“(Y/N)? Are you coming? Axel and Olivia are nearly here!”
You perked up at the voice that pulled you away from your book, attention shooting over to Jesse as he stood in the doorway, watching the broad grin spread on his face upon seeing your expression light up at his words. Closing the book you had previously been using you left it forgotten at your desk as you nearly toppled out of your chair trying to stand up, bolting across the room and over to the leader's side as a grin spread across your face; you didn’t even give him a moment more to speak before you were sliding past him, dragging him along with you by the crook of his arm as you navigated through the halls and rooms of the house, eager to see your friends again after what felt like so long.
“Hey, slow down you don’t even know where they are yet” Jesse chuckled, amused by your enthusiasm as you turned to look at him over your shoulder.
“We’ll find them sooner if we look around enough! So come on!” you retorted, laughing as you pressed on, your eyes eagerly scanning the rooms you passed in hopes of catching a glimpse of the people in question.
It had felt as though it had been so long since you’d had the chance to see your old friends, with everyone swamped with their own respective work and duties it was hard for any of you to find enough time off to all meet up once again, so the prospect of seeing them made you absolutely ecstatic something you were sure Jesse shared with you as he hurried to match up with your pace. Of course it wouldn't feel like a complete reunion without Petra and Lukas due to them being out of town during Axel’s and Olivia’s arrival, but you were just glad to have some of the gang back together even if it was only for a day or two; you could worry about their absence later though, for now you had some old friends to catch up with.
It didn’t take either of you long before you’d finally managed to track them down in the main hall and you couldn’t have opened the doors faster if you tried, hearing the doorframes rattle as they burst open and you rushed inside. Both people present in the room turned around to face you two and their expressions lit up upon noticing it was you and jesse and you grinned and raced over to them, your excitement upon seeing your companions again clearly mirrored in their equally content expressions.
“Axel! Olivia! You guys are really here!” you cried out, barely making it to their sides before Axel scooped you up into his arms, barking out a loud laugh as you buried your face into his chest and attempted to return the hug as hard as you could, giggling as you greeted him.
“Looking good Axel! I’ve missed you so much big guy! - And your hugs!” he was hugging you a bit too tight but you couldn’t care in the slightest, relishing the contact as much as you could before he let you back down onto your feet again.
With you out of his arms Axel turned to Jesse as he came to join the group and promptly scooped him up as he’d done with you and you laughed hearing the yell of surprise he made as Axel buried him in his hold. You turned your attention away from the pair and looked to Olivia, watching her warm, welcoming smile brighten as you practically engulfed her in an embrace. “Olivia I’m so glad to see you - and look at you! Just as beautiful as I remember it’s like you haven’t aged a day!” she chuckled as your hands cupped her cheeks taking in her appearance as she replied.
“I could say the same, (y/N) - it’s been a while and yet you’re still as lively as ever” smirking you pulled away and jabbed a thumb towards Jesse, who was stumbling a bit trying to regain his bearings after Axel’s hug.
“Well with this guy over here running the show one of us has got to have enough energy to keep up” you teased, stepping to the side as Jesse came up to greet Olivia.
You couldn’t help but take in the sight of your companions, watching them talking and laughing as though they’d never been apart and you felt your heart warm up seeing it; even after such long periods of being apart it still felt like the same old time from years ago - of course things had changed so much since then, with each of you having to grow up and adapt to your new lives accordingly, but there were parts of each of you that still felt the same; still felt like home, and you couldn’t have been more grateful for that.
You were still smiling fondly as Jesse moved to stand between his two friends, looking a lot happier than he had in quite a while as he spoke. “We’re so happy that you guys were able to make it, it feels so good to have the gang back together like this -” he began, looking around at the faces of his friends “- I hope that the trip here wasn’t too bad”
Axel brought his hand up to signal it was good before crossing his arms across his chest. “Don’t worry it was fine - getting here was easy, even with all the changes you’ve made to the town” he said, eyes scanning the new layout of the hall as Olivia spoke up moments after him.
“Although we did have some trouble finding our way through here, all of the new rooms definitely made things a bit of a challenge”.
At her words you paused, surprise flashing across your face as your eyes darted to Jesse who in turn seemed equally taken aback by what she said. “Wait, you guys came here alone?” you questioned, watching them nod in confirmation.
“Are you guys sure there wasn’t someone waiting for you? You know - average height, black hair, glasses, looks way too excited and nervous all at once?”
“(Y/N), we haven’t seen anyone but the two of you” Olivia assured, understandably confused as Axel piped in.
You and Jesse exchanged glances from the corners of your vision, silently questioning who was last to see the person in question before you sighed and brought a hand to pinch the bridge of your nose. “Okay so it looks like we’ve got a search on our hands” patting Jesse on the shoulder you swivelled round to turn back towards the door.
“I’m going to look for him while you guys all catch up” you explained, walking over towards the door as you spoke.
“Huh? But you just got here!” Jesse exclaimed, watching you open the door with a reassuring grin.
“Don’t worry! I’ll be back before you guys even notice I was gone~!” you didn't wait for another response and took the initiative to slip back into the hallway, straightening up as you began wandering down it your gaze carefully scanning around for the intern in question as you went past.
Olivia definitely had a point about all of the new stuff, a lot more rooms had been added to help accommodate and keep up with both the growing town and the increasing number of adventures you’d all been on over the years, and whilst they’d been smart decisions at the time there was a part of you that was beginning to resent them now that you were actually having to search through them all. Fortunately the majority of them had windows or an open door which gave you full access to see what was inside without actually having to go through them all individually; it was a relief that you’d just have to look at the rooms as you walked past to see whether anyone was inside, however with each empty room you passed you felt a bit disheartened
It wasn’t like him to just disappear like this, he’d been so excited to meet Axel and Olivia he’d been sticking close to the entrance of the building nearly all morning, excitedly bumbling about finally getting the chance to meet them in person and how much he was looking forward to it, so the fact he wasn’t anywhere in the immediate vicinity admittedly had you a bit worried, which of course made you all the more eager to find him.
You made your way down a few hallways without a sign of him to be seen and you frowned as your eyes avidly darted from door to door, hoping to catch some kind of glimpse as worry bubbled in the pit of your stomach and you couldn’t help but mutter to yourself as you moved around.
“Come on, where are you-”
Suddenly you stopped in your tracks, pausing at what you assumed (more like hoped) was the sound of muffled mumbling and you froze, head darting around before locking onto the door to your far left. Even if you could barely hear it you couldn’t mistake the voice if you even tried and you felt relief wash over you as you released a breath you hadn’t realized you’d been holding and strode over to the door; you didn’t hesitate to open the door just enough to peek your head through and smiled upon finally noticing the figure looking outside of the window idly shifting around as if waiting for something and you spoke up.
Radar squeaked and jolted up in his spot, swivelling around to turn to face you and you chuckled watching the surprise on his face drop to relief as he realized who it was. “O-Oh! (Y/N), it’s just you”
“Yup just me” you giggled with a shrug, taking the initiative to step inside and press the door to a close behind you as you leaned against it, folding your arms across your chest as your posture relaxed, glad to finally see the anxious intern again.
You took a moment to look around the room, scanning the items (or more accurately lack thereof) which scattered the room before falling back to Radar as he stood by the window, offering you a sheepish smile as you spoke. “I wondered where you’ve been; when you weren’t there to greet Axel and Olivia I’d hoped you were still nearby, I’m glad you’re okay though”
“Ah, sorry I was going to come back as soon as-” Whatever he’d planned to say fell to silence as he suddenly paused, tensing up and eyes growing wide as he gasped.
“Wait - they’re here? Already?!” You nodded in confirmation, watching the color practically drain from his face at the information.
“I had a feeling you didn’t know, that’s why I came to look for you” you could already tell that wasn’t the best thing to say as his head snapped back to the window - understandably he’d expected to have seen them arriving from there given it wasn’t too far from the entranceway, but you could see the shock registering as he mumbled.
“O-Oh no, I guess I didn’t see them come in? Oh no they must be furious! I should have been there waiting! I should have…!” He broke off into a bout of rambling, stress making itself evident upon his features alongside a brief flash of panic.
He was anxious, it was clear from the way he started rambling and fidgeting almost unconsciously in his place, and for a little while you let him get it out of his system, after all he always let you come to him whenever you needed to vent or take a break from it all so you figured it couldn’t hurt to wait for him to calm down.
Well, you tried to anyway.
After a couple of moments you couldn’t help but call out to him. “Radar?”
He didn’t turn at your voice, not hearing you as he continued his frenzied mumbling; after a few seconds with no success you tried again.
He still didn’t respond and you watched as his brows furrowed, obviously lost to his own thoughts even going so far as to pace around in the midst of his words. Eventually you gave up on that tactic and sighed, shaking your head as you pushed yourself away from the door and wandered over to his side, once there you clapped a hand onto his shoulder, watching his whole body tense as he whirled back around to face you
“Ah! (Y/N) I’m so-!” you cupped his cheeks, watching the stress melt from his face as you flashed him a reassuring smile and brushed your thumbs along the blush gradually blossoming across his face and growing more prominent as you cut him off.
“Calm down Radar no-one’s mad at you; everyone’s fine and catching up in the hall so you don’t need to worry about it” he seemed to relax at your words at least a tad as his shoulders slumped, releasing an almost relieved sigh at the reassuring gesture.
“Whew that’s, um, that’s good!” he chirped, offering a small smile of his own albeit somewhat sheepish but genuine nonetheless.
“Although~” you began, a smirk rising to your face as you continued. “I’m sure they’d still love to meet you, if you want?” within moments his expression lit up, the worry all but gone in favor of the near ecstatic expression brightening his features as he gasped.
“Really?” even you had to chuckle, finding his sudden change cute as you responded.
“I guess I’ll take that as a yes then” Patting his cheeks you pulled away and swivelled back around, making your way over to the door you’d entered from and opening it, however right before you left you turned to look over your shoulder.
“Are you coming?” Radar was by your side before you’d even finished your sentence, practically bristling with excitement as he cried out “Of course!” and matched your pace, seemingly just as excited as you were as he flashed you an ecstatic smile, one you were all too happy to return as you giggled.
