https://archiveofourown.org/works/83010226/chapters/223650896
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Rating: Mature (for violence, language and sexual themes)
Characters: Reader, Cuphead (Cuphead), Mugman (Cuphead), Bendy (Bendy and the Ink Machine), Boris (Bendy and the Ink Machine), Shelly (Dandy's World), Dandy (Dandy's World), Pebble (Dandy's World)
Pairing: Mugman/Reader, Cuphead/Reader
Additional Tags: I'll add more characters when they show up, Pebble is the goat, I'm gonna try and follow some of the canon but the comic is still in progress, Bendy is hard to write, this is my first fic, Aroace Cuphead, Strangers to Friends to Lovers, Blood and Violence, Blood and Gore, Tragic Backstory, Reader is not named, reader is technically an oc, but I don't specify physical attributes unless they have plot relevance, Cartoon Physics, Polyamory, Reader is gender neutral, Slow Burn, i think, I try to make it a slow burn but I'm an impatient person, Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Fluff, Trauma, The cup bros are not okay, the reader is not okay either, safe to say no one is okay, Slow To Update, Will have many headcanons, Reader has powers? It'll make sense later, farm shit, Gardening, no beta we die like Cuphead
Fic Summary: Bendy has an old friend that owes him a favor, and they need a place to law low from the Stars
So the the crew hide out in the country with you, an underground fighter who can smell trouble from a mile away
The cup bros are wary of this new companion and both have their own ways of digging for answers
But what they find in return draws them further from their games and deeper into something real
And if a serious relationship with someone is not the scariest thing in the worlds then they don't know what is
********************************
You can hardly make a squeak when you have around 50 lbs worth of fluff on ya.
Goose crawled her way from the floor all the way to the bed and is now sprawled across your stomach.
He’s decided the best place to sleep… is right on your neck.
closing any possibility of breathing.
You wiggle around like a fish out of water, shucking both dogs off your person.
Your other two furry friends were being good girls and sleeping on the floor.
Comet noticing the commotion happening on the bed jumps up and immediately tackles you in a chokehold.
Maybe not quite the good girl you were hoping.
“Hhh! Thi-s is n-ot better!” You manage to choke out.
You push against Comets chest, getting her to release you from her “hug” and sit up in bed.
You feel the static in your hair that is most likely wild from your tossing and turning in your sleep.
Your restlessness had been bad the first couple years you were living on your own, but ever since you started housing your canine roommates you’ve slept a little more peacefully.
Doesn’t mean the anxiety has gone away, you just happen to have it less often.
Though you might know the cause of your stress you had last night.
Bendy, and his mysterious entourage of friends.
You don’t know much about Bendy other than what you gathered from your night at the bar.
That seemed like a lifetime ago, almost like a different person.
A person whose wound was fresh and had never been alone before.
Someone who might’ve been more inclined to invite someone over despite hardly knowing them.
Though it could’ve also been the alcohol, the you that offered Bendy your home is not the same as you now.
But you can’t go back on your word….
…even if that means housing wanted criminals in your home.
But hey, that’s pretty normal for the crowd you hang around.
But more people means more food needed,
You might need a couple days to gather all those things
You get up and make your way to your desk where the rotary phone sat, it was never something you bought, those things were way too expensive, but your grandfather who lived here before you bought the phone so he could share a party line with the rest of the farmers living around here.
Nowadays most of the farmers moved to less searcher infested lands but at least the phone was kept so now you can call into town.
You rang up the phone and was greeted by a lady, her southern twang showed in how held the a in her words.
You gave her the number for your needed contact and you hear a click.
You had to wait a bit, the phone ringing six times but it was to be expected from your caller.
A low gravelly voice sounded from the phone, “Hello? Who is this?”
He says your name in a confused tone and replied, “what are you doing calling so damn early?”
“Sorry about this.” You hoped he would be merciful next time you see him. “You’re gonna need to find a replacement for this weekend. I had some..unexpected guests that arrived last night and they take precedence over everything right now.”
You heard a dissatisfied grumble along with the smack of wet mouth, likely from the chaw he constantly has in his mouth.
“Mmm “guests” huh?” You could practically hear the furrowing of his brows, “and are these guests a threat to my employee”
As you’re about to say no, you suddenly recall the events of last night, specifically before you went to sleep.
You don’t know how to feel about Mugman, you can understand his caution but to the point of actively attempting to threaten you and invade your space.
“Uhhh it is to be determined.”
You hear a huff at the other end of the line, “ well you know who to call if that’s changes, and I’ll call the calvary.”
“—Wouldn’t want my top money maker going down, not at least without a fight”
Ehhh. Less sweet.. but he at least got the spirit.
“Okay then, I’ll keep ya posted—and sorry about calling ya last minute. It was kinda a crazy night.”
“Just don’t do it again,” he said gruffly, “—or I’ll have you doing push-ups until yer arms fall off!”
Now that’s the coach you knew and loved.
“Thanks Coach,” you couldn’t help but sweetly adding, “have a great day” which put him in another tizzy.
“Now you listen here you little shi—“
You cut him off, hanging up the phone chuckling to yourself.
You’re gonna miss not being able to mess with that bonehead for the entire weekend.
As well the rest of your crew.
But you have a new crew to deal with..
Which you will deal with….
..Right after you get done with chores!
You’re not avoiding the problem!
…Just delaying the inevitable.
Swiftly getting dressed you open the door are surprised by what you see.
Mugman was sitting on the couch staring right at you.
was he just a morning Person or did he stay up here watching the door the whole time?
The first option doesn’t bother you, you yourself have to wake up at the crack of dawn to start chores.
But the second option gives you a whole lot of implications of Mugmans state of mind and how he sees you
Not that you couldn’t clearly tell from lasts nights escapades.
You lick your chapped lips
Rock on the balls your feet
Mugman grunts, well you don’t know if that was a yes, no, or fuck you.
you continue anyways, trying to be nice. “Well is there anything I can help you with, since you’re up?”
he lets out another grunt, this time accompanied with a glare. That one’s definitely a fuck you.
“Well then! Since you’re totally fine and not dying, I’m gonna go outside and do what I have to do.—“ his gaze is locked on you as you race down the stairs. “—hopefully you can entertain yourself with whatever your brooding self does. Byeeee”—SLAM!
Maybe you were a little too mean, even though slamming the door made you feel ten times better.
The sky was still dark, sun barely peaking above the horizon (you couldn’t tell anyways, you’re surrounded by trees.)
The dogs follow you outside, with Goose bounding in front of you, almost tripping you.
For now let’s distract yourself with what’s important.
All dogs scatter to find a place to potty, except for Goose which isn’t uncommon for her to follow you during chores.
She gets distracted too easily.
The barn is small in size, just big enough to fit your truck and some troughs to feed your animals.
Walking through the big sliding doors you see Hawthorn, your big lumbering horse, coat colored the same as the cloudy sky out today.
He let out sigh, happy at your appearance and you see his sister not too far behind him.
While Hawthorns body was dark and moody, Aelia’s coat (like her name) shown like the sun.
Light golden brown with dark speckles decorating her torso and legs.
They both nod their heads to you as they beckon you closer.
You pet them both on their snouts, “hello to you too! Ya both hungry for some breakfast?”
Aelia chuffs happily as you go and lift a bag of grain from the back of your truck.
Goose runs in circles and excitedly barks at both of the horses, while the two just stare and nod their heads in return.
Pouring out some grain in their trough, making sure to leave some for the cows, who hadn’t gotten up to the barn yet, you see that something has caught Aelias eye.
You look behind you trying to follow her gaze but find nothing out of the ordinary, just the sliding doors.
You shrug looking back towards the barn and see some of the cows making their way inside the barn.
Better late than never I guess.
You pour out the rest of the grain in their troughs, say hello to the cows (“hi Glenda! Hi Judith!”), check to see if their hay was stocked up (it was, it’ll probably last till Tuesday), and then with a wave you set off towards the next thing to do.
As you got closer to the pen you could hear the cluck clucks of your little chicken friends.
You grabbed a pitcher of scratch for the girls and and stepped inside the pen, unlocking the door to their little house.
Five plump hens of different sizes and colors race out of the house looking and you and their food with greedy eyes.
“Heeellooo Ladies!!!” You sing as you dump the scratch onto the ground, “how’re my good girls doing.”
They let out clucks and happy crows in response and dig into their meal.
While distracted you grab a woven basket and slip to the side of their pen house, lifting up the cover to their nests.
Two in one nest and two in the other, it’s about average for your chickens to produce three to four eggs a day, so you’d say you’re doing pretty good.
After collecting the eggs you take a bit to check out the health of the hens and the infrastructure of the pen house (making sure nothing leaked in from lasts night downpour).
everything and everyone looked spick and span so you got up to leave the—waaait a second.
A flash of blue crossed your vision as you turned around, the tail end of a baby blue scarf fluttering past your gaze.
Mugman seemed to very sneaky and light on his feet with how unaware you were of his gaze.
But did he really think he could get away with it?
Your frown deepens as you call out to the empty space, “ if you’re gonna follow me the least you can do is help me out in the garden!”
The quiet was your only reply, making you grimace at his lack of cooperation.
Welp let the record show I tried.
You step out of the pen and are greeted by Goose, now joined by Comet.
The two were roughhousing, rolling around in the mud. You’ll definitely have to give them a bath. Again.
Comets nubbin tail wiggles in tandem with her butt and the sight makes you almost squeal.
Goose is running left to right, trying to goad her sister until she sees you.
Galloping towards you like a horse she runs right past you and towards..
Uh oh, “Goose! Don’t you trample my garden!!” Not again.
As you set a calm pace after her you hear footsteps trailing behind you, ones that weren’t attempting to hide from you.
He wanted you to hear him.
You decide not to look back at Mugman, afraid that looking might “scare” him away.
Instead you take a different approach.
“The garden was one of my first projects when I came to live alone here.” You look fondly at the beds of soil you dug yourself. “For a while I couldn’t afford food for myself, and this was a way I could have food that normally is very expensive from importing it cross country.”
Goose circles you as you pick up the hose, not to water your garden..
But to water your poor thirsty dog.
She excitedly drinks up the water you spray into her mouth, making big chomps to catch every drop.
“You know, you wouldn’t be so thirsty if you weren’t running around like a chicken with its head cut off” you chuckled bringing your arm down from her face and shutting off the water.
“Wouldn’t it be a goose with its head cut off?”
You almost didn’t hear it, his voice softer than anything you’ve heard before, there was mirth in his tone and you couldn’t help but break your unsaid rule as you turn to face him, stunned.
“Was…was that a joke?” You asked incredulously.
He looked at you wide eyed, his face turning a rosy pink. He quickly turned away to hide his expression.
“No..just a statement of fact….” He huffed, there was steam that was coming out his head, you’re unsure why.
“Oh well… alright then” you hand him a basket, might as well not dwell on that.
“I have a lot of stuff still growing in the garden” you walk to the bed growing peppers of different colors, both spicy and sweet, “if you could help me pick all these that would be great!”
Mugman steps forward, scarf fluttering behind him, and picked up the clippers.
He knelt down beside you and followed your lead, carefully taking the vegetable and snipping it off the stem.
All the while his face was tense, eyebrows furrowed, and mouth screwed in a tight grimace.
You both took your time snipping and plucking all your vegetables from their stems, all of your tomato’s, peppers, and some herbs were put in a basket
You took the rotten veggies he also collected,“These will make good food for the chickies”, you walk to the pen, his eyes still trailing you.
“I got some goodies, come and have some” you toss them into the pen with the chickens who happily munch on your gift.
One chicken, Teresa, flies up onto the bottom gate and perches in front of you.
You pick her up and turn to Mugman, still staring at you.
“This is Teresa, she’s one of my older hens, and she does a good job teaching the newer ones what to do,” you pet her gently on her head. “Her beak is crooked, which makes it hard for her to eat, but she does really well on her own. Haven’t had to do anything to help her.”
The look Mugman gives you as you ramble is strange, his eyes are intense and his brows furrow. He looks deep in thought.
You kinda wanna know what he thinks about..
“Wanna pet her?” You ask popping his figurative bubble.
He stammers, “uhh…” as you hold out the chicken to him.
He looks to you, then to the chicken, then back to you.
It almost feels like he’s trying to read your soul with that stare.
Maybe this time you’ve done it, maybe you’ve cracked into his hard, spiky shell and can finally see his true colors. Maybe he isn’t a cold bastard after all.
He turns around and leaves, not another word said, leaving you stunned in your thoughts.
“Am I the problem?” You look to your feathery friend for answers.
She looks back, and does not answer your plight.
By now everyone is awake and around, though sluggishly. And the dogs exhausted from their morning are lounging around (most notably Fable has taken to laying most of her body on Cupheads lap, the latter seeming to not mind)
They all gathered in the living room, seemingly listening to the radio you have sitting on a small table in the corner of the room.
They have it turned on to the news, the voice the only noise in the room.
“If anyone has information about these criminals please contact 265-74”—you stop listening, it’s better the less you know.
Walking to the kitchen, “well who’s hungry? I can make some omelets?”
“Do you have Coffee?” Bendy groans, his brother nods in request to you. “Yea I should just give me a sec.” You say.
You run down stairs to the bottom floor into the storage room where Shelly and Pebble were currently sleeping in.
There’s an empty bedroll and a bag that you don’t look in, instead opting to look in the heap of stuff
You find a percolator made of glass still in the gift box, you got it as a gift for your birthday as a joke because you hardly drank anything caffeinated, it’s basically sat collecting dust all this time.
now at least it’s coming in handy, and your lucky it seems your coworker pre-grinded you some coffee beans, so you don’t have to grind them yourself.
You take both things and run back upstairs, shouting as you ran to the kitchen, “we got coffee!”
You don’t miss the look Bendy gives you, “you have way too much energy for the morning”
“Thank you!” You grinned and gave him a wink as you ducked into the kitchen with your new supplies.
You got the coffee started and you decided to make omelets for breakfast.
Using some of the vegetables you picked this morning you chopped up the peppers and tomato’s to go in your omelets.
While cooking you overhear some conversation in the other room.
“Mugman, we didn’t see you this morning, wanna tell us what you’ve been doing?”
“Cmon Bendy it’s fine, he doesn’t have to tell us…”
“Buuut..” Cuphead pipes up, louder than the rest, “ you could tell me! Your ol’ brother what you’ve been doing?”
It’s silent as everyone seems to await the mugs answer.
Finally he grunts, “I was outside, with our host…”silence in response as if they were begging for him to continue.
He sighed, “I didn’t say much if that’s whet you’re asking….they did most of the talking.”
You hear the following groan of defeat from Bendy as Cuphead whoops in excitement.
“Haha! Yea! I knew you wouldn’t say shit!”
“I’m never gonna bet with you again..”
“You always say that, but you keep coming back.”
“How’d you know for sure that was going to happen!” Shelly chuckled, “—well of course I’d know, it’s brother’s intuition.” Cuphead said in a smug tone.
“—the phrase is “mothers intuition” Bendy interjected, “Oh my stars! You’re such a block head!”
“The names Cup-Head thank you very much… honestly—“Cuphead was suddenly cut off from his jab from another voice. Boris’s, directing the focus back to Mugman.
“Did they say anything that concerned you?”
They paused, seemingly for dramatic effect. You could practically taste the tension in the other room.
Taste like sweet and tangy peppers.
Wait that might be you shoveling the ingredients into your mouth.
“They were talking about foolish things.. they had me help them in their garden…”
Even though you knew that was what he was going to say you still felt relieved. Glad he didn’t try to frame you as some sort of villain.
Maybe he’s not as bad as you thought..
But he’s really confusing. That’s for damn sure.
“That’s all? Seems underwhelming.”
“Everything’s underwhelming for you Cup.”
“If you have something to say Bendy why don’t you——“ you decide to make your entrance, plates in hand in this very moment.
It’s a good thing you worked at that diner for a year, now carrying plates balanced on your arms, hands, and head is easier to do now.
The Demon and Cup are still bickering but you pay them no mind as you hand them their plates, everybody gives a little thank you (even Mugman) and you go back to the kitchen to fish out some drinks.
You set down on your small table the coffee pot ripe with hot bean juice and a jug of milk, and once you’ve given people their mugs Bendy is first to the coffee with his brother close behind.
The food is still piping hot but you shovel it into your mouth with no problem.
Shelly pipes up untrusting your food bliss, “So Bendy told us you sing, do you do that for work?” She was addressing you which was very inconvenient considering your mouthful of food.
You swallow and choke out, “heh, not anymore. I kind of move from one job to another. Right now I do janitor work at a clothing store.”
“Oh..uh. That’s…interesting.” Shelly seemed grasping for a topic.
Not surprising, on the surface you’re not that interesting.
Especially compared to this group probably.
“What about you? Any interests?”
Shelly brightened at your question, “I worked at Gardenview as a researcher! I like to study history and prophecies that have yet to be proven—“ she continues on but you can’t help but get lost in your own thoughts
The thought of Gardenview puts a sour taste in your mouth.
It’s Boris that brings you back to focus, “you seem to have a lot on your plate, is there maybe anything we can do to help?”
Oh that reminds you. Thank you Boris for the segue.
“Uhh yea it would be nice to have some extra hands around here. If you’re going to stay here, I’d like you all to help out around here..”
They all nod in understanding, encouraging you to keep going.
“It might take a day to get in the rhythm of things and find out tasks best fit each of you”
“By Monday I will have figured out chores for each of you…hopefully..”
Bendy looks up from his coffee mug “seems fine, it’s not like we can do anything else.”
“Yea” Cuphead scoffed, “ Everybody knows who we are and are bound to turn us in,”
“Well.. Maybe not… everybody?” You say.
Bendy looks at you questioning, “what do you mean?”
“Uhh.. not much news actually gets to my town, Fanflash doesn’t have many people, only getting busy in tourist season. Not many residents have radio, and I haven’t seen any pictures of you all in the paper or around town.”
“Makes sense why you didn’t know we were on the run,” Boris pondered.
“Right.” You assured, “that would mean as long as you keep your heads down, you could at least go around town and do things there.”
The others thought for a while before finally Cuphead decided to chime in with, “well, at least we could get new clothes.”
You don’t know how long they’ve been wearing those clothes but you could guess a while.
Put that on your shopping list I guess.
“Well I guess we’re in this for the long haul!” You try to say with amusement in your voice.
The others don’t have quite the chipper tone you had, but they all smile to you and nod.
Except for Mugman who seemed distracted staring at his empty plate..
“Ok…” you breathed. “..ok”
You have it all under control.
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