The sight before her didn't get any easier to understand.
She blinked again. With both lids these times.
Still the same.
“.... I- I am not completely sure what I am seeing here, if I must be honest.”
“There was an incident with an artifact while we were all using some of the alchemizers in the labs.” Rose said. “I was lucky enough to avoid its effects, but your friends weren't quite so lucky.”
Ah. That explained… some of it.
Dirk fidgeted, opening and closing his fists. He stared at them quite strongly, as if they weren't acting the way he expected. Behind him, his tail tensed, coming closer to him.
Rose continued “As you can see, their bodies now resemble yours by quite a lot. We figured you would be best equipped to help them with their new forms.”
Calliope winced, her expression twisting in doubt “Ah- I wish I could be helpful, but I have never met another of my kind in person before, I don't know if I can-”
“I’m sure you will manage just fine.” Rose smiled. “From what I have gathered, the effects will fade in a few days or so, so this new arrangement isn't for an indefinite amount of time.”
Well, that helped a bit.
She still jumped when she saw Rose wall towards the door “Wait, you're just going to leave? What if-”
Rose stopped near the door, a sly smirk on her face “I'm sure you can contact me if anything goes wrong.
A bit of advice, though? Don't leave Dirk and Hal alone unsupervised.”
With that Rose left, closing the door behind her.
“Ah.” Callie said, dismayed, tail and wings going limp in disappointment. Then she turned her eyes back to her friends, all of them looking almost as uncomfortable as she did about this.
Roxy was the first to take a step, her small pink-and-white wings fluttering behind her, her pink eyes and cheeks (circled cheeks, like all the others except, of course, Calliope herself.) a pleasing contrast to her now dark green face, reminding Callie of some of the flowers in her garden, with beautiful, pink petals and rich, emerald leaves.
“Hey Callie! How do you think I look?” Roxy settled in front of Calliope, quickly making a pose as if someone were about to take a photo of her. Her teeth looked sharp under the light, her tail reaching to her knees and ending in pink feathers that seemed to be making a heart shape, and her wings shared the general shape of a hummingbird’s, if with wildly different colors. She had all her clothes still on, except for the shoes, which were probably too painful to put on with her new foot shape (Calliope could understand that, putting shoes on was easily her least favorite part of her morning routine, and Roxy wasn't used to it the way Calliope was).
Callie giggled “You look pretty as always, Roxy. Even if I do miss your hair.” Playing with Roxy's hair was one of Callie's favorite things to do, especially when they were watching movies together. “How do you feel though? Are you alright? I'm sure this must be quite strange for you.”
“Yeah we’re all fine! Well, kind of, it’s not exactly comfy to be all different from our usual like this, but it’s not painful or anything- even the transformation didn't hurt, it was more elite s bunch of static and fwoosh!” Roxy made a gesture like an explosion with her hands “Cherub. But it's not permanent so we just gotta wait it out, it could be worse.”
Callie nodded. She definitely wouldn't want her friends to be stuck like this forever either.
“Um- I guess- you can all take a seat, if you want? And I can make you something?” It felt weird to act like this was just a normal visit, but she also had no idea what to say, so she decided to just act normal- that had never backfired on her before! “I believe I have some meat and rice I could make for you.”
“That would be awesome, please. I dunno if it’s the transformation or something but I'm beyond hungry.” Roxy said. Jane seemed to stiffen at the possibility that the transformation wouldn't be merely physical- at which point Calliope decided to simply nod and run off to the kitchen to get everything done before any breakdowns were had.
She made the meat and the rice the same as she always did- two pinches of salt for the rice, twenty minutes to cook for the meat, wait on the rice until it dries, add spices depending on preferences- all of her friends had slightly different tastes, so she decided to simply grab the spice containers and bring them over to her friends so they could choose.
She set down the meat, smiling softly as everyone thanked her- it was no big deal, really! But her friends were always quick to compliment her cooking (even if wasn't very good in her opinion- being able to eat almost anything raw meant you rarely had any reason to cook, and she had difficulty detecting the tastes of different meats once cooked)
She was still surprised when, after lifting barely a forkful of meat to his mouth, Jake frowned at the taste, emerald eyes almost the color of his new skin scrunching up in confusion
“Callie dear, you know I usually quite like your cooking but I cannot help but notice that you seemed to have skipped out on the salt this time!”
She blinked in surprise- “I’m sorry Jake but what exactly do you mean? I'm quite sure I added salt in?” Even as she said it she doubted it, she remembered it quite clearly but she could have easily imagined it, couldn't she?
Dirk chewed his own portion “I didn't want to say anything, but it does seem a little blander than usual.” He took another forkful as everyone else nodded along- she felt like she wanted to bury her head in her hands “the good thing with salt is that it can always be added later.”
He took the salt shaker and put some salt on his plate, then ate some to see how the taste would change- when he frowned and added more- and took a bite- and added more salt-
“Erm. Dirk?” she questioned.
Dirk paused. He must have added salt to the food at least seven times. “I think my taste buds are fried.”
Roxy leaned over with her fork, taking a bite from the meat on Dirk’s plate “really? Lemme see-”
Roxy popped the piece of meat into her mouth and chewed slowly, before swallowing “I don't think it was just your taste buds, di-stri.”
“Perhaps it has to do with our- erm. Transformation?” Jane chimes in “Callie did say once that most cooked meat tasted the same for her”
All eyes turned to her. Her grip on her fork tightened slightly.
“Well. Maybe? It wouldn't be completely illogical.” She offered up.
Jake seemed surprised “Golly, if this is what all cooked meat tastes like to you no wonder you prefer to eat yours raw and with a mountain of sweet confections piled upon it!”
Calliope just shrugged. The bloody taste of raw meat adds flavour, and the sweet taste of the candies gives off an interesting contrast. She never thought too hard about it.
“I do have a bit of sweet syrup in my fridge though” she mused “perhaps you could all pour some on your food? I don't believe it can get worse than it already is”
Lal he friends voiced agreement- Callie noted the excitement in Roxy's faces like a scientist about to do an experiment. Callie stood up from her chair and brought back a few of her favorite sweet flavours, from the sweet and natural honey to the thick condensed milk.
All her friends grabbed a few flavours seemingly at random and started combining- she couldn't help but suggest a few of her favorites.
When they were done, and they were all lying down on the floor (neither the couch nor the beds were big enough to accommodate all of them, especially when they considered the wings, which none of the others had yet figured out how to tuck away) Roxy spoke up.
“You know, just a few hours and we already learned something really interesting about cherubs.” her eyes glittered with excitement as she stared up at the ceiling, then at Callie herself. “I wonder just what else we’ll find out, you know?”
Callie had no idea what the answer to that question was, but one thing was sure.
These were going to be some interesting days indeed.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
Summary:
In which Charlie and Mariana are kind of okay at doing tasks and JuanaFlippa, just a few days old, is kind of okay with the people she gets to call her family.
+++
The universe is kind to the Backflipo family for once.
My submission to the @qsmpzine . I had JuanaFlippa<3 Please excuse the fact that I'm a few months behind sharing this here...
Cheers!
-mad
i kind of love when characters accidentally take part in courting rituals or other unfamiliar habits/traditions. something innocuous to them but is like a ring or declaration of devotion or love to the other
in other words: Étoiles keeps giving Charlie bones
he gets them all the time from dungeons and casual mob slaying around the island, and while he keeps a handful for bone meal, he really doesn’t need to rest so he usually trashes them. then he runs into Charlie one day, desperately trying to fend off some shots from a few skeletons, dragging himself behind a tree with a broken leg. étoiles kills the skeletons quickly and when he gets back to charlie, he's bemoaning about his leg and how that was his last good femur.
étoiles just watches him, gears turning in his head before he jogs back to the slain skeletons and digs for what he hopes are femurs, but cut him some slack, his bones stay in his body like they are supposed to. he goes back to charlie and just holds the array of bones out with a simple "Here."
Charlie just stares, mouth open and closing like a fish. Étoiles would feel nervous that maybe he did something wrong but this dude can't even walk right now and it's kind of sad, in a "Oh this guy is poor" kind of way. so he'd be doing étoiles a favor by taking the bones, even if he's not happy about it. He's not gonna just leave charlie here, stuck
Charlie eventually takes the bones. well, he takes the femur as he absentmindly identifies the other ones and étoiles, who know jack shit about bones, stays for a bit while Charlie swaps the bones out. they parted ways after étoiles checked the others gear which-problem for later.
it was a brief interaction but it hadn't left étoiles, even a week later when he's at another dungeon. Instead of tossing the remaining bones this time, he holds onto them. Meets up with charlie under the guiese of checking his armor but also wants to see if he needs to refresh any of his bones because he just got some more and charlie does that thing where he just stares,
and god étoiles just keeps doing it, keeps collecting and cleaning and sorting through bones becuase it helps his bro out right? His very funny bro that makes him laugh so hard he's going to throw up and is actually really smart. Who teaches étoiles to make a better bone meal, thinking it's for plants when it's actually for étoiles and oh why does he feel so hot all of a sudden
just two idiots going in circles, accidentally completing mating rituals they aren't too familiar with but instinctively, it's so much. stupid fucking IDIOTS!!!!! AHHHHHHHHHHHH
i have to write this or i'm gonna throw up oh my god-
Charlie’s next coherent thought is this is weird.
He taps stiff, sore fingers on the ground once, twice, three, four times. The song fades from his head like it’s walking away from him as he continues the rhythmic action. Bum bum bum bum bum- Charlie’s kind of relieved when the tune is gone but with its absence comes a silence he isn’t ready for.
2.
A shadow creeps over Charlie’s face and he cracks an eye open to see Bad smiling… pleasantly? Probably pleasant. Hopefully. Maybe.
“We need a slime shield!”
Suddenly every stolen bone in his skeleton aches something fierce. Charlie groans tiredly and shifts to upset Pomme’s balance until she’s crashing into Richas who both then crash into Charlie’s waiting arms. He squeezes the eggs close, letting his arms get a little goopy just so they can’t wriggle away easily.
For the eggs he tells himself, sighing internally.
3.
Mike groans and coughs behind him as Charlie finally, finally calms down enough to let Étoiles push him against the side of the tub. Holy shit, it’s easy to forget how strong Charlie is. Étoiles hangs his head with a sigh. “Mike, you okay bro?” Another hacking cough and wet shuffling is all Étoiles hears, very nice. He cranes his head over his shoulder, even as Charlie starts up a hissing rumble under him again. “Mike?”
“Oh,” Mike says and Étoiles sags with relief when he sees a thumbs up appear in the air. But before he can cheer or curse or anything else, Mike follows that thumbs up with something a little less reassuring. “Uh oh. Étoiles? Charlie is—“
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
(tell me why was it drowning)
Charlie must flee the country immediately, but Étoiles would like to get some rest before that, please.
or:
The joys of being human and making a mistake or three.
(college au)
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
Summary:
Charlie was never really been good at the whole parenting thing back with Flippa, but he can try. Again. Charlie can try again. For Sunny.
For both of them.
(...and maybe for Tubbo too. Jury's still out on that one, though.)
or: Sunny gets some guitar lessons from her pop
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
Summary:
“Charlie.”
“What’s up?”
“Can you keep a secret for me?”
-—-
Charlie wasn’t kidding about helping Baghera decorate her wings and Baghera wasn’t kidding about letting him.
They’ve got all the time in the world for this. Might as well take it.
aka the wing preening and decorating fic we all needed for karaoke duo, written with my friend Solaneceae <3
