop it stop it. She yelled at her annoying brain.

“Are you all right? You seemed pretty upset over there, and right now.” Ragatha said, a tone of concern in her voice.

“Yeah I’m just not a fan of parties I guess.” Pomni said. That wasn’t really a lie, parties were hard for her and a part of her knew that was true in her life before the circus too. She had much preferred to… As usual the memory slipped away.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Ragatha asked kindly.

“Not right now.” Pomni knew she wouldn’t be able to hold a conversation with Ragatha when she looked like that. Not without some alcohol in her system first.

“Well what do you think you’re going to get to drink?” Ragatha asked quickly giving a much needed switch in topics.

“I’m not sure. I don’t know much about alcohol, normally I just drink what’s available.” Pomni admitted. “I’m pretty sure I wasn’t much of a drinker or a partier before the circus. And I wasn’t really the biggest fan of what I got in the last bar adventure, so I want to try something different this time.”

“Of course!” Ragatha paused for a moment. “You could try a cosmopolitan! That’s my favorite.”

“Yeah I remember from last time.” Pomni said. “Sure I’ll try it.”

“That’s the spirit!” Ragatha said excitedly.

“What do you two want?” Zooble asked, and Pomni noticed that the grumpy tone usually present in their voice was missing. They clearly enjoyed working at the bar. And Pomni could figure they enjoyed spending time with Gangle too, even if they didn’t say it.

“Two cosmopolitans! Pomni wants to try one!” Ragatha said cheerfully.

“On it.” They walked away and said something to Gangle, who began to help them with the drink.

Pomni turned back around to look at the crowd, keeping an eye out for Gummigoo. But he was still nowhere to be seen.

“Whatcha looking for?” Ragatha asked, startling Pomni, even though she already knew Ragatha was right there.

“Gummigoo.” Pomni said sadly.

“Oh.” Ragatha said, her voice losing its cheerfulness.

“I know he won’t recognize me or remember me but some part of me hopes he will.” Pomni said, feeling a slight sting in the corners of her eyes like she was about to cry. She turned back around to the counter and folded her arms, placing her head on top of them.

“Hey it’s alright Pomni.” Ragatha said, attempting to comfort her. “I get how that is.”

“You do?” Pomni said, wondering what Ragatha meant.

“I’ve made friends with npcs before, only to see them again later and they’ve forgotten about me. I remember, when I was first in the circus, I connected with one of the npcs really well. But next time I saw her she had completely forgotten me.” Ragatha’s cheerful tone had been replaced with a sadder one. “It sucks, to feel forgotten, even with someone you don’t fully know. But when you know someone well, when you care about them, it hurts even worse.”

Pomni suspected part of that might not be about the npcs, but she didn’t pry. She knew Ragatha had a habit of keeping those things to herself, even if it wasn’t good for her.

“Thanks Ragatha.” Pomni said, appreciating the insight nonetheless.

Then Ragatha placed her hand on Pomni’s back, gently. Pomni turned her head slightly to look at her, and everything else vanished.

“It’s okay Pomni, I’m always here.” She smiled gently and Pomni couldn’t help but smile back. She was probably blushing too, based on the sudden warmth in her face.

“Here you go?” Gangle said, gently setting down the drinks in front of the two. “You okay Pomni?” She asked.

“Uh yeah!” Pomni quickly sat up, almost knocking over her drink.

Gangle giggled slightly and walked away.

Awesome. Pomni was such an idiot sometimes.

She took a sip of the drink, noting Ragatha watching her out of the corner of her eye.

It was more sour than she expected, but it also had a nice sweetness to it and it tasted pretty good.

“Whaddya think?” Ragatha asked, grinning in anticipation at the smile on Pomni’s face.

“It’s pretty good!” Pomni said. “I get why you like it so much.”

“Awesome!” Ragatha beamed. “I had a feeling you would like it.”

“I didn’t expect it to be so sour, and I might try something else next time, just to figure out what I like, but it’s nice.” Pomni admitted.

“That’s good.” Ragatha said taking a sip of her own drink.

“Hello you two!” Called a voice from behind them.

It was Kinger.

“Oh hey Kinger!” Ragatha said giving a small wave. “What’s up?”

“Hmm.” He seemed lost in thought. “Good question! Have either have you found the killer yet?”

“Umm to be honest Kinger I forgot about that entirely.” Pomni admitted.

“Me too!” Ragatha said. “Have you had any luck finding the killer?”

“A killer!” Kinger shouted.

Of course.

“Don’t worry about it Kinger.” Pomni said quickly, not wanting to freak him out. “Do you want to sit with us and get something to drink?”

“No I’ll be alright, I think I might go back to the party.” Kinger said, beginning to walk away. “You two enjoy though!”

“Bye Kinger!” Ragatha shouted to him. Then, in a lower voice, to Pomni, “We should probably check on him later to make sure he doesn’t get himself killed.”

“Yeah.” Pomni agreed.

They both sat for a while, finishing their drinks.

Once they had finished, Ragatha stood up.

“Wanna come mingle with me?” She offered her hand out to Pomni.

“O-of course.” Pomni took her hand, feeling warmth in her face that wasn’t just from the alcohol.

The two walked into the party, and even though Pomni was still a bit nervous, the hand clasped in hers acted as an anchor, keeping her from drifting off into her anxiety.

Well sort of. Her heart was still beating incredibly fast at the feeling of the plush hand currently entwined in her own.

Chapter Text

Gangle was trying really hard to do a good job.

When she worked in fast food before the circus, she had a habit of always trying to be a ‘model employee.’ And even in the circus, when they did the Spudsy’s adventure, they still chased the validation that came with being a model employee.

But now, without an employer or even a real focus for profits, since it was at a party, she should be able to relax right?

Well as she figured out quite quickly, not so much.

While she wasn’t focused on profits or corporate standards, she was still focused on customer satisfaction. And impressing Zooble.

Gangle had never worked at a bar before, but if Zooble needed her help, she was going to do the best job she could.

Also, customer interactions were far easier with her happy mask on, and, instead of having to worry about managing everything, she got to just work with Zooble. With some occasional help, of course.

It was nice to see familiar faces there as well, like Ragatha and Pomni. And some npcs that didn’t remember her, but still were nice to talk to.

Overall, it was turning out to be way better than her food service work had ever been.

She even had a particularly funny interaction with Ming. He had wandered up to bar and asked for something strong to drink, looking rather depressed. Gangle asked what was wrong, out of pure curiosity about the new npc. He had responded saying he hated parties because they were rife with people making assumptions. Gangle had to try not to laugh slightly at the npcs antics. Caine truly had a strange sense of humor when it came to them.

And then things started to go downhill.

Gangle guessed Caine wanted everything to be as accurate as possible, because after a certain duration of the party, some customers were behaving more unkindly, likely either due to being drunk, or just being plain rude.

Through all of it, Gangle tried to keep a smile on her face and not let anything get to her. But it was difficult, because she had to deal with Zooble’s presence. Sure she cared about them and they would always defend her against the customers that were rude, but she still wanted to look good for them. Though she wasn’t entirely sure why she felt that way.

Gangle felt particularly upset after one customer yelled at her, saying she was ‘obviously incapable and inexperienced’.

This hit way too close to home with what she had been worried about all day. And proving them right, Zooble stepped in to defend her. She turned around, pretending to be busy with something else, when really she was just trying to hide her face from everyone else. It felt like her comedy mask was on the verge of breaking.

“Are you okay Gangle?” Zooble asked from behind her.

“Yeah.” Gangle said, continuing to face away from them.

“Are you sure?” Zooble asked with a note of concern in their voice. “Normally I wouldn’t push it but you’ve seemed off since this morning.”

“I’m fine, just need a break is all.” Gangle said. “Would you find if I took fifteen?”

“Of course.” Zooble said, and the concerned tone that they were using made Gangle want to tell them everything, but she knew Zooble didn’t deserve to be burdened by her problems any more than they already were.

She began to walk off, partially hearing Zooble say something but the loudness in her brain silenced it.

She opened the door to a supply room in the back and walked over to sit on the back wall, not even bothering to turn the lights on. She tucked herself out of sight in the corner in case someone decided to look inside.

Gangle slipped off her comedy mask, setting it down next to her gently. Then she finally let herself cry.

“Why am I so pathetic, especially in front of them?” Gangle sobbed to nobody.

She had no idea how long she sat there, crying and thinking and muttering terrible things to herself.

She was just thinking about getting up and going back, but the thought of facing them sent her back into a spiral, and just kept sitting there, stuck in a loop of self pity.

Then she heard the door open.

“Gangle?” Zooble called from the doorway.

Maybe if she was quiet they would leave?

“I saw you go in here and I’m just trying to make sure you’re alright. If you don’t respond I’m going to get Ragatha.” Zooble said firmly.

“I’m here.” Gangle called out weakly.

Zooble closed the door and walked over to her, sitting next to her.

“What’s wrong Gangle?” They asked. “Remember what we talked about yesterday? I want you to tell me if I did something to upset you.”

Gangle took a deep breath.

“It’s not you, well not really.” Gangle said keeping her eyes far away from Zooble’s.

“Gangle.” Zooble said warningly.

“I just- I wanted to help you, to impress you. I feel so weak, and- and pathetic, and I’m so sick of being like that. You’re amazing and even though I appreciate you always defending me, it just makes it even worse. Because you’re so strong and I’m nothing like you.” Gangle was crying again, still hiding her face from Zooble.

“You think I’m amazing? And strong?” Zooble asked.

Gangle flushed slightly, but she was already in deep now, so there was no point in hiding it.

“Of course.” Gangle said.

Zooble didn’t speak for what felt like ages. Gangle tugged her knees to her chest, worried that she had messed up.

“I’m not.” Zooble said, with a twinge of frustration in their voice.

Gangle was the one who didn’t speak now. She didn’t know how to react to this. Was Zooble angry at her? Probably not. But what did they mean?

“Remember the other day, when we were in that castle?” They paused for a moment, with a breath so shaky Gangle almost looked up to see if they were crying. “I told you all that stuff about loving yourself, and you asked if I ever had to make that choice. You decided right away that I was too perfect to make that choice, and since then I’ve felt like I’ve been lying to you. Because I struggle with that choice every day. Every time one of my stupid changeable parts falls off, every time I look through that stupid box, and every time I look in a mirror. Actually, this morning was the first in a long time I didn’t-“ They paused for a moment, taking another shaky breath. “It’s the first morning in a while I wasn’t only thinking about how much I hate myself.”

At this admission, Gangle gave up. She looked Zooble right in the eyes. They weren’t crying, but they looked vulnerable. More than Gangle had ever seen them.

“I know it’s kind of an a%€hole move to spring something like this on you when you’re dealing with your own problems, and I’m sorry for that. But I’ve been avoiding telling you because I thought you would think less of me, and you already have this view in your head of me being some strong put together person, so I just needed to tell you so I could stop feeling like I’m lying to you.” Zooble rushed the words out of their mouth, looking extremely upset.

“Zooble.” Gangle’s voice sounded almost awestruck. “I don’t think less of you.” She blushed slightly but didn’t look away this time. “I don’t think I ever could think less of you. Actually, the fact that you’ve been dealing with all this and still always seeming so in control and standing up for me just makes you even more amazing in my eyes.”

She placed her ribbon on top of Zooble’s hand, twining it around when they didn’t protest.

The two just sat there, listening to each other’s breathing and holding onto each other.

After a while Zooble managed to say in a hoarse voice, “Thank you Gangle. I needed to let that out.”

“Of course, I kind of needed to listen. You really calmed me down.” Gangle admitted.

“Listen, I know that we can’t hide in here the whole adventure, and we’ll have to go out there eventually. So what do you think about when we get back to the circus, just talking about everything. I have some stuff I need to talk about, and I think you do too. If you don’t want to I would understand.” After this sentence, they rubbed one of their fingers along the ribbon wrapping around it, causing Gangle to blush again.

She was kind of a mess today, huh.

Definitely because of Zooble. Gangle wasn’t sure exactly when, but she had developed a massive crush on them. Probably not a good thing to realize when she was in a dark closet holding their hand. But she was also glad the closet was dark because her mask was probably bright red right now. Then she realized they were waiting for a response.

“Of course. That sounds nice.” Gangle said quickly. She had meant it though. She figured that talking about their problems outside the rush of an adventure was something they both needed.

“I’m ready if you want to go back now.” Zooble asked.

“Maybe just a bit more please?” Gangle asked.

“Of course.” Zooble said.

“Speaking of the adventure though, who’s taking care of the bar if we’re in here?” Gangle hadn’t thought about this at all, and she worried that if they left it unattended then Caine might punish them.

“Well funny story, I was planning on grabbing Ragatha and Pomni, but I couldn’t find them. So I had to ask Jax and Kinger.” Zooble chuckled.

“How did you convince Jax to work?” Gangle asked skeptically.

“The only way anyone convinces him to do anything. Threats.” Zooble said, with a slightly mischievous look in their eyes that Gangle wanted to see over and over again. “I told him I would tell Caine that he loves corn a lot and to leave some in his room.”

Gangle started laughing uncontrollably. The idea of Jax being the one in terror for once sounded absolutely priceless. Especially over something ridiculous as corn.

When she had finished laughing, she noticed Zooble staring at her, with an indecipherable look in their eyes.

Gangle felt herself blush involuntarily.

“What?” She said, almost embarrassed at the way they were staring.

“I didn’t know you could laugh without your happy mask.” Zooble said, still sort of staring.

“Neither did I.” Gangle was getting annoyed at their staring now. “I guess you’re just that funny.”

Her eyes widened in realization of what she had just said.

Why did she have to be so bad at this?

Zooble laughed too, but pulled their hand away so they could stand up. Gangle missed it as soon as it was gone.

“You ready?” They asked, offering their hand.

Gangle slipped their happy mask on again, and after letting out some of her emotions, she discovered that it felt more comfortable.

She took the hand Zooble had offered, thinking of the time in the castle. Except this time, they weren’t letting go just yet.

“Can I have a hug?” Gangle instantly felt so awkward for asking, but she just wanted to be close to them.

“Yeah.” They said, leaning forward and hugging her.

Gangle curled her ribbons around their torso, startling them slightly at first, but they soon leaned into it.

The two stayed there for a bit, enjoying the comfort of each other’s presences.

After a while, Gangle muttered “I think I’m ready now.”

“Alright.” Zooble said in a quiet tone.

The two pulled apart and walked out of the supply closet.

As they walked back to the bar they were greeted by a truly chaotic sight.

A line of customers was standing at the bar, some yelling, and some entirely calm. Kinger was standing behind the counter staring into the distance at nothing and Jax was just sitting on the counter drinking from a bottle of whiskey.

Gangle knew something was wrong with him, she hadn’t seen him look so out of it in a long while. He grinned when he saw them, dropping down from the counter.

“Well, well, well. If it isn’t the two lovebirds. What were you two doing in that dark closet by yourselves huh? Maybe-“

“Jax! Can you help me with this?” Kinger cut off Jax, holding his hand out.

In his hand was a pomegranate cut in half. Zooble had no clue where he had gotten it from, but it caused Jax to jump back in fear, a little slower than he normally would.

“Screw you Kinger. I’m leaving.” He promptly hopped over the counter and wandered into the party, whiskey bottle still in his hand.

“He’s definitely drunk.” Said Zooble.

“Yeah I think so.” Gangle chuckled a bit. “It would be funnier if he hadn’t left such a mess.”

“Well we can deal with this, then we should see if we can drag Ragatha and Pomni over here to help us out.” Zooble said. “Mind helping me fix this up?”

“Of course Zooble.” Gangle smiled at them, and from the look they gave back, Gangle could tell they were smiling too.

Chapter Text

Pomni was standing and watching Ragatha again.

After Ragatha pulled Pomni into the party with her, Pomni had been struggling to keep up with her. Ragatha moved through the party gracefully, making conversation like she already knew everyone. Meanwhile Pomni stumbled after her, barely talking with anyone.

After a while she gave up and just started to do her own thing and let Ragatha do hers.

The party was in full swing now, evident by the increase in guests. There was also music playing from an orchestra of mannequin npcs that appeared seemingly out of nowhere.

Then Ragatha walked up to her, accompanied by the princess Pomni remembered from the candy adventure.

“Hey Pomni!” Ragatha called out grinning. “Loolilalu, I would like you to meet Pomni! She’s a friend of mine.”

“Pleased to meet you! I am Princess Loolilalu of the Candy Kingdom. And you are?”

Pomni had to remind herself that the npcs didn’t already remember her before she said “Hello, my name’s Pomni. It’s nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too sweetheart.” Loolilalu winked at Pomni, making her blush a little.

Pomni recalled something from the Candy Kingdom adventure, Ragatha saying ‘look Pomni, we’re already friends with the princess!’

Pomni wasn’t sure what to say to the princess in reply. Was Loolilalu flirting with her or was that how she was with everyone? But thankfully Ragatha made the choice for her.

“I’ll have to introduce you to our other friends soon, I think they would like you.” She said, evidently trying to break the awkward silence. “They’re working behind the bar.”

“Sounds wonderful! I could use a drink.” Loolilalu smiled, but then cocked her head as if listening to something. “I do love this song. Would you like to dance with me before we get something to drink?”

“Sounds great!” Ragatha said excitedly.

Loolilalu then pulled her closer to the stage and Pomni lost sight of them. When she was able to see them again, she saw the two holding hands and dancing together. Was Ragatha blushing?

Pomni could see a reddish tint on the dolls face from here that definitely wasn’t present before she was dancing.

Pomni literally didn’t know how to comprehend this. She knew Ragatha was super friendly to everybody, even the npcs, so why did this seem different? Was Pomni just going crazy or acting jealous? Why was she jealous? Did this mean Ragatha was into women?

She needed to take a break, she already felt like she was about to either keel over or cry. All these people and all the loud music were only stressing her out further. She noticed a bathroom at the far side of the room and decided to retreat there.

Pomni walked through the bathroom door and locked it behind her, standing in front of the sink and staring at her reflection. She just needed to breathe and relax.

It was tough though, she was really not good in social situations and she was already stressed enough about Ragatha. She absolutely had a crush on her based on how she had been feeling around her. But the sight of her, dancing with someone else, made her feel jealous, but also miserable. Did Ragatha want to spend time with everyone else because Pomni was boring?

She stood there, trying to calm herself down so she could go back before anyone knew anything was wrong.

Then she heard a knock on the door.

“Hello is- is someone on here?” It was Ragatha, and she sounded kind of upset.

Pomni took a deep breath and opened the door.

“Ragatha?” Pomni asked, looking up at her.

Ragatha’s face changed in an instant, and she gave Pomni a weak smile.

“Hey Pomni! Just gotta use the restroom.” Ragatha was obviously lying.

“Ragatha what’s actually wrong?” Pomni asked, giving her best attempt at a stern look.

“Nothing I- it’s ok, I promise!” Ragatha smiled, but her eyes kept darting away from Pomni’s.

Pomni sighed. She had had enough of Ragatha’s lies and she didn’t want to keep playing this back and forth game with her. She grabbed Ragatha’s hand and pulled her into the bathroom, closing the door behind her.

“Pomni!” Ragatha shouted at the sudden motion.

“Listen Ragatha.” Pomni stood in front of the door, crossing her arms. “I don’t know why you keep lying to me, but I want you to stop. I can tell something is wrong with you and I wish you would stop hiding it. After all the s&£# we went through together yesterday, I would have thought that we were close enough for you to finally share things with me, but you’re clearly still trying to hide things from me even though I can tell you’re upset.”

Ragatha just stood there, staring at Pomni. She opened her mouth as if trying to speak but closed it again.

Ragatha took a deep breath and seemed to find her words.

“I was just upset because I was having fun with Loolilalu but I saw you run off and I got worried, but she got upset at me for being so focused on you.” A tear fell out of Ragatha’s eye. “And you’ve been being weird around me the whole adventure and I’m just worried I did something wrong.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong Ragatha, I just-“ Pomni had to try and find her words now too. “Earlier when you asked me what was going on I told you about the thing with Gummigoo, but that wasn’t the only thing. I’m really bad at parties to be honest. They give me a lot of anxiety because I get so nervous about interacting with everyone and I don’t even know why. It’s just so hard to talk to people, I mean you saw how I was with Loolilalu.”

“What do you mean?” Ragatha asked.

“What do I mean? I was being super weird and awkward.” Pomni said, thinking Ragatha must be lying to avoid upsetting her.

“I don’t think so? All you did was say hello.” Ragatha said with a light smile. “Maybe you’re just underestimating yourself. You probably just think you’re doing bad or saying the wrong thing, and that causes you to feel awkward.”

“I did kind of feel like a mess when she called me sweetheart.” Pomni admitted in embarrassment. “At least you handled that stuff well.”

Pomni was reaching out now, trying to get Ragatha to talk about what happened with Loolilalu. And maybe figure out if Pomni was right about the flirting.

“What do you mean?” Ragatha asked confused.

“Well she was kind of flirting with you wasn’t she?” Pomni asked, suddenly unsure of herself.

“What? She w- Oh.” Ragatha hit herself gently in the face with her palm, groaning in frustration. “I’m so stupid, of course she was. That makes sense why she asked me to dance and why she was all jealous about you. Gosh I can be pretty stupid sometimes huh?”

“You’re not. We should get back to the point though. I’m not mad at you I just suck with parties, and I want to make sure you told me everything that was wrong.” Pomni looked Ragatha dead in the eye. “Please don’t lie to me.”

“Well, there is one more thing. You said you suck at parties, well I kind of do too. I’ve gotten good at acting normally on the outside, but a lot of the time I’m freaked out on the inside. I’m always scared that I’m saying or doing the wrong thing, but it’s even more amplified when I’m at parties. I seem more comfortable at parties because it’s just instilled in my brain that I should be.” Ragatha looked back at Pomni. “Today was better because I had you with me, but then you started acting weird and it made things worse.

“Sorry.” Pomni said. “I didn’t mean to make you more upset.”

“No it’s okay, it’s also my fault for not telling you what was going on.” Ragatha smiled. “I guess I need to get better at that huh?”

“Clearly we both have some work to do in that area.” Pomni admitted, smiling back. “Just promise me something. Promise me you’ll try to share more with me and I’ll do the same.”

“Of course Pomni.” Ragatha said, her smile grew, making Pomni’s chest flutter. “I promise.”

“I don’t really want to go back.” Pomni admitted rubbing her arm self consciously.

“Well we don’t have to, but I promise I’ll stay around you this time if that would help. I have an idea, actually, would you want to dance with me?” Ragatha asked.

Pomni was absolutely shocked.

“W-well that sounds really nice but I don’t know if I would be any good.” Pomni said, looking at Ragatha.

“I can show you how if you want.” Ragatha said.

“Sure.” Pomni looked at the ground, blushing as she reached out her hand.

They walked out of the room together, hand in hand as they had earlier. Except this time, Ragatha didn’t let go and leave Pomni alone.

A song was just beginning to play as they both walked onto the dance floor. It was quick and lively and the other members of the party were just beginning to dance as well.

Ragatha kept her grip on Pomni’s hand, while her other hand settled itself on Pomni’s hip.

“Just follow my lead.” Ragatha looked right into Pomni’s eyes, and every place where her hands touched Pomni felt like they were burning.

Just as they began to move, there was a loud shout from inside the crowd.

Pomni and Ragatha pulled apart to see what had happened. They ran over to the crowd of npcs surrounding whatever was happening and pushed through it. They saw Disappearing Guy, lying on the ground with a pool of blood spreading out around him. Ming was kneeled down next to him, a look of concern on his ridiculous face. Pomni felt Ragatha squeeze her hand slightly.

“Help! I’ve been sta-“ Disappearing Guy and the pool of blood disappeared, causing Ming to break down into tears.

“Look! It was them! By the stage!” A voice shouted from the crowd.

Chapter Text

Zooble watched as Gangle walked through the crowd. They didn’t want to leave Gangle to fend for herself but they knew they couldn’t leave the bar unattended again. So Gangle was going to look for Pomni and Ragatha so they could take a turn working.

Then they heard a commotion from on the opposite side of the room. They cursed to themselves.

Of course as soon as they had to stay put while Gangle was out there, something happens.

Zooble saw that the bar wasn’t busy and most of the npcs were distracted with whatever was going on.

“Kinger!” Zooble shouted, hopping over the counter. “Keep an eye on the bar I’ll be right back!”

“Okay!” Kinger said. “Wait what?”

Zooble ignored him as they walked quickly through the crowd, attempting to figure out what was going on.

For only a glimpse they were able to see Ragatha and Pomni standing in the crowd. They went to made their way over to them but something caught their attention.

The unfortunately similar sound of delicate porcelain shattering against the ground.

Zooble turned around attempting to figure out where the sound had come from.

Their heart sunk as they saw Gangle leaning over the shattered white pieces that were her comedy mask.

“Gangle!” They called out, speeding over. They looked over to see a yellow npc in a black suit and cowboy hat running away. “Hey you!” Zooble shouted, ready to chew out the idiot.

Instead of stopping, they ran even quicker, struggling to move through the crowd.

Zooble realized that the npc, whoever they were, wasn’t the priority right now. They reached down to help Gangle up from the ground.

“Thank you Zooble.” Gangle sniffled.

“No problem.” They said. “I’m sorry your mask broke.”

“It’s okay, I knew it would happen eventually.” Gangle sniffled.

Before Zooble could respond to the slightly concerning comment, they heard someone running up by them. It was Pomni and Ragatha.

“Oh no! What happened Gangle?
Ragatha asked.

“Some jerk ran through the crowd and pushed her over.” Zooble said.

“Where did they go?” Pomni asked. “Somebody just stabbed Disappearing Guy so if someone was running away from the scene of the crime it could have been them!”

“He went this way.” Zooble ran off into the crowd in the direction the npc had gone. They didn’t need an excuse to chase after that asshole after they broke Gangles comedy mask. It made them more angry than it did now than when Jax had done it hundreds of times before. They had developed a strangely protective nature towards her recently, likely due to how close they had been getting.

“Zooble, slow down I’m going to help!” Pomni shouted from behind them.

Zooble ignored her, because if she wanted to come with, then she could figure out how to keep up.

They finally broke through the crowd and got a glimpse of the npc before they slipped out a back door.

“There they are!” Zooble shouted at Pomni.

“Where?” Pomni said. “I don’t see them.”

“Out this door.” Zooble said, showing Pomni as she finally caught up with them.

Zooble opened the door and rushed out, Pomni close behind them.

Outside the door was a shady area with a few dumpsters and an even shadier alleyway connecting to it. But there was no sign of the mysterious npc.

“Where did they go?” Pomni wondered before gasping.

Zooble turned around to see what the problem was, only to see Pomni standing dead still. A yellow gummy crocodile in a black suit and cowboy hat was holding a knife to her throat.

Chapter Text

“Don’t move another step, or the girl gets it.” A familiar voice with a gruff Australian accent threatened right behind her.

“G-Gummigoo?” Pomni asked in a shaky voice.

“Keep your trap shut miss. Unless you feel like explaining how exactly you know my name?” He said down to Pomni, and she could feel him digging the blade slightly further into her neck, not enough to injure her, but enough for her to feel the sharp steel pressing into her neck.

“Hey-“ Zooble began to say something in protest but was cut off by someone.

“Boss!” A voice called out from the alley, it was Gummigoo’s friend from the Candy kingdom, the purple one with the short arms.

“We threw the rest of the party goers off our tails!” Another one of Gummigoo’s friends stepped out next to the other one, this one colored orange with longer arms.

“Oh, I see you got a little friend there, boss! Whatcha gonna do with ‘er?” The purple one asked.

“Well her and her friend over there were chasing me, and the others we were looking at are their buddies.” Gummigoo said. “I say we take ‘em, try and lure in their buddies before killing ‘em.”

“Good plan boss!” The orange one said.

Gummigoo made a movement behind her and Pomni flinched. He tossed a rope to the orange one who began to move towards Zooble.

“Listen I don’t know what the f&¥# you three are trying to do but me and her aren’t a part of it so back off and let her go.” Zooble said glaring at the crocodiles that were closing in on them.

“Hate to break it to you mate, but I’m the one in control here.” Gummigoo said from behind her. “You’re gonna listen up or she gets hurt.”

“Fine.” Zooble snapped. But Pomni noticed they were shaking as the crocodiles approached them.

Gummigoo moved again, and Pomni felt the knife taken off her throat. Then something hit her on the back of her head extremely hard, causing her to black out.

When she woke up, the first thing she noticed was that she had a pounding headache. Then she noticed her arms and legs were tied to a chair, leaving her immobile.

“Hey.” Zooble said. Based on where their voice was coming from they were right behind her. Pomni craned her neck to look, and she could barely see they were similarly tied up behind her. “Are you okay?”

“Ugh, yeah, just a horrible headache.” Pomni said.

“Yeah getting hit in the head does that.” Zooble said grumpily. “I don’t mean to be rude to you I’m just p&@%ed that we got kidnapped.”

Pomni wanted to agree, but the words left her mouth.

Gummigoo had kidnapped them.

Gummigoo had held a knife to her throat and threatened to kill her.

Gummigoo had killed somebody.

She almost wanted to cry, because it felt so horrible to see someone who had been so sweet and kind to her, even when he didn’t remember her, suddenly turn so cruel.

She felt a tear fall down from her face and she sniffled.

“Are you sure you’re good Pomni?” Zooble asked.

“Kinda.” Pomni admitted.

Pomni usually never heard them sound so concerned, but then again she hadn’t talked to them much since getting stuck here. They didn’t really reach out, and Pomni almost wished she could talk to them more because they seemed pretty laid back and relaxed at times, definitely a welcome change of pace from the rest of the circus.

“I just- you don’t know who Gummigoo is do you?” Pomni asked.

“Nope.” Zooble said. “I think I heard someone mention that name before though.”

“Well, he was an npc I met during my second adventure. He figured out he was an npc and not real and kind of had an existential crisis about that. So I helped him figure things out and we were kind of friends, so I took him back to the circus with us. Then Caine exploded him into confetti in front of me.” Pomni paused, shifting in the chair. “He was so nice and sweet, even when I saw him in a different adventure and he didn’t remember me. Well he was the guy who was holding a knife to my throat.”

“That sucks.” Zooble said, summarizing everything perfectly.

“Yeah. And I know he’s just an npc but it still kinda hurts.” Pomni said, sniffling again.

“It’s a pretty f&%¥ed up reminder of how much Caine controls everything huh?” Zooble said.

“I guess.” Pomni said.

An awkward silence lingered between them for a moment.

“Is that why you ran after me? Because you knew that he was the one I was chasing?” Zooble asked.

Pomni didn’t want to talk about it but at the same time she wanted to rant about it before it burst out of her chest forcefully.

“I was actually trying to find some excuse to get away from Ragatha.” Pomni said quietly.

“Why?” Zooble asked.

It felt odd to talk to someone that she didn’t know very well at all about something as sensitive as this, but part of her trusted Zooble, and she knew that if she wanted to reach out, this would be the best opportunity. Which was a bit depressing considering they were tied up god knows where.

“Can I tell you something super sensitive and important you can’t tell anyone.” Pomni asked.

“Do you have a crush on Ragatha?” Zooble asked.

“How did you know!” Pomni sputtered. “Was it that obvious?”

She was absolutely mortified. If Zooble could figure it out when barely talking to her, then Ragatha definitely could.

“Don’t worry it’s not obvious, it took some serious theorizing between me and Gangle to figure it out. But you always seem less stressed around her and Gangle mentioned to me that you were being pretty awkward around her today.”

“Well, that definitely took something off my chest.” Pomni said.

“So you were trying to get away from her because you were nervous?” Zooble asked.

“You could say that.” Pomni paused, not sure if she wanted to elaborate. She decided she was already in deep enough anyway. “We were about to dance. Then Disappearing Guy got killed and I didn’t want to have to face her after everything so I just took the first chance to run.”

“Man, Gangle would love this, she’s such a romantic.” At Pomni’s squeak they added, “I won’t tell her I promise, I just thought she would find it interesting.”

“I’m sorry for throwing all this on you, especially since we barely know each other.” Pomni said apologetically.

“Eh, it’s fine. I bet you just wanted to get it off your chest, and I get that, even if this is a rather inopportune time.” Zooble said.

“Well thank you.”

“No problem.”

She really appreciated that Zooble could be so understanding. Pomni knew they could be a bit abrasive at times but she was glad to see this side of them.

“I got an idea to get out of here before those bozos get back.” Zooble said

Chapter Text

Ragatha was extremely worried.

After Zooble and Pomni had run off, her and Gangle had gone back to the bar, with Gangle doing her best to show Ragatha what to do.

But after a while she was struggling to focus on what she was doing, instead too worried about what had happened to Pomni and Zooble.

“Ragatha?” Gangle asked gently at her side.

Ragatha snapped back to reality.

“Gangle! What do you need?”

“Ragatha, I just want to know if something’s wrong. You seem a bit distracted.” Gangle said.

“I’m alright!” Ragatha paused, not sure if providing her concerns would be helpful or not. She remembered what Pomni had said earlier about sharing more of what she was actually thinking. “Well, I was actually worried about Pomni and Zooble.”

“Oh, that makes sense. They have been gone for a while.” Gangle paused for a moment. “How about you go look for them while me and Kinger handle the bar?”

“Are you sure? I’d hate to leave you two all alone here.” Ragatha wanted to look for the two but she also didn’t want to leave Gangle to manage the bar and Kinger.

“I’ll be fine I guess, I just think looking for them is more important.” Gangle said.

“Well I’ll go and look for a bit and if I can’t find them I’ll come back and we’ll figure out what to do next.” Ragatha replied.

She walked out from behind the bar and towards the crowd.

“Good luck Ragatha.” Gangle called out after her.

Ragatha turned and gave a smile and wave before focusing on the crowd. She wasn’t sure exactly where the two had gone, but she hoped looking through the crowd could help. Maybe she would spot them or she could ask someone? If she was being honest with herself, she was looking more to make herself feel less anxious. Because in reality she had zero clue where those two had gone, she had only seen them vanish into the crowd. But she was still worried, because if that was the killer they ran after, then they could end up in danger.

Another reason she had gone off to look for Pomni and Zooble was to try and take her mind off of her endless worries about why Pomni had run off like that.

Ragatha kept trying to remind herself not to overthink but it was not an easy task. So she needed a distraction.

She continued scanning the party trying to see if she could find any sign of Pomni or Zooble, but she had no luck.

Then she spotted some movement on a balcony behind the stage. She went over to look and saw Jax leaned against the railing, shouting at someone.

Ragatha groaned inwardly but she knew that she should go talk to him and see if he knew where Pomni and Zooble went.

She went up the stairs to the balcony and approached Jax.

“Listen I dunno wha you’re tryin’ to pull here.” Jax was slurring his words, acting erratically, and holding a bottle of whiskey that was half full. He was obviously drunk. This would make him even more impossible.

“Sorry mate!” The npc Jax was yelling at took a look at Ragatha and hurried away. But Ragatha noted with surprise that he was one of the gummy bandits that was friends with Gummigoo. Part of her wanted to run after him and ask him about Gummigoo for Pomni, but she knew Jax would likely know more about where Pomni was than some random npc.

“Jax?” Ragatha said, cautiously approaching him.

“Oh great, you’re here!” Jax shouted. “Here to judge me or somethin’?”

“No Jax, I’m trying to figure out where Pomni and Zooble went, and I wanted to see if you knew.”

“Ha!” Jax shouted. “You can’t find your lil-“

“Just a yes or no would do Jax.” Ragatha said in as sweet as she could manage.

“No.” Jax said. “But that npc said something about ‘em.”

“What?” Ragatha asked. “What did he say!”

“Thought you wanted a yes or no answer raggy?” Jax smirked.

“Jax please, I want to make sure they’re safe.” Ragatha asked frustratedly.

“Fine.” Jax grumbled. “He said he had some big important message for me an’ all my friends. He said we had to be out in the back of the building in fifteen minutes or the jester an’ toy box character get it. So I told him to shut up because you guys are not my friends and he doesn’t get to tell me what to do.”

Ragatha groaned. God Jax could be so stupid sometimes.

But outside of the mild irritation she felt only fear. Likely Pomni and Zooble had somehow gotten taken and their kidnappers wanted something. She only hoped they could save Pomni and Zooble before they got hurt.

“Come on Jax.” Ragatha said, grabbing his arm and dragging him along.

“Hey! What are you doin’?” He shouted in protest but didn’t make any moves to escape, instead taking another drink from the bottle.

“We have to go save Pomni and Zooble.” Ragatha said.

“Jeez, okay bossy.” He went limp and let Ragatha continue to drag him along.

Ragatha’s intention was to get to the bar and take Gangle and Kinger out to the back where the kidnappers wanted them. But as they approached it, Gangle and Kinger were already running to meet them.

“Ragatha!” Gangle called out, tears running down her mask. “We- we got a message, about Pomni and- and Zooble!”

“We got the message too Gangle. According to Jax the kidnapper wants us out behind the building.” Ragatha said. She was terrified for Pomni and Zooble’s safety but she had to stay strong for everyone. “Let’s go.”

She walked quickly towards a door at the back, and the others followed behind her, Jax still being dragged limply.

“This is so h-horrible.” Gangle sobbed. “I hope they’re both okay.”

“Me too Gangle.” Ragatha said, approaching the back door.

Chapter Text

Ragatha swung open the back door and quickly stepped outside, unsure of what she would see.

What she saw was nothing, nobody. Just a dark cloudy sky and a dimly lit alley.

“They aren’t here.” Gangle said miserably.

The door swung shut, and the small bang caused Kinger to yelp.

“What are we doin’ out here.” Jax groaned.

He shouted indignantly as Ragatha let go of him, causing his limp body to fall to the ground.

“I don’t get it. I thought they wanted us out here.“ Ragatha felt fear closing in on her. She was scared, because what if she messed up, heard the message wrong? And what if Pomni was in danger now because of her mistakes? “Did I mess up?” Ragatha felt herself involuntarily mumble out loud to herself.

“Hands behind your heads and stay still, unless you want your friends to die.” A voice called out from the alley.

Gangle squeaked in terror.

When Ragatha saw who was in the dark alley, she almost did the same. It was Gummigoo, the npc that Pomni had wanted to find. Another similar gummy crocodile she recognized from the candy kingdom adventure was behind him. But what really scared her was the fact that in front of him were Zooble and Pomni, both tied up.

They were both beat up too, Zooble had a bruise on their face and was missing both their arms. Pomni had several bruises and a cut on her arm dripping blood onto the pavement slowly.

Ragatha instantly complied and put her hands behind her head.

“Guys just listen to them.” Ragatha called out, her voice trembling slightly.

She turned slightly to see everyone listening, even Jax, although he was still holding the bottle of whiskey.

“Jax.” She reminded him, but clearly even he understood the severity of the situation because he complied and dropped the bottle after only a moment of groaning.

“Now stay there for a bit, ‘cause we’re still waitin’ on someone.” Gummigoo said, emerging further from the alley.

“Hey guys.” Pomni called out shakily.

“Quiet.” Gummigoo snapped at Pomni.

Ragatha didn’t respond, not wanting to further anger the kidnappers. But she looked into Pomni’s eyes, seeing nothing but fear and sadness.

“Good job you three.” A voice called out.

Ragatha turned to see who was speaking.

Two familiar npcs walked towards them, one blue with a baseball cap and large eyes, and one red with a cowboy hat, both wearing simple black tuxedos.

“Disappearing Guy?” Ragatha asked in confusion. “I thought you were murdered?”

“Well that would make sense, considering we wanted you all to think that.” Disappearing Guy said.

“You see, we here wanted a distraction to make everything a little easier.” Ming stood close to Disappearing Guy, a villainous glint in his large goofy eyes. “So we had the bright idea to use my darling’s unique talent to set up a fake murder, allowing our gummy associates to go after the real targets.”

“But why?” Ragatha asked.

“Darling?” Gangle squeaked.

“Where did my hands go!” Kinger yelled.

“Why?” Disappearing Guy stepped closer to Ragatha. “I wanted to kill almost everyone at this stupid party because I am so unbelievably sick of-“

He disappeared suddenly, cutting himself off.

“There he goes. We’re still figuring out the disappearing thing.” Ming let out a sigh. “What he was trying to say is he is sick of always feeling the need to disappear around those people, and I personally am sick of all these cursed assumptions being made. It ruins my reputation. And our gummy friends here also have a distaste for the various party goers. What did you call them again?”

“Greedy f$&%ers.” Gummigoo snarled.

“But why go after us? We didn’t do anything like that to you guys.” Pomni said from behind Gummigoo, prompting him to glare at her.

“Other than the fact you almost figured us out? We wanted you out of the way so we could use the bar to poison everyone.” Gummigoo said.

“Correct.” Ming said. “And the fact that you assumed my partner was dead.”

As if on cue, Disappearing Guy walked through the door.

“Welcome back my dear, where did you end up this time?” Ming asked.

“The balcony.” Disappearing Guy said grumpily, returning next to Ming.

“Wait I thought you actually disappeared, how did you come back?” Pomni asked.

“It’s more of a teleportation thing actually.” Disappearing Guy said. “We’ve been-“

“Okay I’m getting bored of this monologue s£%&. So let us go already before we kick your a&¥es.” Zooble had a threatening edge behind their words but Ragatha felt a sliver of doubt in how threatening they actually were, considering the fact that they were currently missing half their limbs, were tied up, and a person with a knife was standing behind them.

“Ha!” Gummigoo gave a cruel laugh. “And what are you gonna do huh?”

Ragatha took notice of some movement behind him. It was the orange gummy, who seemed to be struggling with something. Gummigoo had not yet noticed yet, and neither had the other npcs.

The orange crocodile was struggling with Zooble’s limbs. One arm was attempting to latch around the gummy crocodiles neck, while the other tried to escape out of his arms.

“So- uh, what do you want from us, then?” Ragatha asked, trying to keep the attention off of whatever Zooble was trying to do.

“What do you think?” Gummigoo asked with a cruel glare. He raised his knife, stepping towards Pomni.

Then several things happened at once. The orange crocodile fell to the ground, Zooble’s arm choking him. Gummigoo turned around to see what had happened. And Zooble’s other arm crawled up from the ground and onto Gummigoo, causing him to jump away and begin fighting with it.

Taking advantage of the distraction, Ragatha ran forward and helped up Pomni and Zooble.

Zooble’s face was list in concentration as their arm attempted to rip the knife from Gummigoo’s hand.

“Gangle help me!” Ragatha shouted, calling her over to help untie Zooble while Ragatha helped Pomni.

“Stop them!” Disappearing Guy called to the other crocodile. He charged towards them.

As he was beginning to close in, Ragatha and Gangle managed to untie Pomni and Zooble.

They all faced towards the gummy, ready to put up a fight.

“He can’t really win against all six of us!” Ragatha said, trying to give everyone hope.

Then he pulled out a knife, and that hope was replaced with light fear. Ragatha still tried to put herself in front of everyone, just hoping that if he did reach them, she could protect the others and maybe it wouldn’t hurt too bad.

Time seemed to slow down as he approached her, knife ready. Then something sailed past Ragatha, crashing into his face.

As soon as it hit him, he crumpled to the ground. Ragatha used this opportunity to take the knife from his hands. She looked to see what had hit him, and it was a whiskey bottle, now shattered.

Jax began cackling and she turned to look at him in astonishment.

“Ha!” He gave her a drunken grin. “That was perfect, the look on his face!” He then began to fall face forward towards the ground. Kinger tried his best to catch him, but his lack of arms just caused Jax to fall through his grip and onto the ground.

Then a clatter caught Ragatha’s attention, and she saw that Zooble’s arm had knocked the knife from Gummigoo’s hand.

“Let’s go!” Zooble shouted, running to the door. They opened it and ran inside with Gangle.

The rest began to follow suit but then a shot ran out through the courtyard.

Ragatha flinched, because the shot had flown right past her face and into the wall.

“Stay where you are.” Ming said. Him and Disappearing Guy were both pointing guns at them.

“You’re going to listen this time.” Disappearing Guy said.

“I’m sick of this.” Gummigoo called out. “You two had guns the whole time and didn’t tell us, and for some reason these idiots are still standing there instead of dead on the ground like they’re supposed to be!”

“Gummigoo we-“ Disappearing Guy started.

“No.” Gummigoo kicked Zooble’s arm away, picked up the knife from the ground, and walked over to the two npcs. “It’s time to do this my way. So you’re gonna give me those guns, or I’ll have to take them from you.”

“And just what are you going to do?” Ming asked.

Then an object flew through the air and promptly impaled itself through his head. It was the knife that Gummigoo had just picked up.

Ming immediately fell to the ground, blood pooling underneath him.

Ragatha chose this moment to whisper to the others. “Quickly and quietly let’s go through the door and run.”

She watched out of the corner of her eye as Pomni slowly opened the door, gesturing the others to go through.

Ragatha flinched as Disappearing Guy yelled in outrage, before being charged by Gummigoo.

Shots rang out but Ragatha didn’t stay to see if they hit anything

Ragatha went through right after Jax, whom Pomni was struggling to drag along. Just as they went through the doorway, Jax stirred to consciousness.

“Bye bye losers!” He shouted out of the door.

Ragatha caught a glimpse of Gummigoo staring directly at her in surprise and anger, before she slammed the door shut.

“We have to find somewhere to hide.” Ragatha said.

“I know a spot, come on.” Zooble called out.

They all followed Zooble who was leading them to a door tucked behind the bar.

They all went into the small room that was a supply closet of sorts and closed the door behind them.

Ragatha stared at the rest of the cast, unsure what to say.

“Thank you for saving us.” Pomni said. She walked over to Ragatha, giving her a gentle smile.

Ragatha’s heart did a few flips. Just from adrenaline, she told herself as she looked at Pomni’s sweet expression.

“Of course Pomni. Wish we could have gotten you guys out of there before you got so beat up though.” Ragatha gently grabbed Pomni’s arm to take a look at the cut on it.

Pomni jerked away suddenly.

“S-sorry I just- it hurts a little.” Pomni mumbled, turning her head towards the ground.

“Yeah we got beat up while trying to escape from those idiots.” Zooble grumbled. “I think we can all agree that all that monologue villain s@€% was ridiculous.”

“Yeah it was pretty corny.” Gangle said miserably. “I can’t believe Caine made Disappearing Guy and those other npcs all murderous and evil though.”

Ragatha looked over at Pomni, who currently was staring into the floor. She realized that Pomni was likely upset about what happened with Gummigoo.

“Are you okay Pomni?” Ragatha asked. “I know seeing Gummigoo like that probably wasn’t great.”

“Yeah, I’ve figured it out.” Pomni said. “I actually talked with Zooble about it and they helped me.”

“That’s nice.” Ragatha said.

But she wondered how Zooble had helped out Pomni. Not that she doubted them, she just never took them for the comforting type. But then she considered that maybe they weren’t, and the reason Pomni ran after them so quickly earlier was because that’s what she needed. Someone that was very different from Ragatha.

But she knew standing around and moping wouldn’t do any good.

“Okay, we need to figure out how to stop the killers so that we can finish the adventure.” Ragatha said to the others. “Any ideas?”

Kinger began rambling about an insect collection as Pomni attempted to remind him what they were doing.

But instead of listening or coming up with an idea of her own, she noticed something. Zooble visibly flinched in the corner. Gangle noticed as well and moved closer to them, muttering to them quietly enough that Ragatha couldn’t hear.

Gangle wrapped one of her ribbons around Zooble’s waist in a hug like gesture that Ragatha found quite sweet.

But she pulled away from staring, not wanting to make them uncomfortable.

That was until she heard a gentle cry from Zooble and Gangles direction. Zooble was standing completely still, a slightly afraid look in their eyes.

Ragatha decided to go over and check on them.

“Zooble? Are you alright?” Ragatha asked.

“Yeah- Yeah I’m fine.” Zooble said gruffly.

“Zooble you need to tell someone. Someone who can help you.” Gangle said quietly next to them.

“Ugh fine!” Zooble groaned before flinching again, letting out a small yelp. “You know how I was able to control and feel my arms back there even though they weren’t attached? Well since I left them back there with those psychopaths, they likely figured out I can feel them when they’re not attached and is currently doing something to it to make it hurt very bad.”

Ragatha stood there, wanting to offer a solution, but the only thing that came out of her mouth was;

“Can you feel all of your limbs even when they’re not attached?” Ragatha instantly regretted saying something so off-topic and insensitive.

“No, after a while the connection fades, and I can only control one pair at a time if it’s not attached.” Zooble said, slightly amused at her sudden question.

But then they flinched and grimaced again.

“M-maybe just sit down.” Gangle offered.

Zooble agreed with a nod, sinking to the floor.

“Well I promise you that I will go and find your arms and bring them back.” Ragatha said, hoping to make them feel better.

“No. It’s to risky, they’re likely only messing with them because they know I can feel it, and they just want to bait us. Zooble said. “I’ll just wait it out until I can’t feel the arms anymore, or until they stop. It’s fine.”

Ragatha didn’t want to leave Zooble to suffer, but she also didn’t want to upset them by going to find their arms despite their wishes.

“Guys?” Pomni called out from by the door, looking through the small window inside it. “The other gummy npcs are at the bar right now, but I don’t see Gummigoo.”

“They said earlier they were planning on poisoning the drinks.” Ragatha said. “We have to stop them.”

“But how?” Gangle said miserably.

“Well Gummigoo is the most dangerous, and if he isn’t there then we should be able to sneak up on them while they’re distracted. We could probably capture them and take them back here until we figure out what to do with them.” Pomni suggested.

“Good plan Pomni!” Ragatha said. “I’ll go out there, but I might need some help, so who wants to go with?”

“I can come with, it was my idea.” Pomni said.

“Gangle how about you go with and I can watch over Zooble and Jax.” Kinger offered.

Ragatha smiled at Kinger, appreciating his occasional moments of wisdom. She knew that he unfortunately wouldn’t be of much help trying to follow a plan, and Jax and Zooble were both currently incapacitated, so she knew she could appreciate Gangle’s help.

“That sounds great Kinger!” Ragatha realized that Gangle might not want to come with, she knew that Gangle could be unsure of herself at times. “Though, only if you want to come with Gangle.”

“Yeah that sounds fine.” Gangle said, walking over to her and Pomni.

Ragatha looked through the small window inside the door, looking at the bar. Both of the gummy npcs were turned away from them, looking at the customers they were beginning to serve drinks to.

“We have to go now before they give out the poisoned drinks.” Ragatha said, opening the door.

They all quietly went over to the bar, but as they crept up behind the two npcs, Ragatha had a moment to think about how this was probably a bad idea, trying to take out those two if they didn’t know where Gummigoo was. But they didn’t have many other options, so she kept going.

Ragatha went behind the orange npc, and Gangle and Pomni went behind the purple one. Ragatha took a deep breath before nodding to Gangle and Pomni.

She launched herself at the npc, wrapping her arms around his waist and throwing to the ground as hard as she could. He started to shout something, but she grabbed his long arms and dragged him over to the closet.

Ragatha looked over at Pomni and Gangle’s progress, and saw that Gangle and Pomni were shoving him towards the door, with Gangle’s ribbons latching onto him like rope, stopping him from fighting back too much.

Ragatha realized she needed to do something about the poisoned drinks.

“Don’t drink anything they just served! It’s dangerous!” Ragatha shouted, before pulling the npc into the closet. He was fighting back, squirming and kicking.

“Here you three!” Kinger shouted right next to her, surprising her. He took a length of rope and tied up the two npcs, so they were immobile. Where did he even find that? Ragatha wondered to herself.

Ragatha stepped back, preparing to ask them about Gummigoo, but then they just disappeared, with a small fanfare playing.

A small picture of Caine appeared, shouting;

“Congratulations! You have captured two of the five killers! Only one killer remains!” Then he disappeared.

“Huh.” Pomni said, slightly out of breath from fighting with the npc. “Didn’t actually believe that would work.”

“Good job you two!” Ragatha said, trying to lift everyone’s spirits, knowing that fighting the remaining killer would not be an easy task.

But she was distracted by Zooble yelping slightly in the corner.

Gangle immediately ran over, and Ragatha followed, just hovering behind her.

“They keep f&€£ing messing with it.” Zooble said in a strained voice.

“We have to go find them now.” Gangle was crying, her tragedy mask dropping tears onto the ground.

“I agree.” Ragatha said. “I know it will be dangerous, so I can go by myself.”

“Absolutely not.” Pomni said. “You can’t take on a killer completely alone.”

Ragatha knew that Pomni was right, but she didn’t want to put anyone else in danger.

“Pomni I-“

“No, I’m not taking no for an answer.” Pomni said, glaring up at her.

Ragatha wanted to laugh, because Pomni trying to menacing was pretty cute, but she also wanted to cry at the level of care and concern Pomni was giving her.

She settled for just smiling.

“Let’s go.” Pomni said, pulling Ragatha out of the supply closet with her.

Kinger shouted “Good Luck!” As they left.

“Pomni where are we going?” Ragatha asked as Pomni grabbed onto her hand and pulled her over to the bar.

“Grabbing something that might help us.” Pomni looked under the counter for a moment, before pulling out multiple knives.

“Oh.” Ragatha said, startled by Pomni’s sudden willingness for violence.

“Did you expect to go against a someone with a gun, with nothing to defend yourself?” Pomni asked, staring Ragatha down.

“Maybe?” Quite honestly, Ragatha hadn’t even had a plan in mind when she had volunteered to help Zooble. She had just wanted help fix things. But now she regretted that lack of planning, because Pomni seemed angry at her. “I’m sorry.”

Pomni sighed. “Just don’t do that okay? I don’t want you to get yourself hurt because you’re rushing off to help us.”

Ragatha didn’t respond because honestly, she didn’t want to talk anymore. She was stressed enough from how insane this adventure had gotten so suddenly. But the fact that she felt like Pomni had been upset or distant with her almost the whole time made everything so much worse. All she wanted was to finish the adventure and relax in her room. Maybe that was one of the reasons she had been so reckless. Maybe it was because she just wanted to make sure nobody would be upset with her. Because even if she did something stupid and got hurt, at least the others would have known she did it for them.

“Ragatha?” Pomni asked, snapping her back to reality. “Please promise me that you won’t do anything stupid.”

“O-of course.” Ragatha said, hating the shake in her own voice.

Pomni handed Ragatha a knife and Ragatha grabbed it reluctantly unsure how she would help with one of these. Usually she was the one who got stabbed with knives, and not the other way around.

“If we’re looking for the killer, I don’t even know where to start, to be perfectly honest.” Ragatha admitted.

“I might.” Pomni said.

She started walking towards the back door and Ragatha went quickly after her.

“There was a room on the roof that they put us in when they kidnapped us.” Pomni said. She opened the door, but Ragatha noticed her steps falter for a moment before she kept walking.

Ragatha got to see why when she also stepped out of the door.

There was a large circular stain of black blood on the ground that shined faintly in the dim light of the evening, with a similar trail leading away from it.

Pomni started walking away quickly, walking into the alley where the trail of blood was leading. Ragatha quickly followed, staying quiet to avoid saying something that might upset Pomni.

Pomni and Ragatha walked through the alley in silence. Ragatha assumed Pomni was walking towards the stairs, but she stopped suddenly, causing Ragatha to almost run into her.

“Pomni?” Ragatha asked cautiously, unsure what was wrong.

Then she followed Pomni’s gaze and also froze in horror. She was staring at a dumpster on the side of the building that the trail of black blood was leading to. There were similar dark stains on the side of the and a familiar cowboy hat, also stained with the same substance, on the ground.

Ragatha could guess what was inside the dumpster, and the thought made her slightly nauseous.

The two just stood there, for a second, neither sure what to say.

Then Pomni just started walking again, and Ragatha paused for a moment before following suit.

Ragatha always took it upon herself to comfort people when they were upset, but she didn’t know what to say. This was such a horrible situation so the fear of saying something wrong was present looming over Ragatha more than it usually did. Not to mention Pomni was already upset with her so she didn’t quite know what to say.

So she kept quiet, and just followed Pomni up the stairs.

As they reached the roof, she saw what Pomni had been talking about. A small room that sat on the top of the roof, with a metal door that lead to the inside.

Ragatha saw Pomni had taken out a knife, but her hands were trembling as she gripped onto it. Ragatha didn’t know how to help with words, so she did the next best thing.

She grabbed Pomni’s hand and squeezed it gently in reassurance. Pomni straightened up for a small moment, before squeezing back, and Ragatha thought maybe, she looked a bit less tense now.

But after a moment, Pomni pulled away, walking forward and gesturing for Ragatha to be quiet. Ragatha followed her and the two went across the roof as quietly as they could.

Once they reached the door, Pomni stopped. Ragatha heard her take a shaky breath before she slowly turned the doorknob.

Pomni peeked inside slowly, before opening it all the way.

“It’s empty.” She said to Ragatha, before walking inside.

Ragatha walked in after her to see the room empty except for two chairs with rope piled near them, and, on top of one of the chairs were Zooble’s arms.

They were both beat up, and one had a large cut that was leaking blood onto the chair.

“I’m glad we can get these back to Zooble.” Ragatha said, shattering the awkward silence between the two.

“Yeah.” Pomni said.

Ragatha picked them up, noticing Pomni’s reluctance to move towards them.

But she had no time to dwell on this, because she heard the door close behind her.

Chapter Text

Pomni didn’t react when she heard the door close, assuming it was just Ragatha. But then she heard a small squeak of fear from Ragatha, and she turned to look.

The sight in front of her sent a shock through her body.

Gummigoo was standing in front of the door that was now closed behind him. He was holding a gun that was pointing directly at Ragatha’s head.

Pomni froze, only able to watch in terror as Gummigoo took a small step forward, quickly closing the distance between him and Ragatha. The gun held was inches from her head.

“You’re not gettin’ away this time.” Gummigoo snarled. “I’ll make sure of it.”

His words snapped Pomni back to reality from her daze of fear.

“W-wait!” Pomni said. “Yo- you don’t want to do this!”

“What are you going on about?” Gummigoo said. “I have a gun aimed at your friend’s head right now, and I don’t think you’re in much of a position to tell me what I do and don’t want.”

“But why?” Pomni was just trying to say anything, do anything that might get the gun off of Ragatha’s head. “Why do you want to kill Ragatha, why do you want to kill everyone else at the party?

“I don’t know why.” Gummigoo said, surprising Pomni. “I don’t know why you think I have to explain to you why I do anything.”

He finally turned towards Pomni, giving her a vicious glare.

“It’s time to end this.” Gummigoo said cruelly.

But before he could turn back towards her, Ragatha used the small moment that his attention had been directed away from her to take out a knife and charge him.

Gummigoo whipped around at the sudden movement from Ragatha, firing his gun. At the same time, Ragatha crashed into him, knocking him to the ground.

Pomni watching in helplessly as the two fought on the ground. More gunshots rang out, and Pomni flinched as one flew past her. Then, Gummigoo’s gun flew across the floor, landing at her feet.

Pomni picked up the gun quickly, not wanting it to fall into Gummigoo’s hands again. She stood there in shock, looking from the gun and back to the fight. She knew that she needed to shoot Gummigoo and save Ragatha, but she didn’t want to take a bad shot and accidentally hit her.

So Pomni stood there, gun raised, hands shaking in fear. Until Gummigoo suddenly shouted and threw Ragatha back, causing her to land on the ground hard, crying out in pain.

Pomni looked straight into Gummigoo’s eyes. He was sitting on the ground defensive-less looking at her angrily. Pomni finally had her shot, perfectly lined up in front of her, but her hands were betraying her, the fingers on the trigger not responding to what she was telling them.

Pomni wanted to shoot, she needed to shoot, but looking at Gummigoo sitting on the ground so helplessly like that, she couldn’t. Because part of her still only saw the terrified and lost version of him she saw all those adventures ago, in that room under the map.

“P-Pomni?” A different voice called out to her, breaking her out of the memory. It was Ragatha.
“Just run Pomni. I know you’re probably scared but I’ll be fine.”

Pomni looked at her. There was a gunshot wound in her shoulder, blood on that beautiful dress Pomni had been admiring all night, and tears in her eye.

The sight of Ragatha so hurt, and the knowledge that Gummigoo was the reason she was hurt caused her to realize that Gummigoo wasn’t himself. The only version of him that Pomni thought was real was erased with a snap of Caine’s fingers.

Her quiet stare into nothing distracted her, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Gummigoo move.

He held up the knife that Ragatha dropped, preparing to attack, and Pomni fired.

She closed her eyes after she had, not wanting to see what she had done. She kept them closed tightly, feeling tears squeezing out of them, she only heard the sound of her heart pounding in her ears and a distant muffled voice.

Everything felt dizzy and fuzzy for a moment.

Then a hand grabbed her own, causing her to jump. She pulled her hands off of her ears, not even realizing that she had put them there in the first place.

“Pomni?” She heard Ragatha calling to her but she was still scared to open her eyes, unsure of what she would see. “His- it’s gone. You’re safe now okay?”

Pomni opened her eyes, and instead of seeing a cramped room spattered with the evidence of violence that had just taken place, she saw the circus.

“Wha-what happened?” Pomni asked.

“We finished the adventure so Caine teleported us back to the circus and fixed me up. We were worried about you because after you- after the adventure ended, you shut down, and you weren’t responding to anything.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.” Pomni said.

Pomni became suddenly aware of the fact that Ragatha’s hand was holding her own.

Pomni yanked her hand away, feeling a mixture of embarrassment, sadness, and frustration.

“Ragatha.” Pomni felt a shake in her voice, but not out of fear. Out of frustration. “Why did you do that? Why do you keep doing that! I made you promise to not do something stupid and you know what you did? You attacked-“ Pomni felt herself tripping over his name, unsure if she even wanted to say it anymore. “You charged at a murderer, and got shot! Just like yesterday when you kept doing stupid things to save me!”

“It’s because I care about you.” Ragatha said, stepping back from Pomni.

“I know! You always say you care, and I know that’s probably true. But the problem is you don’t act like you care about yourself Ragatha!” Pomni didn’t mean to yell, but she was sick of how Ragatha disregarded everything that Pomni told her when it came to Ragatha keeping herself safe.

“I’m sorry Pomni.” Ragatha had almost no emotion in her voice, but Pomni knew her well enough to recognize that the tension in her clasped hands meant she was upset.

“Ragatha I-“ Pomni wanted to stop whatever she had caused, but she was interrupted.

“It’s okay, I understand. I’m going to go to bed for tonight.” Ragatha walked away to the hallway quickly. “Good night everyone.”

Pomni stood there in shock, just now realizing how the other members of the cast were looking at her. Caine was nowhere to be seen, which was odd, but she didn’t care. The way everyone was looking at her made her feel extremely embarrassed, and she felt her face growing warm before she stomped off.

Pomni found herself outside Ragatha’s room before she even realized she was inside the hallway.

She raised her hand to knock on the door. But she stopped. Pomni wanted to try and fix things between her and Ragatha, but she was sick of repeatedly talking and pleading with Ragatha when she didn’t bother listening.

Pomni walked away to her room instead, deciding to try in the morning, when the both of them were less upset.

Chapter Text

Zooble wasn’t sure how to react to Pomni’s outburst. They had first thought that maybe it was just due to stress, but then her panic attack had evolved into a full blown argument with Ragatha.

Well, argument would be a generous term, because it mainly consisted of Pomni yelling at Ragatha, and Ragatha running away. They had never seen Ragatha so upset, and Pomni so angry.

They remembered that Gangle had suggested they talk together after the adventure, and that sounded like a good idea, because they needed someone to help them figure out what just happened.

Zooble went over to Gangle, who was staring off at the hallway where Pomni and Ragatha had both run off to.

“Gangle?” Zooble said. “You said earlier you wanted to talk after the adventure right?”

“Oh!” Gangle looked at Zooble in surprise. “Y-yeah, I just wasn’t sure you would still be up to it, after everything.”

“I’m pretty sure I won’t be able to sleep, so I’d rather spend time with you than just sit in my room.” Zooble said. “If you’re still up for it.”

“Yeah.” Gangle said. “But I don’t want to go in one of our rooms. Jax is being pretty weird and I don’t want him trying to break in to mess with us or something.”

Zooble agreed with Gangle they didn’t want Jax messing with them, especially while drunk. But they were also slightly frustrated about the fact that he had so much control over Gangle.

“Yeah, that sounds good. But where should we go?” Zooble asked.

“I don’t know.” Gangle said. “Maybe outside?”

Zooble thought that going outside sounded nice, but The Moon tended to be annoyingly energetic at night, and Zooble didn’t want her listening in to their conversation either.

“I don’t want to deal with the Moon right now.” Zooble said. But then they suddenly had an idea. “Actually, I know a spot.”

“Oh. Well sure. I mean we can go, wherever it is you want to go.” Gangle said.

“Come on.” Zooble started walking off, unsure why that had felt so awkward.

They figured it would be a good idea to explain where they were going.

“One time, when you guys were out doing an adventure I was bored and just wandering around, trying to see if I could find anything cool. So I was looking through all these doors and I found one that was kinda tucked out of the way. So I went through it, and it’s pretty cool.” Zooble saw what they were looking for.

Zooble walked over to a large yellow toy block-like structure and studied it for a moment. Then they found the small yellow latch that blended in to the structure and pulled it. It opened a small door that Zooble and Gangle peeked inside of.

Zooble heard Gangle let out a small gasp as she looked in the room. Zooble had reacted the same way when they first had seen the room that was essentially an entire galaxy, full of stars and planets that shone beautifully.

Zooble walked inside. They began to walk across the small glass walkway that lead to the center of the room, where there was a small black couch in the center.

Zooble turned to see Gangle standing there in shock, hesitating outside the doorway.

“It’s pretty cool right?” Zooble asked.

“It’s beautiful.” Gangle said in awe. “I just- I’m a little scared about that walkway. I don’t want to fall into infinite space.”

“It’s okay, I’ll walk with you.” Zooble went back across the walkway to the door, and offered their hand to Gangle who blushed slightly. Zooble chose to ignore how that made them feel.

But as Gangle took their hand and walked across the walkway slowly with them, that became impossible. They had only fully realized they had a crush on Gangle today when they were in that closet with her today. And seeing her with her mask reflecting the thousands of stars and having one of her ribbons delicately wrapped around Zooble’s arm felt absolutely electric.

They felt quite warm and tried to stare at the stars instead. Now that the door had closed and all the light cut off, the stars were even more clear. And standing in the middle of the transparent walkway made it feel like they floating in space.

“It’s- it’s so beautiful Zooble.” Gangle said, still utterly amazed.

The two sat together on the couch, Gangle’s ribbon still wrapped around Zooble’s. The two just sat in silence for a minute, admiring the view.

“I know we were planning on talking about our own stuff, but I wanted to talk about whatever happened with everything back there first” Gangle said quietly.

“Me too.” Zooble said. They didn’t want to talk about their own issues right now. They didn’t even fully intend to in that supply closet today, they just had started talking about it because they felt that if they let Gangle keep thinking that they were some amazing individual then they would explode. And they wanted another person to talk about whatever all that was . “That was a s&£% show. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Ragatha or Pomni so upset. Not to mention all the npcs being absolute psychopaths. That was so ridiculous of Caine, I can’t believe that adventure was made for me.”

“I almost forgot it was.” Gangle admitted. “I think Caine took things he thought you would like, then added a bunch of unnecessary violence.”

“All he had to do was let us sit in the circus and just relax and I would have been way happier. Figured that Caine would f¥%& up something easy as that though.” Zooble grumbled angrily.

“I still don’t get what happened with Ragatha and Pomni though.” Gangle said. “I guess they were acting weird earlier, before they went to go run after the murderer. I’m guessing something happened then.”

“Well I have a few ideas. Most likely is Ragatha was doing her over the top positivity thing when Pomni was still dealing with all that stuff about that npc. She was telling me after we got kidnapped that she was upset because the yellow gummy guy was someone she was friends with on an adventure. And she also told me tha-” Zooble stopped talking realizing they were about to tell Gangle about Pomni’s crush on Ragatha, almost forgetting that Pomni didn’t want them to tell anyone.

“And she told you what?” Gangle asked, immediately catching on to the fact that Zooble was hiding something.

“It’s nothing.” Zooble looked away, trying to get her to ignore it.

“Zooooble, I can tell you’re lying.” Gangle said sadly. “You had an important talk with Pomni and I’m wondering what’s happening with her and Ragatha and you’re not telling me about it? Please?”

Zooble looked at Gangle, with her sweet and pitiful eyes staring into Zooble’s own.

Zooble was losing it. How could they say no to that face?

“Fine.” Zooble said, pretending to be grumpy. “But you can’t tell anyone, especially not Pomni, and especially not Ragatha. Got it?”

“Yes, now tell me.” Gangle said, as excited as was likely possible with her tragedy mask on.

“Pomni told me that she has a crush on Ragatha.” Zooble said, feeling their face grow warm at the way Gangle was so excited. But then her face dropped back to sadness suddenly.

“That’s cute, but what if that has something to do with why they’re fighting? That would be really sad.” Gangle looked down slightly and started to cry gently.

“I don’t get why you’re so invested in those two. They’re both ridiculous in my opinion.” Zooble said in exasperation.

“It’s just oddly entertaining to root for those two, gives me a nice distraction I guess.” Gangle said.

“I think you’re just a hopeless romantic Gangle.” Zooble said.

Gangle stopped crying, and gave a small smile to Zooble.

“You know, even though everything has been so crazy lately, it seems like you’ve been more happy.” Zooble said, wanting to appreciate how beautiful the smile on Gangle’s face was.

“It’s because of you.” Gangle mumbled. Zooble felt their heart skip several beats. “You’ve been helping me protect my comedy mask. Even when it gets broken, you do a great job of cheering me up and making me feel better, sometimes without even trying.”

Zooble didn’t know what to say. The fact that Gangle had just told them that they were the reason she had been happier lately made them feel slightly surprised. But outside of that surprise was a warm and happy feeling that was hard to describe, likely because their brain was moving too fast.

“Well you deserve to be happy, mask or not.” Zooble said hoping that they sounded normal.

“Thank you Zooble.” Gangle said. “I don’t think I want to have a big talk anymore though. I’m pretty worn out, so are you okay with just sitting and hanging out for a bit?”

“Sounds good.” Replied Zooble, perfectly okay with this decision because they couldn’t handle talking anymore.

The two just sat there watching the stars. But Zooble must have been more tired than they thought, because they soon fell asleep, Gangle at their side.