#sizeshifter!quackity

After Quackity grew back, he completely avoided everything to do with magic. He tried to ignore the fact that he had been tiny. He tried to ignore the fact that he had wings. In general, he tried to ignore the fact that fairies existed and that he might be one of them. 

It had been a month since Tommy had thrown the dust on him and he had shrunken to fairy size. He hadn’t been back to the grove since that night and he tried to avoid the forest as much as possible. 

“Me veo muy gacho.” Quackity muttered as he glanced up at his reflection as he finished washing his hands in the restroom. (I look really crappy.) 

There was nothing immediately wrong with his appearance. It was the same tired eyes and crooked beanie as before. But after his visit to the fairies and the discovery that he might be half-fairy, it felt like something changed. Every time he looked in the mirror, it felt like something was missing. He looked too dull, like all the magic and energy had been sucked out of him, too human. 

Nothing had noticeably changed, but Quackity couldn’t help thinking he looked different. 

“Ya me cargó el payaso.” He murmured as he walked out of the restroom and back onto the sales floor for BigBuy. (I am so screwed.)

Quackity went through the motions of the day. Stocking shelves, talking with customers, cleaning up spills. He counted down the hours until his shift was over. There wasn’t anything particularly exciting that he had after planned after work, but at least he wouldn’t be working. 

An hour before his shift ended, Quackity noticed something weird.

There was a white guy in the store. 

The man wasn’t Caucasian, Quackity saw those kind of white people all the time, or nor did he have albinism. But instead the man was an entirely unnatural shade of white. It was almost a complete void of all color, rather than any particular color itself. The stranger’s attire was also weird. Who wears a white 6 piece suit to the grocery store in the suburbs? He didn’t appear to be doing anything out of the ordinary, just buying some berries and-

“Hey! Hey!” 

Quackity train of thought was rudely interrupted. 

“Are we paid to just stand around and stare at the customers?” Juan asked in an irate tone in English. He thought using Spanish on the sales floor was “unprofessional”. 

“No…” Quackity said. 

Juan and Quackity had never gotten along. When Quackity had first started working at BigBuy as a quick way to help pay for his mom’s medical expenses, he never expected to stay there. It was a part time gig at a grocery chain. Nothing serious. Nevermind that the part time gig turned into a full time job that he’s been working for the past few years. Wow his life is depressing. 

Juan, on the other hand, was fully invested. He wanted to work for BigBuy his whole life and become a general manager, or maybe even own a chain. As a result, he took everything way too seriously and got on everyone’s nerves. 

“Time is money Quackity. Do you know how many BigBuy dollars you are wasting right now by just standing around?” Juan stared down at Quackity. 

“I wasn’t aware that we had our own currency.” Quackity retorted, entirely disinterested in dealing with Juan. 

He shifted his weight to peak around Juan slightly to see if he could spot the unusual customer again. 

“We’re not stock boys anymore, Quackity. We need to take this seriously. And you wonder why Schlatt wants me to be assistant manager…” Juan sighed and shook his head. 

“There’s an open position? Schlatt didn’t tell me about that.” Quackity redirected his attention to Juan. 

He thought that he and Schlatt had always had a decent enough relationship, but if the general manager didn’t tell him about the position then maybe he was wrong. The assistant manager position came with a nice pay raise, and Quackity could certainly use the money. 

“Why would he? He knows you don’t have what it takes.” Juan spat. “Go help the customers.” He ordered as he walked away. 

Quackity rolled his eyes. He looked back to where the strange white man had been shopping. 

An empty isle. Damn. There goes his entertainment. 

As Quackity turned to walk down a different isle, he was accosted by the sight of the white man mere inches in front of him. 

“Good afternoon.” The customer said, unperturbed by their proximity. 

“Hello, is there anything I can help you with?” Quackity asked in his best customer service voice. 

“Which of these is pure iron?” The man asked as he pulled two packages of nails that he probably grabbed from the hardware section from his basket. 

“Uh…” Quackity stared at the nails, then looked up at the man creep. 

Whatever the thing before him was, it certainly wasn’t a man or human by any stretch of the imagination. In addition to it being as pale as a porcelain toilet, the creep had unnaturally large irises that were pitch black and long black nails that looked too much like claws to be a simple manicure. 

“Let check me on our app.” Quackity said, defaulting to his customer service script. 

He pulled out his phone to take a picture of the products, but Quackity stopped just shy of pressing the button. Instead of pale, long, claw-like hands, there were regular human hands. Quackity stared in bewilderment. Slowly, he raised the camera up to the creep’s confused face. Instead of showing the phantomesque figure before him, the app showed an average, albeit confused man. 

“Are you alright?” The man(?) asked. 

“I’m fine…” Quackity replied. Thinking quickly, he said, “There seems to be an error with the app. Will you please follow me to the customer service desk?”

“Yes.”

Quackity walked stiffly to the customer service desk. The creep followed directly behind him, sending shivers up his spine the entire time. It felt like turning your back to a bear while it was licking its lips. 

On his way to the customer service desk, Quackity walked by the A/V section. A wall of tvs was to his left and a video camera to his right. The camera was connected to the tvs as a part of a demonstration of the recording and display capabilities. As the creep passed the camera, Quackity looked towards the screens. Each screen perfectly displayed a regular man walking in an identical fashion to the thing behind him, wearing the same clothes and carrying the same basket. 

Maybe Quackity was just going insane. That would explain a lot actually. 

Eventually they reached the customer service desk where Missa comfortably sat. Quackity explained the issue with the nails to Missa. As the creep placed his hand basket on the counter to get the nails, Quackity couldn’t help but look in the basket. Lighter fluid, oil, matches, salt, jars. What was this thing doing?

He glanced over at Missa who was chatting with the creature then pointedly looked at the basket. Missa gave him a look back, he thought it was weird too. 

Missa handed the nails back. 

“It looks like these nails are steel,” Missa handed one box over, “and these are aluminum,” he handed the other box over. 

“Where can I find iron nails?” The creature asked. 

“I would look in the garden section or maybe a hardware store. I do not think we sell them here.” Missa replied. 

Without another word or regard to Quackity, the creature walked off. 

Quackity watched him go, then turned to Missa as soon as he was out of their sightline.

“¿Qué es eso?” He exclaimed. (What is that?)

“…¿un hombre?” Missa replied, confused. (…a man?)

“¿El es un hombre normal?” (Is he a normal man?) Quackity asked, praying Missa would see the same thing Quackity saw.

“No. ¿Qué tipo de hombre compraría clavos mientras llevaría un traje?” Missa wondered. (No. What type of man buys nails while wearing a suit?)

“Pero, el hombre se ve normal?” (But, the man looked normal?)

“Más o menos.” Missa shrugged.  (More or less.)

Quackity groaned.

“¿Sabes sobre el puesto de asistente manager?” Missa changed the subject. (Do you know about the position of assistant manager?)

“Sí, Juan me dijo lo sobre. Quiere el puesto.” (Yeah, Juan told me about it. He wants the position.)

“¿En serio?” Missa groaned. “Si el gana, sería horrible.” (Really? If he won, it would be horrible.)

Quackity nodded grimly. 

“¡Tengo una idea! Debe solicitar. Schlatt le gusta te. ¡Si te ganas, sería genial!” Missa grinned. “No puedo ganar porque Schlatt no me quiere después de tuvo un fight club con los Roombas.” (I have an idea! You should apply. Schlatt likes you. If you win, it would be great. I wouldn’t win because Schlatt doesn’t like me after I had a fight club with the Roombas.”

“No se…” Quackity readjusted his beanie, a nervous habit. (I don’t know.)

“Tu debe solicitar.” Missa pressed. “Por me.” He bat his eyes dramatically at Quackity. (You should apply. For me.)

“Voy a pensar sobre lo.” (I will think about it.) Quackity laughed. 

“¿Vamos a casa de Roier después del trabajo?” Missa leaned back in his chair. (Are we going to Roier’s house after work?)

“No voy.” Quackity shook his head. (I’m not going.)

Whatever happened with the strange man from earlier had to be magical. And if he wanted to more about it, he would have to talk to magical creatures directly. 

“¿Por qué?” Missa looked at Quackity with concern and curiosity. (Why?)

“Necesito hablar con un amigo.” Quackity shrugged, trying to make it not seem like a big deal. (I need to talk with a friend.)

Missa looked more concerned, but thankfully he dropped it.

They chatted about a few other things, soccer, the weather, and the latest neighborhood gossip. Then, Quackity left Missa and began to walk around the store, looking for customers who needed help. He checked his phone. 30 minutes left on his shift. A half hour until he could talk to the fairies. 

————- 

“Hey! Tommy! Tubbo!” 

Quackity had been shouting in the woods for the past ten minutes. He was near the area where he had first found the fairies and where he had met them before, but there was nothing. 

“Fairies! Come out!” He shouted, ignoring the piece of him that questioned if they were deciding to ignore him. 

A woman jogged past him with her dog. She gave him a weird look. 

Quackity smiled awkwardly and waved. He stammered to come up with an excuse, but she was gone too quickly for him to piece together anything semi-plausible. 

Then Quackity heard a light ringing. 

He turned back to the forest excitedly, looking for Tommy or Tubbo. Instead, he found a fairy with a long, pink braid flying a few feet away from him. It was the same one who had attacked Quackity a few months ago and given him the scar below his eye. The fairy seemed to be laughing at his encounter with the jogger. 

Quackity took a cautious step back, curious if the fairy would attack him again but it seemed to show no malice. 

“Who are you?” He scowled, wishing Tommy and Tubbo were there. 

A jingle of bells. 

Right.

“I can’t understand you.” Quackity said. 

The fairy shook his head and seemed to dig around in a satchel tied to his hip. It took Quackity a minute to realize what the fairy was about to do.

“Wait! No-“

It was too late. The fairy threw the pixie dust directly at his face. Quackity felt a sudden wave of vertigo. Then he passed out. 

————- 

Quackity woke up to a pair of ruby red eyes staring directly at him. 

He shouted and backed away on all fours in attempt to put some distance between himself and the stranger. The fairy took a few steps back, equally shocked. 

“Heh?” The fairy let out a confused noise while Quackity tried to get a sense of his surroundings. 

He was tiny again. The woods loomed above him. This was fine. He needed to speak with fairies and to do that he needed to be tiny again. This was exactly what he’d been wanting. No need to freak out. 

“Who are you?” The strange fairy asked. 

His hand was on the hilt of an impressive sword that looked like it could do some heavy damage. Correction: He knew it could do heavy damage. Quackity remembered getting slashed by it at human scale. He didn’t want to know what it could do to him at fairy size. 

“I’m Quackity, I need to speak with Philza.” He said, looking up at the fairy. 

Apart from the very dangerous sword, the fairy seemed to have several other weapons on his person. He looked like a modern day viking. He wore a bright red cape that looked to be made from a Dorito’s bag. Quackity couldn’t help snickering a little at the revelation.

“And you just… shrunk?” The fairy asked. 

“The pixie dust makes me shrink.” Quackity pointed to the pixie dust bag. “I’m half fairy?” He meant for it to be a statement but it came out more like a question. 

The fairy stepped forward and offered Quackity a hand. Quackity happily took it and was unceremoniously yanked to his feet. The strange fairy was strong. That felt wrong somehow, considering Quackity had swatted him away the first time they unofficially met. 

“…and you are?” Quackity asked when the fairy made no move to introduce himself. 

“Oh, Technoblade, Captain of the Sparrow Guard.” 

————- 

“Phil! There’s someone here to see you!” Techno called as soon as he landed on one of the branches of Heart Tree. He placed his hand on a vine wrapping around the tree and channeled his magic through it to ensure it reached the roots where Phil’s lab was. 

Quackity landed with a thump behind Techno. Although, landed may have been a generous term. Quackity clung to the branch and awkwardly scrambled his way to a standing position, holding his hands out for stability once he was standing. Clearly, he needed to work on his landings. 

“Oh? And who’s that?” Phil asked through the vine. 

“He says he’s some sort of half-fairy.” Techno replied, hoping Phil could hear the confusion in his voice through the transmission. 

“Quackity?” Phil said with surprise. “I’ll be right up.”

While they were waiting, Techno guided Quackity into the Heart tree through a carved hole. They were on the main level for the Sparrow Guard, so the interior was covered with weapons, armor, and maps. Phil joined them shortly. 

Quackity seemed to relax when he saw Phil. They greeted each other kindly. 

Techno knew they couldn’t have known each other long, but he still felt slightly awkward. Maybe he should just leave…

“Quackity, I didn’t think you would be back. Tommy and Tubbo miss you.” Phil said with a teasing laugh. 

“Yeah, I thought I was gone for good too.” Quackity replied, readjusting his beanie. “But I’ve got a question.”

“Is that so?”

Techno started to edge towards the door, intending on returning back to patrol. Phil seemed to have the situation under control. 

“Are there other magical creatures other than fairies?” Quackity asked. 

Techno paused. 

“What do you mean?” Phil asked, suddenly serious. 

“I don’t know. There was this really weird guy at work who was white, like as white as snow, except none of the cameras showed it. And now that I’m thinking about it, I’m probably overthinking and I shouldn’t assume you know all about any of that and-“ Quackity began to walk away. 

Techno stared at Quackity. If what Quackity was describing was correct, then the fairies were in serious danger. 

“Did he have black eyes?” Phil asked in a whisper. “And black claws?”

“Yeah, how did you k-“ Quackity was interrupted as Phil swore loudly. 

“That’s not good,” Techno frowned. “What did he do? Did he try and hurt you?”

“What? No.” Quackity sounded alarmed. “Who was that guy?”

“A Federation member.” Techno answered. “Are you sure he didn’t follow you?”

“Yes, I’m sure. What’s the Federation? Why are you so worried?”

“It’s a very powerful guild of wizards.” Phil explained. “Their dark magic warps their bodies and destroys their humanity. Humans can’t generate magic on their own, so they hunt fairies to extract their magic from them. Usually they use glamour spells to hide their true form from humans.”

Quackity shivered at the thought of the Federation member. 

“But then how can I see them? And why didn’t they notice me?” He asked. 

“It probably has something to do with the fact you’re half-fairy. Maybe the contact with pixie dust activated some of the latent magic in you?” Phil mused. The he shook his head to clear his mind. “Techno, if Quackity’s reports have any standing, we need to prepare.”

“On it.” Techno flew away to contact and organize the Sparrow Guard. He already had a strategy in mind. 

————- 

The dust, unfortunately, had not worn off by the time dinner rolled around. However, Phil kindly invited Quackity to join them for dinner. 

It turned out to be far more of a community event than Quackity had initially expected. The whole village gathered in the village center while the chefs brought large platters onto a communal table. 

Tubbo and Tommy were overjoyed to see Quackity again and Quackity would be lying if he said he wasn’t excited to see them. They quickly regaled Quackity with stories about everything they had done since he left. Then, they made it their mission to introduce Quackity to as many fairies as possible, making sure to tell all about how the half-fairy could transform into human size. 

It was nice, but overstimulating. 

Soon enough, Quackity broke away from the party. Instead, he sat on a large (relatively) mushroom outside the town square. He munched on a single berry taken from a much larger raspberry which had served as a centerpiece for part of the communal table. 

“How are you holding up?” Phil asked as he fluttered down beside him. 

“It’s a lot.” Quackity replied. 

He didn’t fully know what “it” referred to. The party? The threat of the Federation? His life in general? But it certainly was a lot. 

“Is that why you took nearly a month to visit again?” Phil asked. 

Quackity looked away. 

“Like I said, it’s a lot.”

“We can help.” Phil offered, not for the first time. He had been so kind to Quackity ever since they had met. 

“I don’t know if you can.” Quackity answered honestly. “Last month, I knew exactly who I was, some guy working at a grocery store making eleven bucks an hour. And now? I don’t know. And I can’t figure out why me. Out of everyone, why me?”

Phil thought for a second. “I don’t know, but like it or not, this is what you are now. It’s a lot easier if you accept that. You can’t pretend nothing ever happened, no matter how much you want to…”

“Yeah? Watch me.” Quackity chuckled dryly. 

“I’m serious, Quackity.” Phil looked at him. 

“I am too. I-I’m not meant for this. I’m nobody, I mean, maybe one day I’ll be assistant manager of the BigBuy, and I don’t even know if I really want that.”

“Do you think it will work? Ignoring this?” Phil asked. 

“No.” Quackity admitted. He couldn’t help thinking about how wrong he looked in the mirror. “There’s nowhere I can run, is there?”

“Not from yourself.”

“So what do I do?”

“Well,” Phil said. “I can’t tell you what to do, that’s for you to decide. Life rarely gives you a choice on who you are, but you get to choose how you react.”

Quackity stared up at the stars. What did he want? 

He didn’t want to ignore the fairies completely. He had missed Tubbo and Tommy over the past month. 

When he first immigrated to Essempi, it had been a big change to a whole new way of living. In some ways, this felt the same and he wasn’t sure if he wanted that. But, he couldn’t ignore it either. Especially if Phil was right and this was a part of his heritage. 

“Techno and I talked it over.” Phil continued. “We have an idea, if you want it. The threat of the Federation isn’t going to blow over anytime soon. They’re like roaches, if you see one there’s probably twenty more hiding nearby. But if they don’t recognize you, then you can warn us in advance, like you just did. And, maybe once a week or so, you can come by, give us a report and we can show you a bit more of what life is like as fairies.”

Quackity thought it over. It didn’t necessarily sound bad per se. 

“What would I tell my friends?” He asked, thinking about the concerned looks Missa had given him. 

“Tell them nothing.” Phil replied. “The Federation is dangerous, not just to fairies.”

“Alright,” Quackity breathed in. “I’ll do it.”

————- 

The next morning Quackity stood in front of his locker in BigBuy. He stared at a little bag filled with fairy dust that Phil had given him the night before. It sat innocently in his much larger hand. Of course, the bag looked much bigger last night. But now it was the size of a small jewelry bag. He could scarcely believe the difference. 

“¿Quacks?” Roier called from behind him. 

Quackity quickly put the bag in his locker and shut the door. He was afraid to keep it on his person. Just one touch of the dust inside the bag would make him smaller than a candy bar. 

“¿Qué onda?” He asked as he turned towards Missa and Roier who were also starting their shifts. (What’s up?)

“Aquí nada más, ¿listos?” Missa replied. (Not much here. You ready?)

“Un momento.” Quackity said. (Just a moment.)

From his bag, he pulled out a filled out application for Assistant Manager. He had printed it out last night after the dust wore off. 

Quackity figured if he was brave enough to stand up to the Federation, he could try to be assistant manager. 

Roier and Missa cheered him on as he walked towards Schlatt’s office, maybe a little louder than necessary. Juan leaned against the wall outside Schlatt’s office. He gave Quackity a nasty glare as he walked in. 

The office was small and smelled of coffee, cigarettes, and alcohol. Schlatt sat behind a desk with a nameplate that read ‘General Manager’.

“Put it in the pile.” Schlatt said, not looking up from the poker game on his computer. 

Quackity did as he was told, placing the application in a pile of similar applications. Then, he turned walk out of the office. 

“I didn’t think you’d apply,” Schlatt said as Quackity reached for the doorknob. 

He turned back to Schlatt. 

“Well, I’ve just been doing a lot of thinking and I believe I’m ready for this and-“

“Did I ask for an explanation? Save it for the interview.” Schlatt frowned. “Now get back to the sales floor. I need you to train the new guy.”

Quackity nodded and left. As he walked onto the sales floor, he scanned for anyone unfamiliar in a BigBuy uniform who might be the new guy Schlatt was referring to. 

Finally, Quackity saw him. 

A man stood a few aisles in front of him with the slightly embarrassed look that came from wearing a minimum wage uniform for the first time. 

Quackity stopped. 

The new employee had skin so pale it looked like a ghost’s and hair whiter than snow. Black claws drummed nervously against khaki pants. His name tag read, ‘Cellbit, Member in Training’. 

Quackity took a sharp breath. 

It was a fairly sunny day, in which Quackity and Sapnap had arranged to have some ice cream, when the sky began to cloud over with black clouds, implying that it would rain or there would be a storm soon.

"Sapnap, we have to get going." Quackity commented a little worried, waiting for his boyfriend to agree. "Come on Quack, it'll only be a few drops of water, we can stay on the street for a while." Sapnap answered, trying to drag Quackity to another place.

"Please Sapnap, I just want to go home." Sapnap just snorted, turning around to look at his boyfriend. “Quackity, we've only been together an hour and you already want to go home? Is there anything more important than spending time together?"

Hearing this, Quackity tried to convince him that he was wrong. "Of course not Sap!" "Then why do you want to leave so soon just for a few small drops of water?!" he answered back, 'a little' flustered. "That’s not-!" "Then why! Why don't you want to be with me!?"

"Sapnap, I do want to be with you but-" He was interrupted by a shiver that went up his spine, beginning to shrink slowly. "Oh fuck-..." Quackity continued to shrink until he was 4 inches tall. He took a step back not daring to look at Sapnap, tripping and falling to the ground.

He noticed how Sapnap bent down to look at him closely, then he closed his eyes tightly, not being able to look at his now big boyfriend. “Q-Quackity?...” he heard him say before feeling something touch his arm and he pulled it away with a yelp.

"I'm sorry!" He apologized with a soft sigh before gently lifting Quackity's head with a finger. "Quackity... I'm not going to hurt you... you know that, right?" He saw Quackity nod slightly before saying.

“I'm so sorry Sapnap, I just panicked a bit…” Sapnap smiled as he ruffled his hair with one finger and then gently lifted him up in his cupped hands. “So… Is this why you wanted to go home?” he received another small nod from his little boyfriend.

“When the weather is bad my body gets weak and loses control over the shifting, so after a short time I shrink. I'm sorry I didn't tell you before Sap, I was afraid of how you might react-” He was interrupted when Sapnap put a finger over his mouth to shut him up.

“I understand Quack, I know it's hard to tell some things sometimes. By the way… You are super adorable being this small!” he exclaimed, giving him a soft hug.

Quackity just laughed at his stupidity. Finally Sapnap started walking, leading Quackity to his house, stopping every now and then, clearly to talk about his size or pay him compliments.

"Sapnap, Can you just help me get home, without all the gushing about how 'fantastical' I am?" he said with a smile seeing the stupid face that was left when he looked at him. "Okay, okay, just don't be so cute next time." he replied with a laugh.

Goggles reflected from the light coming from across the room, a classical steampunk style with varying colours. It had been a pair that Sapnap had gotten him since he had started tinkering with different technologies.

Unlike his fiancé and others, he was entirely human. Which usually led to him mingling with different things to at least catch up with his hybrid friends. Everyone told him that he was fine the way he was, but he couldn’t help but be interested in the factor of electronics.

Especially since he had his time-travelling events, every time it would happen, he would forget so many different things and would have to use notebooks to remember what had happened. It hadn’t happened for a good while though, thankfully.

He had his reasons for picking up this hobby but if he was honest; it was honestly kind of pleasing in a way. He enjoyed tinkering with things, figuring the ins and outs of it only to create something completely different with its components.

In his hands currently was probably a very small object compared to the many other things he had tinkered with. It was a small pocket watch and for some reason it caught Karl’s eye, luring him, and asking to look at what’s inside. He couldn’t help but feel intrigued about it.

He figured that he could make a couple of adjustments such as adding a differing moon cycle, the date and maybe even temperature to the thing to help Karl in certain situations. The reason behind those choices had their reasons.

And maybe because he was just a little bit bored, things hadn’t been entirely pleasant since the establishment of Kinoko kingdom and the disappearance of Quackity…

He continued to fiddle with it, the tool in his other hand is used to get a general look at the components. Then, a knock came from the door, and entered was a familiar sight of his beloved demon, Sapnap. Holding a tray of food with him.

“Hey Karl, you’ve been down here for a while without food. You, okay?”, Karl pulled the goggles from his face that no doubt had left a mark from being on his face for so long. He gave a stretch before turning his desk chair towards Sapnap.

“I’m fine, hon. Just working on a couple of things. How about you?”, there was a soft smile on his face in which Sapnap returned, walking towards Karl’s desk and placing the tray of food down before taking a seat for himself.

“I’m okay, you know. Just worried about Kinoko, Dream and stuff.”, Karl gave him a more reassuring smile and ruffled his hair playfully. He adored his fiancé, though sometimes he had to admit that there would be a bit of distance, not entirely on purpose. They were just giving each other space.

Karl picked up a slice of the pizza that was on the plate and took a bite. He had seemingly forgotten how good the food was as he quickly began to chew it down, happily eating the slice as he hadn’t eaten the entire day. In the corner of his eye, he could see Sapnap smiling at him.

“What time is it, anyway?”, Karl asked in between bites. Had he been so lost in his small project that he had forgotten even the time of day, even to eat? That thought made Sapnap worry, he really didn’t hope that was the case.

“It’s just about to turn to the evening, Karl.”, Karl simply hummed in reply and continued to eat the food that had been given to him. He really didn’t seem to care about the surrounding atmosphere, a tension of worry. At least from Sapnap’s perspective.

Not too long after, Karl had finished his pizza and stood up. He turned to Sapnap with a cunning smile which wasn’t an unknown sight for Karl. His hand moved to reach out to him, offering to take his hand.

“How about we go on a walk? It’s been a while since we’ve spent some time together!”, his tone was reassuring and happy. And Sapnap graciously accepted, grabbing his fiancé’s hand, and stood up, leading then towards the exit of the building.

The two of them walked through the streets of the town they had built, all the beautiful architecture they had both built with so much meaning behind them that some would never even know. Mainly only him, Sapnap and…

There he was, standing there in disbelief. He stood there blankly as if he were in his own thoughts. His hand on one of the walls of the buildings, refusing to let go for whatever reasoning he had… Karl wasn’t sure what to think.

He had changed since he had last seen him, adorned with much tidier clothing and gold, he still wore his signature beanie though. And he still that mark since the incident with Technoblade, it was a lot more healed than since he had last seen it.

And from whatever thought process he was in, he snapped out of it as he noticed the two of them approaching, his head turned with a confident and happy smile, his body language completely changed to one of confidence.

“Karl! Sapnap! Hey, you two! How are you guys doing?”, the tone was characteristically cheerful. Karl grimaced from it; how could he hold such a solemn expression when he was the one who hurt all of them? The one who drew them all apart.

“Hey Quackity!”, he greeted with reluctance. He put away his hesitance and dread in favour of being nice to the familiar face. If not for him but Sapnap, after all the two of them were still on good terms compared to him and Quackity.

Though, it didn’t seem that he wasn’t quite good in his acting as he was caught red-handed. Quackity seemed to have noticed his mood, as his expression turned to one of concern. Causing Sapnap to become confused, who also turned to Karl.

“Karl? Are you okay?”, Quackity reached out his hand to Karl’s shoulder, the other reaching towards his cheek. He could only slap the hand away and shake off the other. He didn’t want Quackity’s concern or pity.

He turned his head away, turning to walk away from the two. But a hand to his arm caught it, he turned angrily to see Quackity’s worried expression. Why was he so concerned about him? After what he had done?! Quackity opened his mouth to speak but Karl cut him off…

“Leave me alone, will you?! Don’t think I haven’t forgiven you! Especially after what you did!”, Quackity let go of his hand as his expression turned to one of confusion. Karl turned away with tears in his eyes, running away.

…

He ran into the woods until his lungs ached and begged for air, he didn’t want to stop but his body complained otherwise. He could only lean back against a tree, alone in a forest as night would most probably come soon. Not only that but he would have two people searching for him.

He didn’t want this, he wanted to be left alone. He thought he’d be fine, but Quackity had caused him to spiral all over again. He knew that the loss of his life was only an accident, but he couldn’t help but blame Quackity for it, it had hurt him after all.

He wasn’t surprised to see a giant Quackity in the distance searching for him. And he wasn’t sure if he wanted to be found in the first place, but he knew that he’d have to return eventually or Sapnap would most probably burn down the forest in a blind panic.

He could hear the giant yell out his name, profusely. His tone was clearly desperate and worried, and Karl had sworn that he could’ve heard some heartbreak in his tone, at if at any moment he could break down. Had he really been that worried Karl?

And minutes passed...

Which turned into a couple of hours, he thought…

Or was he really just that deep in thought?

…

“Karl!”, he sounded relieved. He looked up to see a Quackity staring down at him from a distance, tears were in his eyes. And on his shoulder was his fiancé, Sapnap. Who was probably just as worried as Quackity was?

Not too long after, Sapnap was gently put down on the ground and running towards Karl in a worried frenzy. Karl stood up to greet him, only to be tackled into an embrace from Sapnap. He almost sent the two flying to the ground but the two stopped due to his strength.

“Oh, Karl! I was so worried!”, his embrace became even tighter as Sapnap placed his chin on top of his head. Squeezing reassuringly and mumbling something to Karl in an attempt to keep calm after finding him. Karl turned towards Quackity, who spoke.

“Karl, what happened? Is something wrong? Why did you run off like that?”, Quackity’s hand once again reached towards him, but it was more of an offer for comfort if Karl so desired. He seemed hesitant and scared.

Karl wanted to lash out at him, but that would only make everything worse. He had already tried to run away from the situation and yelling had done nothing. It would most probably be better if he handled it calmly. He leaned in closer to Sapnap’s hold.

“Quackity, do you remember when I lost that life all that time ago?”, Quackity fumbled for a moment. Seemingly trying to remember whatever had happened all those months ago, and finally, he seemed to have caught on.

“Oh, Karl…”, the hand clenched and pulled away. His expression was grimaced and angry, not only that but heartbroken. He felt guilty and sorry, he had pushed that incident aside and hoped to have forgotten about it, but it seemed to have affected Karl more than he thought.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to… I didn’t think it would’ve affected you this badly when you said that you needed space, I didn’t think you…”. He stopped, and Karl could just see that he regretted everything.

And another thing was that Karl had never stopped loving Quackity…

“Quackity.”, he made Sapnap let go of him and let him walk towards his gigantic fiancé. Although there were tears in his eyes, there was a smile on his face. He felt relieved that Quackity had apologised, sure, they would have to work on multiple things, but it was a start.

“I’m sorry.”.

Quackity turned back towards him in disbelief and went to ask something but stopped himself. He simply sighed and reached out his hand towards Karl and Sapnap, allowing them to climb onto his hand as he brought them towards his cheek.

Mcyt g/t tag list:

Flying to the fairy village was both much longer and much shorter than expected. Quackity was quite adamant about not wanting to fly and the possibilities of falling. But after Tommy picked him up and dropped him from the lowest branch on a berry bush to get him over the initial fear, Quackity took to it naturally. He seemed to steer almost instinctually and, while not what Tubbo would consider graceful, he did possess a certain agility. 

Once they rose above ground level, Quackity’s mouth was wide open. His eyes shined bright with wonder at every little thing. 

“I never knew it could all be this beautiful,” he whispered. 

Quackity continued to gawk as Tommy and Tubbo guided him to the fairy village.

“We’re here!” Tubbo said when they finally reached the mushroom circle. 

“What? There’s nothing here.” 

Quackity stared at the circle of large mushrooms and surrounding trees. The grass inside the circle was downtrodden and seemed to form various spirals and designs, but that was the only real indication of any disturbance. 

“Of course there is!” Tommy tugged at Quackity’s arm, pulling him towards the circle. 

Quackity screamed with surprise and flailed as he was pulled down and towards the mushrooms. He temporarily forgot to flap his wings, throwing both of them off balance and dragging them further down. Tommy’s pulling quickly turned into Quackity wildly grasping at his arm to keep from plummeting to the ground far below. 

“Big Q! You’ve got to flap your wings!” Tommy called, flapping his own wings twice as quickly to try in vain to slow the descent. 

“What?” Quackity was practicing clawing Tommy’s arm as he clutched onto the only semi stable object in the air. 

“Flap your wings!” Tubbo yelled. He was trying to keep pace with Tommy and Quackity’s descent while also avoiding the chance that Quackity would pull him into the chaos as well. 

Quackity started to flap but it was too little too late. They crashed into the dirt just in front of one of mushrooms. Tubbo carefully landed next to them. 

Quackity groaned as Tommy picked himself up and started trying to brush the dirt and mud off of himself. 

“Come on! Get up.” Tubbo said when Quackity continued to lay on the ground. 

“I should be dead, that was like… a 60 foot drop.” 

“It wasn’t too bad. Tommy’s fallen from twice that distance and he’s fine.”

“Yeah, exactly.” Tommy looked up. 

“Well, fine might be an overstatement. We haven’t checked for brain damage.” Tubbo reconsidered. 

“Hey!”

As Tommy and Tubbo began to bicker, Quackity picked himself up. True to Tubbo’s word, he was fine apart from being a bit muddy. Maybe fairies were tougher than they looked? Still, he’d have to wash his uniform when he got home. If he got home. 

Quackity looked up at his surroundings. They were just inside the mushroom circle and it had completely transformed. The mushroom seemed more like a small building, complete with a door in the stem. And beyond it were other small buildings and structures. Some were constructed from mud, sticks, or leaves, but there were also flowers and mushrooms that served as buildings while growing straight out of the ground. While there weren’t any other nearby fairies, Quackity could see a few flying around. Meanwhile, the boundary of the mushroom circle was clear to see from the inside. There was an iridescent, almost bubble-like barrier separating the fairies from the rest of the world. 

“It’s… wow!” Quackity was at a loss for words. The village was so beautiful and looked so different from any other place he had been that he had to stop and stare. 

“Yeah, it’s alright.” Tubbo said when he noticed Quackity’s amazement. “Come on, we need to go find Phil.”

Tubbo grabbed Quackity’s hand and led him through the village, forcing Quackity to move quickly instead of gawking at everything. Tommy followed behind them, chattering and pointing out various points of interest. They made their way through a large plaza where various fairies were trading goods and to the base of a large tree. 

Tommy placed his hand on the wood. It glowed red and white for a moment, then the bark shifted. Quackity watched as a door-sized hole in the tree opened up before his very eyes to reveal a hollow inside that was illuminated by designs of glowing moss. Tubbo stepped inside and Quackity hesitantly followed. Tommy took up the rear. The door closed as soon as he took his hand off the tree. 

“What is this place?” Quackity asked. 

“This is the Heart. We use it for a lot of things. Techno’s probably on the top branches with the rest of the Sparrow Guard. Then we’ll have lessons towards the middle. But we’re going down to the bottom, where Phil’s at. He deals with all the magic and healing stuff.” Tubbo explained, as he walked towards a mushroom staircase. 

Tommy caught Tubbo’s arm. “Do we have to tell him about… you know?” He nodded his head toward Quackity. 

“How can we not?” Tubbo replied. 

“I-just, trust me. You know how he’ll react.” Tommy lowered his voice. 

“But this is serious! Tommy, we don’t have time for your family drama.” 

“Please. Come on, Tubbs.” Tommy pleaded. “Can we at least try my way first?”

Tubbo sighed. 

“I’ll play you for it.”

“Rock, Dust, Leaf!” The boys chanted as they mimed something like Rock, Paper, Scissors. 

“Dust lifts leaf! I win!” Tommy cheered. 

Tubbo sighed. 

“Alright Big Q,” Tommy started, turning towards Quackity, “Stay here while we go down and talk to Phil.”

“What if someone comes?” Quackity asked. 

“I don’t know! Say you’re from another village or something? You can figure it out. Just stay here.”

Quackity watched as Tubbo and Tommy flew (literally) downstairs. 

“Que la verga…” He swore, after a moment alone. 

His first moment alone since the transformation had happened. The situation seemed even more real now that Tubbo and Tommy weren’t by his side. It all came crashing down. 

He was, somehow, absolutely tiny in the middle of a magical fairy village and he didn’t know if he was ever going to get back to normal. He would never see his home country again. It was far for him even when he could use regular transportation, but now… He would never see his family again. Would they even know what happened to him? Or would they think he was stuck up and simply refusing to talk? That he had gotten too good for them while in Essempi? 

Quackity’s heart ached and his hands trembled.

What was going to become of him?

————

Tommy and Tubbo made their way down to Phil’s workshop nestled under the roots of the tree. As they expected, Phil was calmly working on weighing out fairy dust in one corner of the large room. He looked up as they entered. 

“Hey boys!” Phil said with a smile. 

“Phil, the biggest man ever! How are you doing?” Tommy said with false cheer. 

“I’m doing fine. How about you? Shouldn’t you and Tubbo be patrolling the southeast meadow?”

“Well, yes but…” Tubbo began. 

“But we got into an argument, Tubbo and I. And, well, you know how we get when we’re arguing. We, we really just get in it, yeah? And we just can’t focus on anything else til we get it settled.” Tommy butted in. 

“Can’t focus.” Tubbo echoed, nodding along. 

“So we figured we would come to you for an answer.”

Phil sighed fondly and shook his head. “What’s the problem?”

“Well… Let’s say you, hypothetically, threw a bunch of pixie dust at a human and, hypothetically, that human went VWOOF and shrank and turned into a fairy. How would you, hypothetically, go about fixing him?” Tommy spoke very quickly. 

Phil stared. 

“What?” 

Tommy opened his mouth to repeat himself, but Phil interrupted him. 

“Tommy, what did you do?” Phil stood up from his seat. 

“Nothing!” Tommy said defensively. “It’s just a hypothetical.”

“Where are they?” Phil looked at Tommy. 

“Who?” 

“The human, Tommy.” Phil massaged his eyebrows. 

“Look it’s just a hyp-“

“Tubbo?” Phil looked over to Tubbo. 

“Upstairs.” Tubbo answered, pointing to the staircase. 

Phil climbed the stairs with Tommy and Tubbo at his heels. 

When he got to the ground floor, Phil paused. It was hard to believe that Tommy’s story was true, but he knew his son too well to believe any half-baked lie either. He stared at the person in front of him. 

“Who are you?” He asked bluntly, forgetting his manners in favor of his curiosity and shock. 

“My name is Quackity, I’m from out of town?” Quackity said. 

“Jig’s up.” Tubbo said from behind Phil. 

“You used to be human?” Phil asked with a tone of disbelief. 

Quackity winced but nodded. 

————- 

An hour or so later, Quackity was seated in Phil’s workshop. 

“So, how do you fix me?” Quackity asked after he had told Phil everything about his interactions with Tubbo and Tommy as well as the day’s events. He had to stop several times when Phil would ask questions or when Tommy and Tubbo would clarify something from their perspective. 

Phil thought for a moment. 

“I don’t know.”

Quackity’s heart dropped. What did Phil mean? Tubbo and Tommy had assured him that Phil would know how to fix him. Would he be stuck this way forever?

Phil continued. “I have never seen or heard of anything like this. Ever. I’m sorry. This isn’t supposed to happen with pixie dust and humans. I don’t know if it’s permanent or if it will ever wear off or if there’s some sort of trigger. You’re not human anymore but you’re also clearly not a fairy.”

Quackity froze. Was that it? He would never go home. He would never see his family again. His friends would never know what happened. He wanted to cry. 

“What I can do is help you acclimate. I know it can be really difficult to adjust to a new way of life, so I want to help you in any way I can. We have an extra room that you can stay in.” Phil offered. He looked like he wanted to say more but he didn’t. 

Quackity nodded and forced himself to say something. 

“T-Thank you.”

“And don’t worry,” Tubbo said with sincerity in his eyes, “Tommy and I will be there every step of the way.”

Tommy nodded. 

“Thank you.” Quackity repeated. His mind had gone numb and it seemed the easiest thing to say. 

Phil reached for Quackity’s hand, grounding him more. 

“In the village, I work as the Dust Keeper, which means that I am in charge of taking care of all of the pixie dust for the village.” Phil spoke gently. “Pixie dust is very important because it allows fairies to do more complex spells than they could accomplish without it. Because of that, I am generally an expert in magic and it’s part of my job to keep the villagers healthy, both magically and physically.”

Quackity nodded. He was processing the information, barely. 

“So,” Phil continued, “would it be okay if I gave you a quick checkup? It’ll be just like a doctor’s visit, just without the lollipop.”

“What’s a lollipop?” Tommy asked. 

“It’s nothing. Nevermind it.” Phil wave him off. 

“Um, yeah, sure.” Quackity said. “A checkup can’t hurt.”

Phil led Quackity to stand in a different part of the room. He took his pulse, then examined Quackity’s arms and legs. He studied his nails, teeth, eyes, and ears. Finally, Phil examined Quackity’s wings. He lightly touched the edge of Quackity’s wings. The wings shot up and Quackity jumped unused to the feeling. 

“Good reflexes,” Phil chuckled. 

Phil continued his examination. When he was finished examining Quackity’s wings, he faced Quackity. 

“What’s the diagnosis?” He joked. 

“For the most part, you seem to be in perfect health.” 

“For the most part?”

Phil nodded. “It looks like some of your human features transferred over. Your ears are rounded and you don’t have claws or sharp teeth. But, given everything, it shouldn’t be too concerning.” 

“Okay, okay. Good.” Quackity breathed a sigh of relief. “So we’re done?”

“Not quite. I still need to check on your magic.” 

“I don’t have magic.” Quackity shook his head.

“Yeah you do!” Tubbo called from the other side of the workshop. 

“You made the cards disappear and you can read minds!” Tommy said, next to Tubbo. 

“What?” Quackity looked at them in confusion. “No! Those were just tricks and illusions, not magic.”

“Still.” Phil said. “It would be better just to see.”

“Alright.” Quackity nodded. 

Phil took a hollowed beetle horn from the wall and poured a circle of fairy dust onto the ground. Quackity watched in awe as he poured, a sense of wonder nestled itself in his heart. As Phil poured the golden dust, it didn’t stay on the ground. Instead, specks floated up into the air and hovered. The whole ring seemed to glow. 

Phil gestured for Quackity to enter the ring, then he turned towards Tubbo and Tommy.

“It would probably be good if Quackity sees this before I examine him.”

Tubbo and Tommy both entered the circle. They all stood a distance from each other along the edge of the ring. Only Phil stayed in the center. 

Quackity watched with wide eyes and Phil slowly raised his hand and all of the dust rose from ground to form a glowing, golden curtain. 

“So what we want to do,” Phil called to Quackity as he walked towards Tommy, “is to focus our magic and channel it outwards. The key is to focus on the magic, not anything else.”

Tommy cupped his hands and then expanded the space slowly, until it looked like he was holding an invisible baseball. 

Then there was a flash and Quackity gasped. 

Levitating in his hands was a ghostly flower unlike anything Quackity had seen before. Its petals glowed a bright red and white. 

Phil continued to explain something about the health of the flower and how it was tied to person, but Quackity was too entranced by the flower to pay attention to what Phil said. 

Then, Tommy clapped his hands together and the flower disappeared. 

Phil moved on to Tubbo, who repeated similar steps. When his flower appeared, it looked different than Tommy’s. Tubbo’s flower was a different species and it glowed green and brown. Phil started to explain how things like shape and color were influenced by a fairy’s family. Family lines, apparently, were traced through flower colors. Every fairy had bicolor flowers, inheriting one color from the maternal line and the other from the paternal line. 

Like Tommy, Tubbo clapped his hands together and the flower disappeared. 

Then Phil made his over to Quackity. 

“Are you ready to try then, mate?” Phil asked with a warm smile. 

It wouldn’t work. Quackity knew it wouldn’t work. He wasn’t magical like that. There was nothing special about his family. 

“I don’t know if I can.” He said with disappointment. 

“Let’s try it anyways,” Phil said, “I’ll help you through it.” He held out his hands for Quackity. 

Quackity steeled himself with a breath, then placed his hands in Phil’s. 

Phil carefully guided Quackity through the same steps and motions that Tommy and Tubbo had just performed. 

Quackity felt something weird in the pit of his stomach. The feeling grew heavy. As Phil guided Quackity’s hands into the last position, the feeling swelled. A jolt of energy ran through Quackity. There was a sudden flash. Then, Quackity felt something warm and almost magnetic in his hands. 

He looked down. 

In his hands was the same magical flower that Tubbo and Tommy had created. He stared in shock. It was his! He created something magical!

Phil looked equally shocked. 

“Why’s it look so bad? Is Quackity alright?” Tubbo asked with concern. 

Quackity glared at Tubbo. It was his flower and it was beautiful! How dare Tubbo say anything contrary! But he was right, the flower did seem different than the others. 

It was much smaller than the other two and some of the petals seemed to be missing. The petals that were present were solely a deep navy blue instead of multiple colors. 

Phil looked closely at the flower. 

“The brightness is good. The size is a bit concerning. It ought be to larger, but after such a large magical transformation, especially without preparation… Rest should fix that.” Phil muttered to himself. “As for the color…” He looked up at Quackity. “How long have you known about fairies?” 

“About two months.” Quackity answered honestly. 

“Are you sure?” Phil asked. 

“What?” How was Quackity supposed to respond to that? It may not have been two months exactly, but it’s couldn’t have been any more than three months. 

“You can finish the spell.” Phil said. “I think I know what’s going on.”

Quackity clapped his hands together. They passed through the flower and the flower disappeared. Quackity could feel a rush of energy when it disappeared, as if the magic was going back into his body. 

Phil waved his hands and the pixie dust surrounding them fell back to the ground. 

“So?” Quackity asked. “What is it?”

“There were two things that I was expecting to see from you. Either you wouldn’t have any magic at all or your flower would identical with Tommy’s. If you were completely human, then you wouldn’t be magical and the spell wouldn’t have worked. But if Tommy, somehow, transformed you into a fairy, you would have inherited his magical traits.”

“Wait, I’d be his father?!” Tommy exclaimed. 

“But that didn’t happen?” Quackity questioned. His flower was unique. 

Phil nodded. “It didn’t. And only half the flower was there. But magic has to be inherited from somewhere, so it’s likely that one of your parents was a fairy, making you half-fairy. It would explain why you reacted so strangely to the dust.”

For a second time that day, Quackity felt his world crash down around him. It couldn’t be. It was impossible. He grew up far, far away from the forest, he couldn’t be the son of a fairy. 

He heard himself laughing. 

“Yeah, sure.” He heard himself say. “Why the hell not?”

“Are you alright?” Tubbo asked. 

“What do you think?” Quackity shot back. 

No, of course he wasn’t alright. If it were true, and a large part of Quackity wanted to insist that it wasn’t, then that would mean that his family, his mother, had kept this from him for years. Why wouldn’t they tell him?

“I’m sorry you had to find out this way.” Phil said sympathetically. “There’s very little that I know about half fairies, but feel free to ask me anything while you get settled.”

“Thanks,” Quackity said. “Right now, I just want to process one life altering thing at a time.”

“Of course,” Phil nodded, “it’s getting late. As I promised, you can stay at my home as long as you need.”

Phil led Quackity up and out of the workshop. They walked away from the center of the village and towards a large mushroom that was, apparently, Phil’s house. 

But the whole time Quackity couldn’t help but think about what Phil had told him. He had been lied to his whole life. He wasn’t fully human and no one had bothered to tell him. It circled around and around in his mind without any clear resolution. 

Phil led Quackity to the guest room which was part of the hollowed out cap of his mushroom house. The floor was made of pine needles woven together so Quackity was a little concerned about its strength, but when he stepped on it, it proved durable. Yet another reminder of how small he was. 

“Welcome to the hotel Minecraft,” Phil said as he pulled back the curtain to what would be Quackity’s room for the foreseeable future. He ignored Tommy’s questions about what a hotel was. “It’s a little sparse on the amenities, but the bed is made of cotton tufts with spider silk blankets, so that should be comfortable. And we’ll have breakfast in the morning.”

Quackity forced a smile and a nod. 

“Usually, Techno’s here too, but he drew the short stick for nightly patrol and he won’t be back till morning.” Tommy said. 

“We’ll be just a call away if you need anything.” Phil tried to assure Quackity. 

Then, they both left him. 

Quackity lay down on the bed. He tried to curl up as best he could, but his wings still stuck out. He stayed awake, but his mind drifted. 

Was this what his life was going to be from now on? Would it ever go back to normal?

He lay on the bed for hours, awake and afraid. It felt like the first night he spent in Essempi, when he had been alone in his freshman dorm room. The giant yawning abyss of reality and an unfamiliar future opening up in front of him. 

Then a jolt of pain ran through him. Quackity winced. His muscles hurt as he tried to relax. He had never had a panic attack before, but after the day’s events he was sure he was overdue. Yeah, that must be it. 

Quackity breathed slowly, trying to remember the grounding techniques that Missa had once talked about. 

He just needed to find five things he co-Another jolt of pain hit him. His muscles seized and his lungs felt tight. In fact, everything felt tight. 

This wasn’t normal. He needed help. 

“Phil?” He called, stumbling out of his room. “Phil, something’s wrong!”

Another jolt ran through him. They were faster now. He gripped the wall to steady himself. 

“Quackity?” He heard Phil say. Cool hands grabbed his arm. “You’re burning up!”

“I need- I need-“ Quackity tried to figure out the words, but it was harder than usual with the tightness closing in. He needed air. 

Instead, he pushed Phil aside and made a break for the ladder that led out of the mushroom. He stumbled on the rungs and fell a small way to the ground floor. 

Quackity shakily ran out of the home and further away from the village. It all felt like too much. He had to get away. 

His muscles seized again while he was running and he dropped to the ground. Things seemed quieter now and he couldn’t see the light from the village. He must have been outside the boundary. 

He grit his teeth as another jolt of pain ran through him. Why couldn’t it stop?

The tightness was still there, worse than before. His breathes came low and shallow. A sense of vertigo hit him. Quackity closed his eyes. 

Suddenly the tightness stopped, the pressure eased, and the pain receded. 

Quackity opened his eyes. He pushed himself to a sitting position and looked down at the grass. He looked down at the grass. He was human again. 

Quackity smiled. Then fell back on the ground and laughed. It was finally over. 

He looked up at the sky. While the stars were still bright, he could see the first blue hours of the morning. 

But that night?

What the hell, he figured, if the monsters wanted to eat him then at least he wouldn’t have to deal with work the next day. 

However, what he discovered was far from any monster. There were beautiful fairies that lived in the woods. They were tiny, no bigger than the width of his hand, but they showed almost no fear of him. Quackity was enamored by them and their antics. The only trouble was that everything they said sounded like little jingling bells ringing in his ears, but that was minor. Almost every day he would visit them after his shift was over and they would hang out. 

Today was no different. As soon as he had clocked out and said his goodbyes, Quackity rushed to the forest. He made his way deeper and deeper into the forest until he reached an idyllic little grove encircled by trees and berry bushes. 

“Hey! Fairies! I’m here!” He called out, looking around. 

It was unusual for them to not be waiting for him when he arrived. Quackity was more than loud enough for them to know he was coming. For a second, his heart drooped, wondering if they had forgotten him or had gotten bored of him. Then he heard the chime of little bells. 

“Where are you?” 

He turned around looking for the source. At the corners of his vision he saw glimpses of the green and red fairies he had come to know. Despite being so small, the two were incredibly fast. 

Quackity chuckled to himself, realizing this was some game of chase. As he took a step toward the fairies, the red fairy flew directly in front of his face. He was so close that Quackity had to go cross eyed to see the little thing. 

“What are you-“ Quackity got cut off as the red fairy chucked two big handfuls of golden dust directly into his face. Quackity was so shocked, he didn’t move. 

It felt strange. The dust tingled where it hit him. And everything suddenly felt removed from itself, like he was deep under water. Then, Quackity passed out. 

—————

“-re we going to do?”

“Don’t ask me! This wasn’t supposed to happen!”

“It was your plan!”

“That doesn’t mean I thought it through, Tubbo!”

“… Do you think we killed him?”

Quackity groaned. 

Everything ached and the loud voices around him didn’t help. Why couldn’t everyone just shut up? 

He opened his eyes to find that he was staring up at a grouping of several oddly shaped green pillars and the sky above it. Somewhere out of view and a bit above him, the argument continued on. 

He lay there for a moment more, taking stock of himself. Overall, Quackity felt fine, a little disoriented but that was to be expected. He couldn’t explain it, but something felt off, just not in a bad way. 

He rolled on his side and started to get up when he heard someone shouting. 

“Holy shit, Big Q, you’re awake!” A loud voice yelled. 

A guy dropped out of the sky in front of him. Quackity scrambled back. 

“Oh my gosh, Big Q, Tubbo and I were so worried. We thought we’d killed you! Humans aren’t normally supposed to react that way to pixie dust.” The guy rambled though Quackity wasn’t listening. Instead, he was focused on the vivid red wings that fluttered on the man’s back. 

“What the-Are you my fairies?” Quackity said breathlessly. 

“Saying we’re your fairies is a bit rude. We belong to the forest. But yeah.” Another guy said as he landed next to the first fairy. “I’m Tubbo and that’s Tommy.”

Quackity stared, too dumbfounded to speak. Knowing about the existence of fairies was one thing. But this was entirely different. When they were small, it was easier to rationalize them, like pets or interesting insects. But now, Quackity could see every micro expression on their faces and every worried glance they gave each other. It gave another element to the situation that seemed to humanize the forest dwellers even more. Wait, why could he see them that well? Quackity looked around again, the green pillars were not pillars at all! They were blades of grass! Quackity was tiny! 

“You shrank me?!” 

Both fairies looked sheepish. 

“We didn’t mean too!” Tubbo said and, wow, did it seem weird for Quackity to hear his voice. It cemented the reality of the situation. 

“Here let me help you up.” Tommy said, offering a hand towards Quackity. 

Quackity took it and was surprised by the strength and solidness of Tommy’s grip. Tommy pulled him to his feet and Quackity stared. The fairy was nearly a head taller than him. This was so wrong. 

“So?” Quackity said with all the patience of someone who had just finished up a very long and trying shift. “WHY AM I THE SIZE OF A BLADE OF GRASS?”

“It’s Tommy’s fault.” Tubbo said quickly. “We wanted to use some pixie dust on you to make you understand us, but after we sprinkled it on you, you just went BAM on the ground and then VWOOOF our size.”

“How is that my fault?” Tommy said.

“It’s your dust.” Tubbo replied. 

“It’s my dad’s dust!” Tommy shot back. “How was I supposed to know it was going to do this?” He gestured at Quackity. 

“Wait! It wasn’t supposed to do this?” Quackity said. So now not only was he dealing with some crazy magic, he was also dealing with crazy magic that not even the magical people understand? Great. 

“Look, every story I’ve ever been told about pixie dust on humans is that it’s just supposed to make them understand you, and maybe help them fly, but that’s only if there’s a butt-ton of dust used. There is ab-sol-lutely nothing like this.” Tommy said authoritatively. 

“So if it’s just dust, then can we just brush it off me? And then I will go back to normal?” Quackity asked, already brushing dirt and dust off his work clothes. He turned around to try and get as much dirt off as possible. It felt a lot coarser than usual, probably because of how small he was at the moment. 

“Afraid not, pixie dust usually gets absorbed by the skin pretty qui…” Tommy trailed off. “Tubbs, you seein’ this?” He whispered. 

“Mm-hmm,” Tubbo nodded, wide-eyed. 

“What?” Quackity turned back around. 

Carefully, Tubbo approached him. Tubbo put his hand on Quackity’s back and he flinched. Except Tubbo’s hand wasn’t touching Quackity’s back… 

Quackity looked over his shoulder and jumped back. 

“I HAVE WINGS?!?” He yelled loud enough for the whole forest to hear. 

On his back were two fine gossamer wings with a golden tint. They had been lying flat on Quackity’s back until Tubbo touched them and now they were slowly unfurling. If felt almost like a jacket against his back, if you could also feel your jacket. What was happening to him?

Tubbo looked over at Tommy. “We need to tell Phil.”

“Are you sure?” Tommy said. “If we tell him, we’re going to have to tell him how this happened, you know he won’t be happy that we stole the dust.”

“Do we look like we know how to do anything about this?” Tubbo looked over at Quackity, who was slowly but intentionally opening and closing his wings while staring deliberately at them. 

“Fine.” Tommy scowled. “Hey, Big Q!”

Quackity looked up. 

“We need to head out. We’re going to go to someone that can help explain everything.” 

Quackity smiled. “And he’ll be able to fix everything? That’s great. Which way are we walking?” 

The voice came from behind him, the ornate table in front of him empty and shrouded in shadows. Sapnap shifted uncomfortably in the chair he was tied to, the ropes rubbing uncomfortably against his now bare wrists. He saw his gloves laid on that table in front of him, now replaced with power suppressant cuffs. Great, so whoever took him wasn’t stupid. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but you’d better let me go this instant. It’s a federal crime to hold a hero hostage.”

“Oh we know, Mr. number 2 hero. But I think you’ll find that we’re wanted for worse.” The voice said before a shadowy figure finally stepped into his line of sight.

The man was fairly average in height and build, but that wasn’t what made him intimidating. No, the glistening black wings longer than he was tall and deadly sharp talons that reflected in the dim torchlight made him quite fearsome looking all on their own. Azrael. The top villain of the greater smp and leader of a group called the Syndicate, an organization of some of the most feared villains in the public eye. The villain glared at Sapnap, icy blue eyes visible behind the crow skull he wore. “You have something that belongs to us.”

“You’re mistaken, unfortunately. Anything I have that I took from you was rightfully someone else’s to begin with. I have no quarrel with you outside of the battlefield.” Sapnap said, doing his best to maintain his professional anti-conflict hero tone that he’d been trained to use. The villain loomed over him, the eye contact prolonged and uncomfortable. Sapnap knew that he was trying to read for any expression, but they were at a standstill. Perks of having blank white eyes in this more humanoid form that the hero agency requested he take during missions (as to not scare the kids or something) meant that he was hard to read. He mentally thanked his dad for picking up that trait, as even though his father was kind, Bad was fucking terrifying.

“Liar.” Was all the villain said before more people came into his view. Not all the members of the syndicate were here, Sapnap noted, but the recognizable ones were Phase, a villain who could teleport, Thunder, a villain with a pretty self explanatory power, and Metis, a villainess who could read people’s feelings and the basic gist of thoughts and just also happened to have deadly aim with a dagger. He took a few moments to wonder where Azrael’s right hand man Blood God or presumed son Psychosis were before remembering they’d both been missing in action for a few months now. Ignoring the few other hooded figures and some minor villains, the only person who Sapnap was actually surprised to see was Brutus, a [seemingly] young new vigilante on the scene who’d made a habit of specifically targeting Azrael in fights and running from everyone else, heroes included. Everyone seemed oddly chill with him being there, in fact everyone seemed to be going out of their way to look any direction other than his.

“Where are the rest of you.” Sapnap asked, more a demand than a question. He could almost hear Azrael’s smile in his response. “Observant, aren’t we, Blaze? Well, the rest of us are going to be taking care of your little friends. I’ll call them off if we get what we want out of you, but if not, we’ll have to get answers from Dream and Nightcap. It likely won’t be hard with your life on the line. As for right now, though, they haven’t noticed your absence. So let’s make this easy; you give us what we want, and you’ll be free to return home before they even notice you’re gone! Everyone wins, really.”

“For the last fucking time I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Sapnap sneered. Azrael looked like he was going to respond, but Metis suddenly spoke up. “He’s telling the truth. He really doesn’t know what we want, he’s just that stupid.” “Hey!” “Fine,” Azrael sighed. “Phase, his bag, please.” At that, Sapnap paused. What could they possibly want from his bag? It was just a bunch of his hero junk and-

Oh. Oh fuck.

Metis noticed his falter immediately. “He’s afraid.” She announced, turning her attention to Azrael who looked back at Sapnap with a glare in his eye that could kill a man weaker than a professionally trained hero. “So you do know what we want then.” He said, pulling something out of the bag. Red sunglasses. Round, gold rimmed thick bright red sunglasses. “If you’re so innocent, tell me, Blaze, how you got these? Or better yet, the rest of it?” Azrael spat, shoving his bag over on the table and knocking the contents everywhere. A red button up, gold corset, black and red pinstripe dress pants and red heeled leather shoes. A black dress coat with an insignia on the back, a red star encompassed by a horizontal diamond. A logo that had haunted the hero agency for years. The symbol of a gang with a leader so evil and cunning that he’d not only evaded capture, but evaded any forward malpractice in his casino so no one could legally shut it down. Sure everyone knew a villain ran the casino as a front for crime, but legally, there was no evidence, so it became a hub of drugs, violence, and information. A villain who’d been active before even Sapnap, Dream, and George became heroes.

Oberon. Casino owner, leader of the Las Nevadas gang, spreader of illegal information to whatever party was willing to pay him. Supervillain.

And all of his costume had just fallen out of Sapnap’s hero bag.

“Speechless? I thought you’d take pride in having caught one of the biggest criminals in the city.” Azrael droned. Sapnap stared, unblinking, willing his face not to move despite the mask that covered the lower half of it. “Anyway, we will be needing him back. He’s useful to us, after all.” Sapnap stayed silent, and he could tell it was aggravating Azrael. Metis stepped closer to him, a dagger held at his throat as the Lynx mask she wore drew closer to his face. “He’s terrified. I can’t tell of what exactly, but it’s not us.”

Azrael hummed, not making a move. Sapnap didn’t dare flinch. No, he wasn’t scared. Not of the Syndicate, not of the knife at his throat, not of being kidnapped. He was a hero, shit like this happened.

No, he was terrified because he knew exactly where Oberon was, and he couldn’t get out of this situation.

Sapnap was something of a hybrid. His dad was a demon, his surrogate mom was a human, Skeppy was Skeppy and no one quite knew what he was. But Sapnap was a demon hybrid, a fire demon hybrid to be exact, which didn’t fair well normally. He remembered being beaten up for his horns in school, having his tailed yanked on the street, having people point and laugh at his fangs in cafes. He learned he could hide his hybrid traits. It made things easier. He passed as human almost completely, save for the white eyes and pointed ears. That’s how he was as a hero. Blaze, to the public, was a human with some odd hybrid-esc traits, and that was that.

To his friends and family, he was Sapnap, a fire demon. To his parents, big brother, best friend, and fiancés, he didn’t have to hide. They knew all the weird shit that being a demon came with, one fiancé especially.

Quackity, in Sapnap’s eyes, was perfect. They grew up as neighbors and became instant friends, with Quackity even announcing in the 3rd grade that he was marrying Sapnap and no one was gonna steal him. In high school, after much deliberation, he conceded that he would back down a little bit and share with Karl. As adults, they’ve been planning their wedding for years now. Quackity was funny, optimistic, and kindhearted; the perfect future husband.

Who also happened to be a supervillain on the side.

Sapnap knew. Of course he knew, he’d been one of the first people Quackity told when he first started and couldn’t keep all his secrets and stay sane. But Sapnap became a hero, following his big brother into the field because that’s what he always did. He followed Dream, as did George. Eventually, Karl followed, too. Quackity knew. The first time Quackity walked up to the new heroes on the battlefield as Oberon, he wiped the floor with them. No real damage done, but he knocked out 4 new heroes in one fight solo, and that made him a significantly more threatening and famous villain to the public.

From Sapnap’s perspective, he didn’t want to fight his fiancé and as he was later told from his fiancés perspective, Quackity just wanted the fight over with as quickly as possible. 3 out of 4 heroes pulled their punches while Quackity fought hard. It was an easy match, in the end.

Karl knew who Oberon was too, since “you can’t keep a secret like that for long when you’re so intimately in love with a person that you could identify them by the way they flick their wrist” (and was swiftly punched for by both fiancés for being too sappy). George guessed it immediately. It took the three fiancés a while to stop trying to convince him that Quackity was a regular civilian when George wouldn’t back off that he knew. Dream…well, they’d tell him eventually. Probably.

Point is, Quackiy is awesome and the love of Sapnap’s life, whether or not he’s a supervillain. And as the love of Sapnap’s life who also happens to have shapeshifting superpowers, he volunteers to do some things to help his demon instincts that Sapnap really appreciates. As the only two hybrids of the polycule, they help each other out. Sapnap preens Quackity’s wings, helps him nest, and makes sure he’s warm for the winter while Quackity…well, Quackity lets Sapnap eat him.

Sapnap has been called names before. “freak,” “hellspawn,” he’s used to that, but every so often he’ll hear “maneater” called in his direction and wonder if the person calling him that knows how close they really are. See, while demons have a bad rep for plenty of made up things like stealing souls or cursing people, the rumor that demons kill and eat people is only half wrong. No demon would grab someone off of the street and eat them alive, but a person who the demon cares about immensely and who could fit in their mouth?…yeah, they’d get eaten, but not without proper warning and consent. Demons had crops for a reason (albeit an unknown one, far too evolved in this modern society that the original use for it has been lost to time), and that reason was to store things the demon cared about. There was a reason Bad, at over 9 feet tall, had married a man who could shrink to 2 feet. Sapnap had instincts to store plenty of things: items from his childhood, his fish (he wouldn’t), his friends (he physically can’t but damn if his instincts aren’t stupid), and of course his fiancés. He’d just happened to win the lottery and fall in love with a man able (and more importantly willing) to be stored. Quackity, as an avian, knew the instinct cause he had a crop too, and was more than willing to help Sapnap when he needed it (he occasionally wondered how Quackity dealt with it considering he and Karl couldn’t shrink, but Q always said “a friend” or “work associate” helped him out, so really it wasn’t Sapnap’s business).

Today, Sapnap’s shift had sucked and Karl was stuck at the tower for the rest of the night doing paperwork. So as he often did, Sapnap called Quackity and asked if he would “sleep in” that night. Quackity, as he often did, said yes. Sapnap went down to Las Nevadas and was passed into the casino with no hassle, the worker’s shock of seeing a top three hero walk into a villain lair long worn off. He made it to the office and there sat Oberon. Average height, long wild black hair, and a massive gash that took up almost the whole left side of his face that left his eye milky and showed a golden fang behind his split lip. The expression he wore was always mischievous and hard to read, a poker face that he’d bet not even Metis could get past.

It all fell apart when he saw Sapnap.

His expression melted into joy, the cunning and somewhat frightening look dissipating as he waved slightly. The man shrank to below average height, his hair becoming much shorter and showing feathered ears for a split second before a beanie was hastily thrown over them. The scar closed itself until only a thin pale puckered line showed where the scar had once been, though his eye remained murky. He removed his dress shirt so he was only wearing a tank top and sighed as he let his wings out, stretching out the black and golden feathers. This was Quackity, the man Sapnap fell in love with.

Within a few minutes they were both in pajamas and Sapnap was holding his fiancé in his hands. The only warning Quackity gave was that he had a meeting in the morning so Sapnap would have to let him out early. Sure, he could do that. So carefully, he lifted his hands up to his mouth and slowly tilted his lover in. He felt Quackity melt into the warmth as he slowly raised his own body temperature knowing how much the duck avian liked the heat. He felt feathers press into the walls of his mouth as Quackity stretched his wings and then shapeshifted them away again to get down easier without leaving feathers in his fiancés throat. Other perk of marrying a shapeshifter: they can do shit like that. Within moments of Q patting the roof of Sapnap’s mouth, he was being pulled down by the throat muscles, and Sapnap could feel when Quackity landed in his storage because his powers immediately flared.

Being a fire demon was…weird, Sapnap had come to learn. He’d always known his powers were emotion based, he learned that at a young age. Joy and anger sparked the strongest, sadness and fear dimmed him. Simple. Until he stored Quackity for the first time and almost lit his bedroom on fire. Sapnap learned 2 things that day: 1- turns out, as sappy as it sounded, love was way stronger than joy or anger. 2- according to Quackity, his fire, the root of his power and life force as a fire demon, was in his storage. Literally. Quackity told him cause Quackity saw it. Physically. A glowing orb of fire that just permanently existed in Sapnap’s storage. Quackity also decided touching it would be a good idea (that’s how the bedroom fiasco happened, but that’s besides the point). Point is, when that love he has for his fiancé is combined with the primal demon instinct to store and protect, Sapnap can become an absolute powerhouse of destruction. Higher endurance, stronger, faster, even his flames were hotter. The rest of the heroes called it Hellfire. Quackity agreed it was fitting.

Which meant that when he got an emergency call that a supervillain was on the loose and he was needed immediately, he knew he’d get it over with quickly. He felt Quackity pull his wings back out and push them against the walls surrounding him, a sign that he was good for Sapnap to go do his job. So, that’s what he did, knowing it wouldn’t take long with his hellfire active.

He was right, of course. It was less than an hour before the criminal was in custody, unable to escape past the walls of fire Sapnap put up. He was home only an hour after than, drained of energy and barely able to stand (Quackity massaging him from inside was definitely not helping). He fell asleep before he even got changed out of his hero gear.

Looking back, he realized neither of them had remembered that there was anything important the next day.

Sapnap geared up to do hero work the next day at around noon, packing up Quackity’s villain costume in his bag so he could let his fiancé out later and he could get back to work. He told his higher ups that he was going to patrol around Las Nevadas, which wasn’t suspicious cause of the absurd amount of gang activity that needed dealt with. Quackity, meanwhile, was still asleep, and likely would be till Sapnap returned him to his office and he had to be Oberon again.

Then he was grabbed from behind.

In a split second, he was in a dark alleyway he hadn’t been in a moment before, and there was something swung at his head rapidly before it all went black.

And now he was here. Tied to a chair with a power suppresent cuff, surrounded by supervillains, with his supervillain fiancé in his storage.

Sapnap was speechless, for maybe the first time in his life. He..he couldn’t deny this. There was no way he could plead innocent to having every single piece of Oberon’s costume in his bag. Half the syndicate was glaring down at him, the other half was staged to fight his friends, and the one thing they wanted was something he couldn’t and wouldn’t give up.

“How…how did you know it was me?” “We have a tracker in his costume.” Metis answered simply. “Oberon has never missed a meeting. We have trackers in all Syndicate member’s costumes, just for cases like this. When he didn’t show, we tracked it and it just so happened to lead us right to your stuff. Never imagined a hero would stoop so low as to kidnap someone rather than arrest them.” “I wouldn’t.” he growled. “Are you seriously trying to argue with us right now?” Brutus spoke up for the first time in the conversation. “You have all of Oberon’s missing stuff, you’re getting really defensive, and you’re a hero for fucks sake! Who else would have taken him? Now give us our friend back or else.”

“Pardon, ‘friend?’” Sapnap questioned, momentarily caught off guard. Sure, he knew Quackity worked with the Syndicate, but were they his friends? Did he enjoy their company, or know them on a first name basis? “Yes, friend, dickhead. Villains can have friends too, y’know.” “I know, I just…I don’t know, assumed it was more of a business relationship?” Sapnap questioned, Brutus going to answer before Azrael pushed him back. “Our relationship with Oberon is none of your business, hero. Now tell us where he is.” Oh it very much was his business, but Sapnap wasn’t going to mention that right now.

“…no.” “Ex-fucking-cuse me??” Azrael gawked, momentarily dropping his mask as a terrifying supervillain to just be plain confused. “I said no.” Sapnap said as calmly as he could given that there was still a dagger at his neck. “I can’t tell you where he is, all I can tell you is that he’s safe and I sure as hell didn’t kidnap him.” Azrael’s supervillain mask of annoyance was slipped back on as he glared at Sapnap. “You expect us to believe that, Blaze? You expect us to blindly trust a pro hero?” Azrael scowled. “Exactly, i’m a hero. I wouldn’t hurt someone with no reason, even a villain. I wouldn’t hurt Oberon.” Sapnap pleaded, and from what little he could see of Brutus and Metis’ faces, he thought they might have believed him. Phase and Thunder stood stock still, masks fully covering their faces so Sapnap had no idea what they were thinking. Azrael, however, looked angry. He looked so fucking angry.

“We’re getting nowhere, we don’t have time for this! Oberon could be dead, I can’t trust a word out of your mouth.” He shouted, pushing Metis’s dagger out of the way and grabbing Sapnap by the hair, yanking his head up to look him in the eye. “This isn’t a request anymore. You’re going to tell me where he is right-“ Azrael reeled his arm back, and Sapnap only had a few moments to realize what he was going to do “-fucking-“ oh no “-now!” Azrael punched Sapnap in the stomach hard, knocking the wind out of him.

Sapnap screamed.

He curled in on himself and gasped for air, crying and screaming. It was all he could think to do in his panic. He couldn’t even bring himself to think of words to say, could only shout and cry and hope that Azrael would leave him alone. He saw the winged man jump back in shock, along with the rest of the villains. He doubted they’d thought that when they captured a superhero they’d end up watching said superhero sob, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. He wrapped his arms around himself, desperately trying to feel for any sign that Quackity was alright, only to realize that this was the first time in hours he’d moved his arms.

He looked down through the tears in his eyes and realized he wasn’t tied to the chair anymore. The ropes that had been tied around him were now strewn on the ground; singed, tattered, and smoking. The power suppressents lay on the ground with the ropes, sparking and useless. Holy shit, did he just break the power suppressents??

Sapnap’s thoughts were cut off when he felt and heard something from in his storage. He felt Quackity grow heavier, likely shifting just a little bit bigger, and he could feel him pressing into the walls. “What the fuck?” Quackity asked groggily, Sapnap feeling him stretch out. “Ow, fuck, what the fuck was that, Sap??” Lots of thoughts ran through Sapnap’s head, his instincts flaring and clouding his thoughts. Was Quackity ok? He was conscious thank god, but he said ow, how badly was he hurt? Quackity was supposed to be safe when he was with Sapnap, but he wasn’t safe, how could he keep his fiancé safe? “Blaze?” Who? “Blaze, you with us?” Not Quackity, Quackity would have called him by his name. He looks up and sees Brutus standing over him, most of the villains having taken a step back, including Azrael, surprisingly. “You feeling better?” “…please don’t hit me again.” Sapnap pleaded quietly through a sore throat. “What the fuck does that mean? Sapnap what the fuck?? Are you safe, where are you!?” Quackity shouted, shifting himself smaller so he wouldn’t be as loud. Brutus, oblivious to what Sapnap was hearing, knelt down to be eye level with the hero.

“I won’t. Maybe those guys will, but I’m not that kind of guy. I like to think of myself as a hero.” “…I can’t back down on this. I’m not telling you or the Syndicate where Oberon is. That’s final.” He said strongly. “Fucking what?!” Quackity shouted, pushing himself forwards only to fall. “Fuck! Shit, ow…” He trailed off, which almost made Sapnap panic again, but he knew things would only get worse if they knew where Quackity actually was. Brutus was silent for a moment. “Ok,” he said finally. “Then they’ll just keep you here until you do, I guess. But I can stick around to make sure they won’t hit you again, that was uncalled for.” He finished, glaring angrily at Azrael at the end. “Thank you, Brutus.” Sapnap finished, not making any move to stand or move. “Brutus?!” He heard Quackity yell, though he just hoped his fiancé could understand why he wasn’t answering.

Things got quieter after that. Sapnap, despite still being free from his restraints, did nothing to run. What could he do, after all? He was totally outnumbered. And despite Brutus’s promise that he would keep him from getting hurt (again), he knew that if it came down to it, Brutus would fight with the Syndicate, not him. Besides, even if he did get out, the villains would come after him immediately. Or worse, they’d target Dream and George, and Dream did not need to know of his (or literally everyone else’s) ties to the casino villain.

Quackity tried communication. Sapnap could hear him asking questions, begging for any reply to let him know that Sapnap was safe, that they were both safe. But he couldn’t. The villains and Brutus were watching him like a hawk, making sure he wouldn’t run. As if he was that stupid. But in return, he couldn’t comfort his frightened fiancé. Every second he spent listening to Quackity was another second he spent willing tears out of his eyes.

“Ok, ok, so you obviously can’t talk right now. Or hum. Or physically signal. Fuck, how…how can I talk to you?” Quackity pleaded aloud as if Sapnap hadn’t been pondering the exact same thing. He couldn’t speak, tap, hum, or even try to constrict his stomach: he didn’t know how badly Azrael’s punch had hurt him or if constructing the muscles around him would worsen the injury.

Every thought frustrated Sapnap further. It was infuriating.

“That’s it! Sapnap, your flame!” Quackity exclaimed. “It just flickered and got brighter, did you do that on purpose? Can you control it?” Holy shit, right, the power suppressants were off. Sapnap didn’t think he could, he certainly didn’t mean to just then; it must have been his anger that made it flare. But the idea that he could communicate, even one sidedly, with his lover made hope blossom in his chest. “There! You did it again, the flame got bigger!” Quackity excitedly yelled. ‘Ok, we can communicate,’ Sapnap thought, ‘all I have to do is control my emotions.’

“Are you safe? Flicker for yes, do nothing for no.” Sapnap tried very hard to not feel frustrated at the current state of things so he could signal that he was not, in fact, safe. There was a few seconds of silence as Quackity processed this. “…shit. Ok, so not safe.” Yeah no duh, stupid fucking supervillains. He could almost feel his flame flare in his chest at the thought. “Yeah, definitely not safe. The syndicate, you said?” Sapnap looked over Azrael , who was watching him with disinterest. He let his disdain for the man take over his thoughts. His flame sparked. “Ok, fuck, that’s worse.” Quackity said. “Are you hurt?” Jesus fuck the emotional whiplash he was putting himself through for this was gonna take years off his life, Sapnap was sure of it. He tried to reel back the hate, to take deep breaths and calm himself and imagine his flame returning to normal. “Ok, that’s good at least.” Quackity sighed, and in that moment Sapnap wanted nothing more than to ask it back. To beg, to plead that he answer his own question. He heard the pain laced in Quackity’s voice, he wasn’t going to forget the pained yells right after he was hit. He needed to know Quackity was ok.

A door across the room that Sapnap hadn’t even realized was there burst open, startling everyone in the room. “Sorry, Dream and Nightcap got away. We chased them, but they were too quick.” The man who was speaking had dark green hair, a massive gas mask looking face covering, and was big as a motherfucker. This was one of the most well known members of the syndicate, a previous hero called Machina who had quit the committee before the Dream Team was ever even introduced to the public, though he trained them all behind the scenes. Only a few months after his retirement, he showed back up as a villain. Sapnap knew this man well. “Shit,” Azrael cursed. “That’s fine, Warden, we’ll work with it. We just need to let them know we still have Blaze as ranso-“

“Sam!!” Sapnap screamed, pleading to whatever god that would listen that Sam could get him, them out of this. He felt Quackity perk up, dragging himself to the front of the stomach with only minor noises of pain. Sam was his hero mentor and one of his dad’s best friends, basically his uncle. He trusted Sam, and he knew Sam would at least want to do the right thing here. Whether or not he could convince Azrael to let him, though, was a different issue.

“Hm? Blaze!? What the fuck are you doing here, what happened?!” Sam yelled, storming over to Sapnap. Ok, so apparently Azrael hadn’t told him why he was supposed to be attacking Dream and George. “Look at his bag. We haven’t heard from Oberon, and it’s pretty damn clear whose fault that is.” Sapnap couldnt see Sam’s face behind his mask, but he could imagine his expression as he faced the bag and slowly turned his head to stare at Sapnap. It almost would have been comical if not for the situation.

See, Sapnap wasn’t the only one who was close with Sam. Quackity, despite not being a hero, knew the man pretty well himself, given that he was his legal guardian and all. Quackity’s parents abandoned him when he was really young, and Sam, his older cousin, took him in. Sam and Quackity had been pretty inseparable ever since, so he was sure that Sam’s presence made his fiancé feel exponentially better. Given that Sapnap and Quackity had been neighbors growing up, Sam had a lot of time to get accustomed to his ward’s role in Sapnap’s weird demon halfling shit. A role that grew larger when they started dating as teenagers, and Bad had to begrudgingly explain to Sam what a storage was when Quackity didn’t come home on time one night and Sam walked in on Sapnap eating him. That had not been a fun talk, but in hindsight it was better for him to have learned earlier than later.

Sam’s gaze lingered on Sapnap for a while before he flicked his head down just a bit, almost imperceptibly. Sapnap gave a quick abrupt nod in response and saw Sam’s shoulders tense. He knew.

“Are you hurt?” Sam asked, his head tilted down enough to show that his eyes were clearly not trained on Sapnap’s own, but rather his torso. “Yes.” Sapnap answered simply, hoping that if Sam thought one or both of them were injured he could get them out. He knew Quackity was hurt, that was his main priority. Sam sucked a breath in. “Azrael, I’ll handle it from here.” “Warden, I don’t think you-“ “I said,” He turned to the other villain, looming over the man. “I’ll take it from here. I know Blaze from my time as a hero. I know how to get him to crack.” Sam said, walking over to Sapnap and grabbing him by the collar of his shirt. Sapnap very carefully kept his face stone cold. He needed Azrael to believe Sam would actually torture information out of him. “…if you insist. I suppose you know him best.” “Perfect. I’ll be taking him now then.”

“Now hold on! What?!” “Is there a problem, Azrael?” “Ye-“ “Of course there is!!” Brutus interrupted, shockingly. “You can’t just fuckin’ kill the guy! Y-“ “I won’t hurt him more than necessary. You know I won’t.” Sam said, placing a hand on the boys shoulder who just sighed. “…ok.” “Warden, what are you going to do?” Azrael responded clearly fake calmly. “I’m taking him to a safe house for interrogation. I know his weaknesses, you’ve clearly been going to easy on him if he hasn’t spilled. I’m not letting Oberon get hurt.” Sam said with a tone of finality. And again to Sapnap’s surprise, Azrael stepped down immediately. In the back of his mind he wondered if the syndicate knew how close Sam and Quackity truly were, or if they knew the two were family, but he pushed the thought off. That wasn’t what was important right now.

Sam walked back over to him, pulling his trident and holding it to Sapnap’s neck. “You want to live, you’ll do what I say. Got it?” Sapnap nodded easily, incredibly used to the persona Sam puts on when working (Machina and Warden acted incredibly similar, one was just a lot scarier cause he had a giant fucking trident and was no longer bound by law). He pulled a piece of fabric from his costume and handed it to Brutus, who quickly got the message to tie it around Sapnap’s eyes. Once he was blinded, he felt the cold metal of Sam’s suit gloves grab him by the back of his neck and lead him (hopefully) out of the room. After that, there was no communication between the two of them besides the occasional warning of a step or ledge, but Quackity kept talking. “We’re walking, ok, I can tell we’re walking, that’s good. Sam’s getting us out? Are we safe? Ok I can’t tell if we’re not safe or if you just can’t respo-“

“Sam, are we alone?” Sapnap said, desperate to finally be able to console Quackity. “Yes, but play it safe. I don’t remember where the cameras are.” Sapnap nodded. Ok, better than nothing. Sapnap discreetly rubbed his storage, figuring that would look innocent enough over any potential security footage. Then, with no better option, he started to hum. Sapnap had never been incredibly musically gifted, but he hoped the tune of “Every Little Thing Is Gonna Be Alright” was recognizable enough to be comforting. Not long after, he heard Quackity quietly laugh and sing along with whatever words he knew. He smiled. Eventually, Sam’s hand shifted from grabbing the back of his neck to supporting his back, and he felt the trident be lowered away from his throat and heard the scrape of metal on metal as it was re-holstered. He felt the now empty cold metal glove take his hand and guide him further until eventually he was stopped and the blindfold was removed.

Sapnap stopped humming. He was standing outside a car and Sam was very quickly shoving most of his supervillain gear in it. From the look of the run down city around him, they seemed to be in one of the poorer areas of L’manburg, probably near the Pogtopia district. Something tapped his shoulder, and Sapnap whirled, coming face to face with Sam. Not Machina, not Warden; Sam. His dark green eyes and freckled face looked at him with worry. He’d seen that expression so many times; as a concerned family friend, as a mentor, and Sapnap always hated it. Hated seeing Sam sad. Sapnap couldn’t help the tears that welled in his eyes, couldn’t help pulling the man in for a hug. He would have squeezed him half to death if he wasn’t hyper aware of the weight in his middle who was still hurt. He felt Sam hug him back just as carefully, equally aware of Sapnap’s passenger even though he was unable to feel him. “I’m taking you to my place, let’s get out of here.” Sam whispered, and Sapnap nodded, letting out only a few tears before he got in the passenger seat of Sam’s car and immediately pressed both of his hands to his stomach.

“Quackity holy shit are you ok?!” “Fucking finally!!” Quackity cheered in response, growing larger once again now that he knew he didn’t have to hide before hissing in pain again. “I, uh..could be better, hotstuff. What happened?” Sam sat silently behind the wheel as they drove, though Sapnap saw his ear flick in their direction. He wasn’t sure what the limit of his enhanced creeper hearing was, but he hoped he could hear Quackity cause Sapnap didn’t want to have this conversation twice. “There was a tracker in your costume. We forgot about your stupid fucking meeting so the syndicate tracked your costume and found it in my bag. I was on my way to Las Nevadas to return it to you and let you out for work but I was kidnapped because they thought I kidnapped and de-masked you. Then when I wouldn’t talk Azrael punched me in the stomach, which is what woke you up.” “That…that explains a lot. I was half woken up by getting the shit knocked out of me, but also cause your flame fuckin’ blinded me, dude.” ‘That would make sense,’ Sapnap thought. If he got scared enough that his powers managed to burn off literal power suppressant cuffs, it must have been pretty damn bright. “Azrael fucking what?!” Sam interjected. “Yeah. I’m not hurt too bad, maybe a little bruised, but Q seems to be in bad shape.” Sapnap explained. “No I’m-“ “Yes you are. You sound like you’re in pain, you move like you’re in pain, you’re clearly in pain.”

Quackity sat in silence for a moment before relenting. “…I can’t move my left arm and anytime I move my torso or breathe my chest feels like it’s imploding. I think my shoulder’s popped out of it’s socket and my ribs might be broken.” “Fuck.” Sapnap and Sam said simultaneously, answering Sapnap’s silent question on if Sam could hear Q or not. “Ok, we get back to the house and go straight to Ponk. Quackity, do you think you can handle getting let out?” Sam asked louder than normal so Quackity could hear him. “I…I don’t know. I don’t think so. I don’t want to be a pussy but…fuck, it hurts. It hurts so fucking bad, Sam. I don’t wanna know how much worse it’ll get if I get compressed.” “You can cut me open, I don’t give a shit.” Sapnap said, deadly serious. “No, absolutely not you psycho.” Quackity said, kicking his stomach.

“I’ve got enough cuts up here, it’d be fine. It’d match.”

“Those are top scars you bitch that’s not-“

“Same difference.”

“Same difference my ass! We’re not cutting me out of your storage.”

“You need medical attention! What if you’re like, bleeding internally or something??”

“You’ll fuckin’ see what internal bleeding’s like if you insist that I get cut out of here one more time Sapnap I swear to god-“

“Boys!” Sam yelled, slamming his hands on the steering wheel. “No one is cutting anyone open! We’ll see what Ponk can do. Worse comes to absolute worst, we’ll wait to see if Q feels better enough to come out tomorrow.” Sam pulled the car into his driveway and stepped out, motioning for Sapnap to follow. He walked in behind Sam, untensing muscles he didn’t even know were tensed upon seeing the familiar rooms and smelling the same lemony citrus scent that had filled the house since his childhood. Safe, he was finally safe.

“Ponk! Get down here, we have a situation!” “What’s up?” He heard yelled from upstairs, then he saw Ponk come into view. A retired hero healer, Sam’s spouse, and Quackity’s step parent who honestly functioned more to him as a cool aunt rather than another caretaker. Sapnap also knew them well. They were well acquainted back when Blaze was new to the Smp, and they’d spent a lot of time getting to know one another given Sapnap’s track record of very very frequent injury. “Q is hurt, but we can’t get him out of Sapnap’s storage. Any ideas?” “Oh fuck, what?” Ponk said, running down the steps. “How bad? What happened? Is he conscious? Is he bleeding? Sam, what are you doing, go get my med bag!” Ponk rambled, and Sam ran to the bathroom and came out seconds later with a first aid kit. They took a stethoscope out and looped it around their neck before Sapnap even had a chance to process half of those questions. “Ok, Sapnap, you’re not the one hurt, correct?” “Correct.” “Ok, then I’m gonna need you to take your shirt off.” Sapnap shrugged and removed his hero gear, and while he was at it, shifted back to his more comfortable and natural half demon form, letting his horns and tail grow back out. “Ok now lay on the couch.” Ponk instructed, leading Sapnap to lay on the couch and pushing a coffee table out of the way so they could kneel next to him. They pressed a hand down in a few areas on Sapnap’s torso before they found Quackity and took off their stethoscope, pressing the cold metal right where they felt the shrunken man.

“Big Q? You doin’ alright in there?” “Good as I can be, Ponk.” Quackity replied, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Awesome.” Ponk replied with equal sass. “Now, this is a bit of an unorthodox check up, but i’m gonna need you to shift bigger if Sapnap can handle it so I can get a better idea of where I’m checking you.” “Im good,” Sapnap replied, “Do what you have to do, Angel.” Sapnap’s breath hitched as he felt Quackity grow larger, laying on his back in the storage and stretching out the walls around him, just on the brink of being uncomfortable for Sapnap but not quite there. Sapnap sucked in his stomach as much as possible to give Ponk more direct contact to Quackity. With Quackity so thoroughly pinned in his storage, he could feel every breath, every twitch, every heartbeat. He nodded at Ponk, who went back to checking up on the shrunken man. “Ok, I’m gonna press where I think your chest is, you’re going to tell me if I’m pressing in the right place and if it hurts.” Ponk placed a hand down and pressed gently, making Sapnap wince as Quackity flinched and shoved at his storage. “Yeah, that’s my chest and it fuckin’ hurts.” “1-10?” “8 or something I don’t know. I’m a supervillain, I get hurt a lot, i’m used to it.” “Ok. I have an idea. I can’t tell if your ribs are broken or if you just have a contusion, but either way it would take too long to heal naturally in there. You need to get out, but getting out would worsen the injuries, so I’m gonna try something.”

Ponk placed both hands right over where they’d deduced Quackity’s chest to be. Then, their hands (er, hand [Sam was never going to stop apologizing for that, despite it being a workplace accident that Ponk had long forgiven him for]) began to heat up. Sapnap was very used to seeing Ponk use their powers, having had them used on himself many times, but what Ponk was trying to do now was not only fascinating to watch, but logically also impossible. They were trying to heal Quackity through Sapnap’s skin. Ponk’s eyes squeezed shut tight as they bit their bottom lip almost to the point of blood in frustration, focusing all their energy on their power. “Ponk?” Quackity asked, before gasping. “Holy shit…” and Sapnap knew what that meant. “Ponk, it’s working, keep going.” Sapnap pleaded breathlessly, because he can tell it is. He hears Sam gasp as well from his place watching behind the sofa. He can only feel minimal amounts of Ponk’s power on his own skin, the minor bruising left behind by Azrael’s punch dissipating under their power. He looks down at himself and sees Quackity glow with the affects of Ponk’s power on him, the healing light illuminating through Sapnap’s storage. It was mesmerizing.

Eventually Ponk lifts their hands off Sapnap’s torso and sighs. Sam runs and quickly returns with water, which Ponk accepts graciously. Sapnap sits up, placing a light hand over Quackity. “Angel? Are you alright??” “I- I can’t believe that worked. What the fuck.” Sapnap just laughed, curling both arms around himself and hanging his head down, crying out of sheer relief after the incredibly fucking stressful evening he’d had. “Oh my fuck, thank god. Thank fucking god.” “He’s ok?” Sam asks, hands on Ponk’s shoulders supporting his partner. “Yes. He’s ok.” Sam sighed dramatically and rested his head on Ponk’s shoulder who just laughed and placed their hand on Sam’s head. “That didn’t take nearly as much out of me as I thought it would. Bone healing normally is a lot more tiring, so i’m gonna guess that it was just a shoulder injury and contusion in your chest, no actual broken ribs. Still, though, neither of those injuries would have done well under intense pressure. I’m glad healing it worked from out here.” Ponk explained. “Yeah we can figure out how the fuck you did that later.” Sapnap said, standing and stretching his arms above him, feeling his shoulders pop and hearing Quackity yelp as he got constricted in the surrounding muscles at his still bigger-than-average size. He was kind of glad Sam and Ponk were distracted with each other since he was sure that Quackity’s outline in his stomach was incredibly visible at the moment.

Sapnap patted his stomach and felt Quackity pat back. “Ok, as much as I love having you this close and all, cause I do, it has been almost 24 straight hours. You ready to come out now?” “Fuck yes, i’m raiding Sam’s fridge.” Sapnap laughed and pressed under where he felt Quackity, feeling weight dissipate as his fiancé shrunk to a size that Sapnap could manage to bring back up and hid his wings away. It was only a few more seconds before Quackity was traveling up Sapnap’s throat and ended up back in his mouth. Sapnap paused for just a few moments to suck the remaining spit off his fiancé and savor his flavor just a bit longer. Quackity lightly kicked Sapnap’s teeth, though Sapnap could feel the vibrations of laughter against his cheeks until he eventually relented and pulled the man out of his mouth, holding him gently in his palms. “Couldn’t help myself, darlin’, you taste as good as ever.” Sapnap purred, the shrunken man turning red in response. “Christ Sapnap, don’t do this to me so soon after I get out. Give me like an hour of grace before you make me want to go back in, you know I can’t say no to a pretty boy like you.” Quackity smiled back, a smirk pulling at his scarred lips as he gently traced his finger along the palms he sat in. Sapnap flustered; no matter the size or situation, he knew he’d always lose these word games with Quackity.

He loved him so goddamn much.

Quackity was quickly pulled from Sapnap’s hands by a very relieved and stressed Sam, who held the shrunken man to his cheek tightly. “Quackity oh thank fuck, I was so worried when I figured out where you were I assumed the worst at first when Azrael said-“ “Sam, I’m fine!” Quackity comforted, pushing himself away from Sam’s cheek to make eye contact with his pseudo-brother. “I’m alright, thanks to you. You got us out of there, thank you. I mean, talk about a literal Deus Ex Mach-“ “Quackity if you finish that joke I’ll fucking eat you.” Sam sighed, no actual heat behind his words. Quackity just laughed. “And Ponk, thank you. I don’t know how you did that, but thank you.” “No problem. My powers are less based on contact and more if I can get a clear visual of the person I have to heal and what injuries they have. It apparently works just as well if I can picture them in my head, which was pretty easy given I’ve known you almost your whole life.” “That’s fuckin’ sick.” Quackity nodded. “Now Sam, hand me back to Sapnap, he’s a human furnace and it’s really cold out here covered in spit.” Sam passed Quackity off to Sapnap who held him reverently as Quackity melted into the warmth the fire demon provided, pulling his wings back out as he curled against Sapnap’s fingers. “Would you mind grabbing food, too? I don’t think he’s eaten in like a day and a half.” Sapnap asked, and Sam and Ponk nodded before heading to their kitchen.

Sapnap took his bandana off and offered it to Quackity, who took it and began wiping himself down. Sapnap gently sat Quackity down on his lap. “I’m sorry about all of this.” He sighed, and Quackity gave him a confused look. “Sorry for what? You didn’t do shit. Believe me, I’ll be sure to put Azrael through the wringer next time I see him for this whole situation. But everything turned out alright, didn’t it? I’ll bet you anything that this won’t even be the most stressful fiasco this week.” Sapnap groaned. “I hate that you’re right. Why the fuck did I pick this job.” “Beats me, hero boy.” Quackity shrugged, done drying himself off. “But we survived our life-threatening mission of the day, you know what that means?” “What does that mean, hun?” Before he could blink, Quackity was back to normal size, sitting horizontally on his lap and looping the bandana behind Sapnap’s head, pulling it forward to kiss him. Sapnap was taken aback for all of 3 seconds before he slipped his arms behind Quackity and under his knees and held him closer to his chest, not breaking the kiss for a moment. He wasn’t lying before, Quackity did taste incredible. Quackity in turn dropped his hold of the bandana, instead electing to loop his arms around Sapnap’s neck and ensnare his hands in his fiancés hair and around his jawline for a tighter hold. It was messy; too long and somewhat violent (listen, they both had sharp teeth, blood was bound to be drawn) and not quite right with Quackity’s scar and golden tooth and Sapnap’s demon fangs. They were both smiling like idiots, too caught up in the joy of just being there kissing the other to worry about if they were kissing right.

It was perfect.

“I love you.” Quackity whispered, and Sapnap took note because it was rare that Quackity ever spoke outright like this. His lover was always more for gifts or quality time than words, though flirting was his exception. Words were more Karl’s thing, actions were Sapnap’s. But Quackity almost never directly said what was on his mind. “I was scared tonight.” Quackity continued quietly. “I’m not used to being scared for you. I know you’re a hero, and I know you can handle yourself, but my…’work associates’ can be vicious. I couldn’t hear them, you couldn’t speak. I sat for so long just begging you’d get out safely. I couldn’t do anything to protect you. I felt…well, small. I don’t ever want to be afraid of losing you ever again. I love you too much for that.” Sapnap pressed gentle kisses to his fiancés hairline, wiping the slow tears that fell from his eyes. “If I could help it, you’d never fear for me again. I’d set the world ablaze before I’d ever want to see you scared.” “Jesus Christ you sound like Karl.” Quackity sniffled, chuckling.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t be a safe space for you.” Sapnap sighed. His storage was supposed to be a place where Quackity could feel protected, and now it had made him feel anything but. His instincts were in a fucking mess about it. “You’ll always be a safe space for me, baby.” Quackity answered, leaning his head against Sapnap’s shoulder. “I’ll always feel safer within you than anywhere else. I was scared for you, that’s all. I got you into that, and I couldn’t help you.” “You just being there helped more than you know. I hate that you got hurt, I hate that I couldn’t stop it, but…well, even if it’s selfish, I’m glad I wasn’t going through it alone.” Quackity smiled at him, an adoring look in his eyes before he laughed. “Aw, tsk tsk, selfishness is no trait befitting a hero. Maybe you should just quit and join my gang.” He grinned evily. “Ooooo, maybe some other time, but as of right now I rather enjoy upholding the law, Oberon.” “Ew, yuck.”

“We didn’t know what to grab so we threw frozen pizza in the oven.” Sam announced loudly, re-entering the room and placing two full hot pizzas in front of the couple. “Also we figured we should grab food that takes a while to make to give you two some alone time~” Ponk winked before he was promptly elbowed by Sam. “Oh fuck yeah!” Quackity cheered, practically shoving himself off Sapnap to grab a slice. Sam and Ponk laughed as Quackity shoveled the whole thing in his mouth, moaning at how good it was before swallowing and quickly grabbing another piece. Sapnap just watched for a moment. Quackity trying to reach for his third piece in the last 30 seconds, Sam trying (and failing) to hold him back so he didn’t choke and die after being saved less than an hour ago, and Ponk losing their absolute shit watching it all. All these people he’s known almost his whole life, yet when he also knew them so intimately on the battlefield, he sometimes forgot how…domestic it all was. How nice it was to just be with his lover and his family.

“Hey, Cracknap,” Ponk broke his train of thought, “you gonna eat or what?” Sapnap smiled. “Yeah, sorry, just got distracted. Thanks, guys.” “Anytime, Sap.” Sam replied, finally trusting Quackity to not die since he was now eating pizza at a normal speed. Good food and people he cared about, safe and sound.