listen puppet boy, before you disobey

[generationlost]

There's a knock at the door.

The sound is startling, makes Ranboo suddenly bolt upright from where they'd been lounging on the couch.

Knock-knock.

They pick themselves up from the couch and, as quietly as possible, they creep out of the room, searching frantically for somewhere to hide; his frame is much too long to tuck away into a cabinet or something, but he does, with some internal amusement at the joke, find a closet to tuck himself away into. Thankfully the swords in there aren't taking up too much space.

Knock knock, Dirk! There's a knock at the door!

Comments

[themostempty]

"Yeah." Dirk doesn't disagree.

"I knew this was going to be a hassle, but you've really pushed the limits of what I've got to give." He realised at some point that this is what his bros must have been through with him. Only it would have been years. A decade and a half of this, and worse. That made it easier, somehow. If they could do it, so could he. Pay it forward, or something.

Framing it that way sounds a hell of a lot better than 'refusing to let go.' But he committed to this.

"I told you not to make it easy for them. Remember? You don't get to tap out because that's their win. You keep telling me you want to die, but I know you don't want them to win. You looked me in the eye when I took bolt cutters to that mask because you'd rather have died free than live with their prison on your fucking face. But you didn't die there. You got to live. Now that's your responsibility, here. I keep you alive, you live, Showfall pisses their little pants in fury, we all keep going until one or the other loses for real. That's the game. I'm playing too, here. And I'm on team Ranboo."

[generationlost]

... that's right.

It feels like it was a lifetime ago now. Ranboo, beaten half to death, sprawled on Dirk's floor as the latter carefully cut away the mask-- let them feel fresh air on the face for the first time in... they don't know how long. How that felt-- freedom. For a single soaring moment, they felt free.

And then reality came crashing down around them.

Even so, that moment of recollection, of perspective does quiet Ranboo down finally-- their gaze drops thoughtfully, some of the anger fading from their face, instead replaced with something more thoughtful, almost sad.

"... yeah," they finally say, their voice softened now at its edges, lacking the wounded, angry edge from before. "Yeah. Okay."

It isn't a sarcastic response in the least. It's easy to feel like this must be hell... but the reminder of what they were running away from, of what came before is grounding. This might be hell for a regular person, but... for Ranboo, it's still, comparatively, freedom.

The sick pit of anger and disappointment still lingers, the pain of Dirk's betrayal of their trust... but at least they aren't trapped inside of the mall any longer. At least there's that.

[themostempty]

"Good man." Dirk voices his approval the only way he really knows how. Praise, the way he'd want to hear it.

He doesn't relax now, either, but he's glad to see Ranboo letting go of some of his... whatever it is that has him convinced that his is a tortured existence. Which it is, maybe. But it's not that bad, from where Dirk is sitting. Ranboo just isn't conditioned to it, yet. The looming threat of losing for real, knowing that it's coming, that it will come sooner or later and there's nothing you can do about it except push it back. To fight against it until ultimately you go to fight it and this time it wins.

It's not a great life, but for Dirk, that's what life is and he's always known that. It's less fair in Ranboo's case, though. As far as Dirk can tell, nothing about Ranboo earned this, or warrants it at all. He's never done anything except want to be free. Free from something he doesn't seem to have agreed to, and Dirk doesn't see anything inherently present in Ranboo that suggests it's needed or deserved. Maybe that's what keeps sticking in Ranboo's brain. The unfairness.

But if so, that's just... too bad. There's nothing anyone can do about that.

He sighs, tired of thinking about this already. Holding out until Ranboo stopped crying was bad enough.

"You ready to eat something? Or do you need to talk about your feelings some more?"