@twinkpeaksssss

header art & Mikie belong to @femboyhunting, Rhett belongs to @wreckowafer

If someone had asked you what Rhett and Mikie were to you even just a few weeks ago, you’d have probably have kept it short and sweet: Headaches.

You couldn’t have even said when your views of the fucking menaces had begun to shift until it was glaring you right in the face.

Like right now.

(1) But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Go back to the start.

Breaking orphans out the pillories at night was nothing new to you these days. It was practically a part of your nightly circuit, going out of your way to check on your way between Landry’s bar and the mansions on Danube street. You recognized the two locked up — you’d be kinda shit at your self-assigned job if you didn’t — but had no real idea what their names were.

Also fairly standard, honestly. Most of the fellow orphans you helped were there and gone as soon as you got them out of trouble and it became clear you weren’t going to demand some sort of reward, or else didn’t even bother to wait around long enough to find out.

So you couldn’t have really known what you were getting into when you set to work picking the locks open, free one of them and then the other before standing back, pivoting on your heel to scan for trouble—

And not at all prepared for the brawny arm that slung over your shoulder, tensing up something fierce as you just barely avoided face-planting into their chest at the tug.

“The fuck I tell you, Mikie? Hope ain’t lost,” The taller of the two guys and the one who nearly smushed your face into his chest at his sudden proximity was loud, loud enough to have even more alarm bells ringing in your mind, your attempt to whip your gaze to the surroundings ruined even further when the fucker ruffles your hair? “—She’s just short as fuck.“

(1) What the fuck?

“Shit, you right,” Mikie, presumably, laughs with the same kind of elated carelessness you really don’t think suits the situation, being that you’re all still standing right beside the fucking pillories, “Fuck, you’re a life saver, Bubblegum — glad to see the revolution ain’t down to just Rhett and me.”

Bubblegum? Revolution?

“Hell fucking yeah it’s not!” The mere mention of the word seems to incite Rhett(?) to, sadly, an even louder volume, an almost crazed glint to his eyes that you’re pretty sure is pure adrenaline as he shouts, “Viva la fuckin’ Revolution!”

What had you done to deserve this?

“Viva the Revolution, baby!”

And now they were both shouting, increasingly animated despite the bruises quite literally littering both of their bodies, and you’ve only just ducked out and under Rhett's arm when you hear a familiar siren start up very close by.

Fantastic.

"We should—"

You aren't given the opportunity to finish that sentence. Why?

Because you instead find yourself hauled up and over Rhett's shoulder like a sack of potatoes, entirely unbothered by your startled flailing as he gives your ass a pat that is a little too close to a smack to really count as reassuring.

"Don't worry, strawberry shortcake— we won't leave ya and your short ass legs behind!"

For the first time since you'd arrived in this town, you begin to wonder if you shouldn't have tried to help.

(1) And like Pandora's Box, it seems there's no coming back now that you've unleashed the two of them.

After that day, you begin to see them everywhere.

Not always together, of course, but it feels like you can't go a day without running into one of them — or them into you, sometimes literally.

A jaunt through the residential alleys finds you turning a corner just in time to watch Mikie blow some guy off before the man shoves some bills in his hand and staggers off. He's licking his lips when he turns and notices you, waving before he meanders off. You wave back.

You spot Rhett on the beach when you stop to check on Robin, clad in the tiniest pair of swim shorts you've ever seen and his chest on full display. You think his tits are actually bigger than yours.

You perform at Briar's club every Wednesday night — too many people home at night in the mid-week for robberies to be all that profitable, you've found — and notice familiar faces popping in and out of the crowds as you climb and spin and slide around your pole.

(1) And the more you run into them, the more they seem to seek you out.

You'll go out to case the next house on your hit-list and instead find yourself — sometimes literally — swept into one of their harebrained schemes for the evening instead. Very rarely, you come out net positive, or at least break even with what you would've made on your own—

Most of the time finds you caught in some precarious situation with them or because of them or both.

You've found yourself crammed into too small closets with both of them as you try to avoid getting caught in the factory, every breath threatening to expose all of you with how the metal groans against your combined mass.

You've been caught flat-footed when you squeeze through somewhere they can't fit through only to come face to face with mobsters, monsters, and what feels like everything else in between.

You've been used as bait, as being the smallest makes you the most appealing victim among the three of you — which is true but you certainly don't enjoy the reminder, Rhett — only for their covers to be blown minutes into whatever party or event they'd been trying to infiltrate to cause chaos from within.

Yet, no matter what kind of trouble one of their harebrained schemes lands you in—

(1) They never leave you behind, even when you're adamant that they should.

You've tumbled out of hiding places and gotten hurt by landing wrong, or ending up beneath both of them, or both, only for Mikie to haul your arm over his shoulder to help you hop and limp your way out while Rhett creates a distraction in a different direction.

You've seen them burst into whatever space you'd crawled into from another direction to beat off whatever creep or creature you'd stumbled into.

You've been 'kidnapped' by Rhett when a party only you'd managed to sneak into started turning really fucking weird, slowly becoming more amused than annoyed at how often you find yourself slung over his shoulder as Mikie carries whatever random valuables you'd managed to steal along the way.

And despite your very vocal dislike for their reckless antics, you never quite find it in you to truly turn them down when they corner you with a new dumb, anarchist plot.

. . .When they even bother to give you much of a choice in the matter, anyway.

(1) And eventually you have to admit, at least to yourself, that they've started to grow on you.

Which means when you hear that the pair of them have been arrested and the cops seemed really excited about it, you're quick to grab your lockpicks and head towards the station, dread twisting in your middle.

While it should be a relief that you don't find either of them in the pillories, it only sends alarm skittering down your spine as you sprint towards the police station.

It takes you a few tries to sneak into the compound without getting caught, but the quiet that greets you beyond the reception area only makes you feel worse. There’s nothing quiet about Rhett or Mikie; where were they that you can’t hear them?

It takes a few minutes that feel like hours, but finally you find the two you've almost fondly begun calling your personal headaches— but the sight that awaits you beyond the interrogation door does something to you. Something that has you moving on auto-pilot, a passenger in your own body as a harsh buzz settles in your ears.

Beat to the point of near unconsciousness, three cops surround your erstwhile troublemakers. Both are handcuffed, arms strung up high above their heads — and entirely at the mercy of the roaming, rough hands of the cops surrounding them, who hold nothing back as they pinch and grope and even punch, eliciting a groan from one of the two that only thickens the haze over your thoughts and the brings the white-noise in your ears to a near-deafening volume.

(1) Time moves in snapshots.

One: you’re slipping inside of the room with barely a sound, the rattle of chains shielding the soft click of the door when you close it behind you.

Two: hands that don’t feel like your own find a wooden bat tucked off to the side near the door, doubtlessly confiscated from one of the two boys. Your personal headaches. Your troublemakers. Your boys.

They’d hurt your friends.

Three: the sound of splintering wood fills the air, and between one hazy blink and the next, one of the cops has crumpled to the ground. You feel disconnected from the violence as you swing, catching the next uniformed bastard in the jaw when he turns sharply in your direction, realizing the danger too slowly to avoid the blow. The third has more time, scrambling away as your overhead swing slams into the ground instead. They reach for their belt, and all of your instincts shriek in unison as you throw the bat, the wooden barrel slamming into their face with a sickening crunch that doesn’t even begin to sate the bloodlust coursing through you.

The only one conscious to punish, you pounce the moment they slump back against the wall; the sturdy heel of your combat boots smashes into their kneecap hard enough to make them scream — you snag a fistful of their hair before they can crash to the ground.

(1) You want to slam their face into the wall for every bruise you’d seen on Rhett and Mikie— but something does, eventually, make it past your bloodlust.

Your name.

Your real name, instead of Bubblegum, or Shortcake, or whatever pet name they think is oh-so-clever in the moment, but—

“Aster!”

You’re disoriented as you blink towards them, unsure of which of them even said it — Rhett, maybe? — as something drips down your cheek. A touch finds it red, but you don’t remember even getting hit; a glance down at the bat you’re holding finds it more red than brown, a fact that has your vision swimming a little before Mikie’s voice draws you back.

“Y’just gonna leave us hangin’, Bubblegum?”

Of course not. You’d come here to rescue them.

“Then why don’tcha get to work on these cuffs, yeah?”

Right. Yes. You needed to. . . Do that.

The disassociation holds fast as you work on freeing both of them, the motions smooth and practiced despite how foggy you feel.

They’re both a little shaky as they find their bearings, but somehow you can’t help but feel like somehow they seem concerned about you, but that doesn’t make any sense. You didn’t get arrested, beat, and molested, alongside who knows what else. You just—

(1) You did what you had to.

Sneaking back out of the police station must have been an affair, but you can’t seem to maintain enough focus to remember. When you come back to yourself, the three of you are crammed into the orphanage bathroom even though you have no real memory of even crossing town.

Something tight in your chest relaxes as you watch the both of them go about cleaning themselves up, the world re-orienting itself as Mikie snarks and Rhett replies with something even worse. A pair of wolf whistles cut through the air when you finally start unbuttoning your shirt, and you huff a laugh that is only tinged in a bit of hysteria as you flip them both off.

You hadn’t lost anyone.

You hadn’t lost anyone this time.

Mikie, a classic video game from 1984, was brought to life by Konami, initially gracing arcades before making its way to various home systems. Its gameplay and novel concept quickly won hearts.

Players step into the shoes of a high school student, Mikie, embarking on a quest to gather hearts across different classrooms to woo his girlfriend. The journey unfolds across diverse settings, including classrooms, a cafeteria, and a dance studio, each presenting unique challenges and adversaries.

This game is celebrated for its vibrant music and sound effects, along with the vivid graphics characteristic of its time. Mikie must skillfully dodge or incapacitate teachers, cooks, and other characters to secure all the hearts within each level to progress. The gameplay is a blend of action and strategy, requiring players to meticulously plan their movements while evading or confronting foes.

Mikie holds a special place in the realm of retro gaming, cherished for its distinctive charm and the rigor of its gameplay, epitomizing the inventiveness and pioneering spirit of the 1980s arcade era.

However, it's essential to acknowledge the game's more controversial aspects, which, through a modern lens, reveal it as an early instance of politically incorrect content in gaming.

At its launch, Mikie was part of a cultural landscape less critical of video game narratives, where the breadth of themes in entertainment encompassed those now deemed questionable or potentially harmful to impressionable audiences.

The game's core narrative, depicting a student maneuvering through school to amass hearts and ultimately elope with his girlfriend, reflects actions and attitudes now at odds with current values on education and respect for authority.

Moreover, Mikie's portrayal of conflict resolution through evasion and physical aggression—encouraging players to dispatch school staff to achieve goals—showcases a problem-solving method that diverges sharply from the conflict resolution and respect teachings emphasized in educational settings today.

Additionally, the game's focus on pursuing a romantic interest at the cost of educational disruption may appear to belittle the significance of schooling and student responsibilities.

This portrayal of a school environment, where the primary objective is to abscond with a girlfriend rather than engage in the learning process, might be construed as diminishing the value of education and respect for the educational institution.

In the current era, with a heightened focus on producing content that promotes positive values and behaviors, Mikie stands as a testament to the evolving nature of cultural perceptions and sensitivities.

🎵 Oooh Mikie, You so fineee, You so fine I’ll blow Your mind, hey Mikie~ 🎶