Chapter Text
The first thing he noticed upon waking was the faint sound of chirps from outside his window.
The second thing he noticed was the ever present shuffling of his bed sheets.
The third… was the looming presence of Chosen above his bed.
Opening his eyes, Dark blinked at the sight of Chosen clinging to the ceiling with their talons. They were huddled up in a loafed position, not even their tail sticking out as they stared at him with those lavender eyes and much too big pupils of theirs.
“Another, Darling?” He smiled and yawned slightly. “The kids are supposed to come over today! How long is this one going to last?”
Although he knew that it wasn’t Chosen’s fault, times where they got feral were quite the hassle. They could be both cute and cuddly or wild and dangerous depending on what type of day it was.
Sighing, Dark made his way to a sitting position, wincing as a chunk of drywall fell onto the floor and clattered loudly. He watched as Chosen straightened, crawling over to the foot of where Dark’s bed would be if it was on the ceiling.
Yawning themselves, Chosen retracted their talons and freely fell onto Dark’s mattress, bouncing the both of them into the air a bit and effectively waking Dark up fully.
Chosen stared at him from across the mattress, slowly creeping forward and tilting their head. Chuckling, Dark opened his arms, inviting them to come closer.
Chosen happily obliged, scooting into the embrace and curling up beside Dark. He grabbed their waist and hoisted them into his arms, removing the blanket from himself and standing up from the bed. Chosen just so happened to grip Dark’s arms even tighter at the action, letting a startled grumble escape their throat.
“Wow Cho, you’re clingy today!” Dark laughed, swaying back and forth as he walked to the door, lulling Chosen into a restful calm. He looked at them as he grasped the door handle, taking in the sleepy hollow head’s expression.
Dark opened the door and adjusted Chosen in his arms, carrying them bridal style down the stairs and into the living room. Once the duo arrived, Dark set Chosen on the sofa, the latter dragging him down on top of them in reluctance to let go.
Dark grabbed a blanket, tossing it over Chosen as they started to knead his T-shirt like an oversized cat. Dark softly kissed their head, earning a gentle chitter from Chosen at the action.
“Alright Cho, I’ve got to go get breakfast.” Dark eyed the lump of blanket as it gripped tighter onto his shirt. “Please, Firefly?”
With a sigh, Chosen hesitantly let go and brought their claws to their face, gripping the fuzzy blanket nearby instead of Dark’s clothing. Without much pause, they started to knead the blanket, closely resembling a baker making dough. Chosen brought the blanket closer and started to curl up on the couch, their tail sticking out of the lump and waving gently.
Dark smiled once more. He got up from the couch and trudged behind it, giving Chosen a quick pat on the head before rounding the door into the kitchen.
“What to do…” Dark hummed. He and Chosen never really kept stock of groceries. They never really needed to. Dark was the cook for the both of them, but even he didn’t do anything extravagant with their food. At most it was a bowl of mac-n-cheese for lunch and risotto for dinner!
(The only other time that he had tried making a big dish was the night before everything happened with… the bots)
Opening the freezer, Dark let out a grumble. Some frozen soups, mini pancakes, toaster strudel, and… a pineapple popsicle? He closed the door, opening the actual fridge instead. Upon once again finding nothing to make, Dark simply sighed and walked over to the pantry.
Chosen didn’t mind eating whatever— Dark knew that— but if Dark himself wasn’t feeling up for it, then it was a no go. He had just about finished looking when he spotted a container of chocolate chip muffins.
“Huh… I didn’t know that we had these?” Dark picked up the container, checking for a date on the bottom. Within a few seconds of not finding an expiration date, he turned it around and opened the lid.
They smelled heavenly, making Dark’s mouth water at the mere thought of eating one. Maybe Blue dropped them off, he rationalized. Well they wouldn’t be good forever, so he set the container down and picked up two muffins.
Turning to go out of the pantry, Dark shut off the light and closed the container. He opted to grab a plate for the muffins, but they would be eaten before he even got the chance to put them down.
Walking back to the living room, Dark stopped by the window. The birds from earlier were no longer outside, but there was still the sound of chirping as he got closer and closer to the glass.
“Huh, that’s weird…”
Dark turned back to the living room, shaking his head as he looked across the sofa.
Of course…
While he was gone, Chosen must have gotten restless. How could he tell? Well the couch was lacking any Chosen One… that’s how.
“Damnit…” Setting the muffins down on the side table, Dark grabbed the blanket that was left on the seat and folded it. He tossed it over the back of the couch and pulled away just as a crash sounded from the upstairs loft.
“You’ve got to be kidding me Cho.”
Running up the stairs, Dark halted upon the sight of the lamp toppled on the ground. It was darker up here than down in the living room, the knocked over lamp not helping with the lighting at all.
A soft clatter came from a few feet left. From Chosen’s room itself. The door was cracked ever so slightly and it allowed Dark to see Chosen shuffling around their room.
Scoffing, Dark picked up the fallen lamp and put it back by the wall, striding towards Chosen’s room.
Once he stepped inside, Dark was greeted by a purring mess of a Chosen One. They were in the middle of arranging a huge nest on the floor of their room, filled to the brim with blankets and spare pillows. Chosen had even thrown on a mint colored sweater, further comforting themselves as they wrapped up in the pile of blankets.
Chuckling, Dark stepped into the room and cracked the door again. “What have you got there Cho?” He asked playfully.
Chosen’s head snapped up, looking at him with that derpy little smile of theirs as they got up from the nest. They bounded over to Dark, their sweater cascading over them as they came to a stop. Though Chosen was admittedly much taller than Dark, they looked down at him with admiration, grasping his hand and pulling him easily into the nest on the floor.
Dark stumbled, falling down on top of Chosen as their purring started to steadily grow. He felt their hands combing through his choppy hair, undeterred by how tangled and thick it was. Dark smiled as Chosen worked, their purring growing ever louder as they adjusted their hold on him.
Dark’s eyes quickly grew heavy. While he was being surrounded by blankets, comforted by Chosen, and lulled to sleep, Dark barely thought twice about the muffins that were left on the table nor about the day that it might be.
Letting himself be dragged under by sleep, he couldn’t fathom ever needing to worry about anything. He had the beast tamed for now and man did it feel wonderful.
~*•*~
“Sec! Stop squirming!” Green held Second close to his chest, trying to stop them from getting to the cursor. Alan had just returned from work and Second was like this?
Green could see the man behind the screen clearly as he laughed, a hand over his mouth as he moved the cursor a bit further away.
Second struggled, grunting softly and biting Green’s arm as they reached for Alan’s cursor. Their hair was fluffed, stuck out in all different directions and wild as they thrashed to get out of his hold.
Eventually, Blue came over and took them from Green’s arms, holding them back by the wrists as she sat them down on the PC’s floor. Second calmed almost instantly, seemingly melting into her arms as Blue combed through their hair with her hand.
Green sighed, shaking his head and walking over to the couch with exhaustion. He all but collapsed onto the cushions as Yellow snorted, finally looking up from his computer after a sudden groan from Green.
“Tired now? We’ve got a whole day planned!” Yellow snarked. He closed his computer and leaned over Green’s face, tapping his temple as he looked inquisitively at the lack of energy Green displayed.
Green only managed to groan again, adding a stubborn eye roll as he sat up.
Or tried to… that is.
Second bounded up to Green, jumping on the stick and clinging to him with their talons as he winced. The air blew out from his lungs as Sec startled him, making Green instinctively cough and gasp.
He could hear Yellow and Blue snickering in the background. Second’s loud chitters nearly drowned them out, but it wasn’t quite enough to stifle the quiet amusement radiating off of the other group members.
Sighing and reluctantly petting Second’s head, Green thought about the hollow heads. All of them were known to have their “feral moments”— as they were called —but Second’s were never usually this hyper.
How come they were hyper? Green had no idea. All that he knew was that ever since about 5:37 this morning, Second had not only been bouncing off the walls, biting the Color Gang, and clawing at them, but they had been both hugging and tackling everybody in a five meter radius.
Usually if Sec was feral they went up to one of the others and requested silent hugs. That was usually the first of many things that led to a snowball of blankets and pillows later.
So how come they were so active today?
It wasn’t because today was a visiting day, right?
Green sighed, noticing that Second’s chitters had turned into a steady rumbling. They were purring, sprawled out on top of his chest as their tail flicked happily beside them.
Glancing over the couch’s backboard, Green caught sight of Blue using the notepad with Red. Likely telling Alan about the plans for the evening.
Dark and Chosen had invited the entire gang over a few nights ago, claiming that they— or more specifically Dark— wanted to “get together for the holidays”. However when Sec was stuck like this for hours, it made things much more difficult to follow through with.
“So~… Dibs on not holding them again!” Yellow touched his nose and quickly stepped back towards the couch as Green heard two thumps on the ground. It was likely just Blue and Red jumping off of the notes tab.
“Uh Yels, you were already voted upon?” Blue’s voice rang out.
Green tried to stretch his neck to see the rest of the group, but a certain hollow head held his body in such a tight grip that it was almost impossible. He barely caught a glimpse of Red standing next to the portal before his neck started aching.
He could hear all of the bickering as Yellow constantly tried to defend himself against the accusation of Blue’s. Red backed away from the duo and sat on the couch next to Green, patting his lap for the orange hollow head.
Second blinked lazily, gently pushing up from Green’s chest and letting themself be pulled into a hug by Red. Green gasped in mock offense as Second made a sudden yawn and curled up on Red.
Glaring softly at the younger, Green mumbled something in Red’s direction before turning back to the bickering. Grumbling something to himself, Green got up off the couch and set himself in between the two younger sticks.
“Oi! Quit arguing! It’s already about 9:30 and we were supposed to be on our way by now!” Green firmly grabbed Blue by the shoulder, directing her away from the still peeved Yellow with a kiss on the cheek.
Turning her to face him, Green brightened once more. “Blueberry, did you tell Alan about us going over to Dark and Chosen’s place? He won’t miss us, right?”
Blue shook her head with a fond smile, seemingly brushing off the earlier argument. “No. In fact he said that he had plans with his family. So needless to say, Alan won’t be around to hang out with us anyway! We’ve probably got today and most of tomorrow free to do whatever we want!”
Green’s smile widened at hearing that news, knowing that it was likely a good thing that Alan had given them as much free time as he did. Being in the Outernet was still a rather large hurdle that Alan wasn’t quite comfortable with. After The Showdown, Alan didn’t let anybody off of the PC for months because he was so worried.
“Good to hear!” Green responded.
He let go of Blue’s shoulders and walked back over to the couch, scooping Second off of Red’s chest. Green ignored the small gesture that Red gave him at the action, rather focusing on Yellow as he plopped Second into the other’s arms.
Taking a few steps back, Green picked up a backpack that he had previously set near the taskbar. Now prepared to leave, he watched as the others gathered their things behind him.
With Yellow holding Sec, Blue carrying her signature Peppermint Delight, and Red waving a goodbye to Alan, Green smiled and stepped over to the WiFi at the end of the taskbar.
And as soon as it was opened, it closed behind them all, leaving them free falling into the giant Interweb Tunnel system.