Interlude 2-2: Shipping and Handling
Interlude 2-2: Shipping and Handling
As happy as the boys were to see Rubble getting the care he needed, instead of being a stubborn ass about the ordeal, the hideout really didn’t feel like ‘home’ without all four of them. Of course, it didn’t look much like it either at the moment. Each of them had held onto some spending cash from their hard-earned weekend, and put a little of it into the hideout. Unfortunately, before they could actually make any proper changes to the place, they had to clean it.
Normally, they’d lament the absence of one of the stronger sets of hands in the group, but as it turns out, they had other people they could call. Or rather, that Treble could call. Dusty had suggested asking some of the Rainbooms for help, which the other two had been a little cautious about, until he also brought up the fact that one of them, whose life they had recently saved, could move things with her mind, and another, whom they had fought with not two months ago to save the school, could literally lift buses.
Treble had been nominated to make the phone call, as Spooks still got flustered at the prospect of talking to cute nerdy girls that didn’t run away from him, and Dusty had all the social graces of the pile of debris they were trying to clear out. A brief round of phone tag later, and a whole gaggle of girls had come by to help clean up the place.
“I still don’t understand why you just don’t find a better spot to hole up in,” Sunset groaned, taking a crowbar to some loose nails in the wall.
Whether Treble had wanted them too or not. “If you could find us a spot where four boys can live off-and-on without question or paying rent, please, do let us know. Also, I’d be careful with that wall. It’s hollow right there.”
Sunset looked to the stubborn nail, and the crowbar she almost brought down on it like a hammer. Thinking better of it, she went back to prying it the old-fashioned way. Applejack and Rainbow Dash had taken to cleaning up the outside of the first floor, including the non-essential graffiti and loose metal, while Twilight was busy shuffling through the abandoned supplies on the upper floors (by virtue of being able to levitate the mess and sort through it without having to touch anything). “Well it’s not like you guys don’t have room at your own places, right?”
Dusty barked a laugh that echoed in the cabinet his head was currently buried in. He shuffled a little and looked over the top of it to look at Sunset. “Please! Spooks lives in a two story house with no basement and an attic that he turned into an art studio. Treble’s family is stuck in a shitty two-bedroom apartment-”
“-hey! The apartment isn’t shitty, the tenants are,” Treble protested.
“Tomato tomahto. My house is… out of the question, and Rubble and his mom live in the smallest hole I’ve ever seen two people fit in without being socially questionable. Literally nowhere else we have access to has enough room for four teenage boys with a propensity for breaking shit and taking up whole rooms with books and… questionable paraphernalia,” he added after a moment’s hesitation.
The other people in the room gave him strange looks, most of which deciding they’d rather not know. Then a loud bang rang out from behind the building. “Sorry!” Applejack yelled through a window with no glass. “Tryin’ ta get this shoddy gutter off the side!”
“Jesus, AJ, that was almost my head!” RD snapped.
“I said sorry!” the farmgirl yelled back.
Treble and Dusty exchanged glances. “We sure we need them?”
“Yes,” Spooks said from his desk. Or rather, fold-out table. Without much muscle on him, he’d been delegated to organizing everyone else. A rather large, if less-than-professional, blueprint was spread out on the table before him. “Applejack’s the only one strong enough to move the heavy metal and fallen beams around here, and Rainbow Dash… well, I’m not sure, but I’d rather have the extra hands than the quiet.”
The ceiling above them shook slightly with a loud thump, which caused them all to stop and stare at it in slight alarm. A few moments of silence later, Twilight came down the recently-cleaned stairway in the back with a box of assorted junk. When she saw the group staring at her, she smiled sheepishly. “Um… I guess that filing cabinet fell kinda hard, huh?”
“Ya think?!” Sunset said, a little louder than she intended. Doubling back, she corrected. “You just scared the lot of us, Twi. Please do try and give us some kind of warning next time?”
Twilight brushed a lock of hair out of her face. “Uh… sure, sorry. Well, anyway, I found some stuff we might be able to use. Most of it is just office supplies and filing stuff, which I thought might help with sorting out your grandfather’s notes, Spooky.”
Bones nodded briefly and smiled. “Thanks. We don’t really have a system for it right now. I mean, I don’t think any of us knows how to file.”
Treble, currently arm-deep in a pile of light debris, raised his other hand. “I do.”
The room at large looked at him in disbelief. “Ok, I’ll bite, how?!” Sunset asked.
Treble raised an eyebrow at her. “Uh, my mom’s a lawyer and my dad’s filed more patents than Edison? Really, half our apartment is file cabinets. Well, not really, but I mean, it’s not that hard.”
“And you haven’t said anything until now why?” Dusty demanded, fiddling with a loose screw in the cabinet.
Treble swept a hand over the room. “Oh wow, look at all the filing cabinets and office space we have! Ooh, aah!”
Dusty threw a chunk of drywall at him. (“OW!”) “Don’t be an ass. That’s my job. Especially since Rubble’s not here. Besides, we have filing cabinets upstairs, apparently.”
“To be fair,” Spooks interjected, “We haven’t been able to get upstairs until Applejack cleared out the chunks of cement.”
“Ok, seriously, what even happened here?” Twilight asked, looking back at the stairway with some alarm.
“Nothing major, I don’t think,” Dusty mused. He ducked his head back into the cabinet, and his next few words echoed in the wood. “Most of it was vandalism -not mine- and the natural decay that comes from abandoned buildings. This place hadn’t really been used for several years before we got here, so none of us really knows. I mean, it’s not that big a deal, I don’t think.” He surfaced again, throwing aside a broken piece of wood into a large pile of scrap to be taken out later. “We did some research-”
“Cough, cough,” said Treble.
“...ok, fine. Treble did some research on the place just to make sure we weren’t stepping on anybody’s toes, and as it turns out, the city doesn’t even know who owns the place now. It’s just one of those sad places that gets left to the wayside because whoever actually owns it doesn’t give enough of a shit to say anything. And it’s in that dirty part of town where the city’s basically abandoned it in favor of putting money towards things they could actually fix.” There was a rustle as he dug into the wood fixture, and pulled out a bent nail. “GOD this thing is trash. Why am I fixing it again?”
“Because new cabinets would take up more than all of the money we kept from the Inkwell job,” Spooky explained. “And I’d really like a place to keep our food that isn’t a cooler sitting in the middle of a large room with holes in the wall. At least we could lock a cabinet. Also, this is the best I could think of to keep you away from the piping. Just because you have a wrench doesn’t mean you know what the hell you’re doing.”
“Hey, it worked that one time!” Dusty protested.
Bones didn’t even look up from his table. “And if you can tell me why and how it worked, I will gladly let you fix the plumbing here.”
“...”
“I thought so. Back to it, cabinet boy,” Bones chided.
Sunset and Twilight chuckled as the cabinet muffled some of Dusty’s less favorable language. “I think he’s enjoying this,” Sunset said with a smile. She looked around, and noticed Spooks eye-deep in his planning, Treble digging through a pile of drywall for… something, and Dusty having disappeared completely into his woodwork, she leaned in conspiratorially to her friend. “So, uh, how’s things with you and Spooky Bones?”
Twilight spluttered a response. “Buh-whu-what are you talking about?”
Sunset rolled her eyes. “Oh, please. You two are like, nerd-central in both our groups. You couldn’t be better made for each other if you had matching puzzle pieces. I mean, technically you do-”
“SUNSET!” Twilight shrieked. The boys all turned to look at them, and Twilight blushed furiously, dragging Sunset into a far corner. “What is the matter with you?!”
Shimmer chuckled. “Sorry, but you have to admit, you two aren’t terrible together.”
“Neither are Timber and I! You know, my boyfriend?!” Twilight protested. “I’m perfectly happy with my current situation, thanks!”
“Oh please,” Sunset groaned, her eyes taking a round-trip in their sockets. “He’s what… four years older than you?”
“Two and a half, Sunset,” Twilight groaned. “It’s not that big a deal. And it’s not like we’re… doing stuff, or anything.”
“Oh my god, Twilight, it’s called sex! It’s just a word!” Sunset chided.
“And age is just a number.”
Shimmer crossed her arms. “That’s not the same thing and you know it. And besides, that’s not even the biggest problem here. When was the last time you saw him?”
“For your information,” Twilight said crossly, “I saw him only a couple days after that whole haunted house ordeal. We spent the whole day together, and he was a perfect gentleman. Besides, why do you care so much who I’m dating?”
That gave Sunset pause. After a moment’s thought, she said, “Well, it’s less about who you’re dating, and more about… Spooks. Ok, if you tell any of the boys what I’m about to say, I’ll deny it and arrange your entire collection of lab notes in reverse alphabetical order.”
Twilight shivered. “Ok, fine.”
“I… I kind of like them, alright? They’re not quite as bad as I thought. I mean, they did a great job with the dance, and the party was a pretty good time. I admit we didn’t really have much reason to spend time with them last year, so actually seeing them in action is kind of… enlightening. They’re not as bad as I thought they were. So I kind of… fell bad for Spooky. I mean, I know he has really good friends, but he always looks.. alone, kind of.” Sunset glanced over her shoulder back at the boys, who seemed to have disregarded their conversation as the dreaded ‘girl talk’ they’d heard so much about. “I think it would be good for him to have someone… special.”
Twilight’s expression softened. “Sunset, that’s sweet. But that doesn’t mean you get to play matchmaker with people who are already in a relationship. Besides, it’s not like you don’t know a bunch of single cute girls.”
“Yes, but they’re all scared of him to some degree. I mean, he makes Pinkie jump. Pinkie,” Sunset stressed.
“Which I still don’t understand,” Twilight sighed. “I mean, he’s quiet, sure. But it’s not like he sneaks up on people. They just don’t really… notice him. Which is kinda sad, actually. I mean, even his friends get startled when he shows up. I kind of know what it’s like to be that… invisible.”
Sunset thought back to the last school year, and to a certain member of their yearbook committee. “I don’t think you’re the only one. Although it’s almost… supernatural with him. Which wouldn’t surprise me, given these guys. Considering one of them is literally carrying a ghost in his pocket-”
“Which he still won’t let me study,” Twilight grumbled.
“It’s his dad, Twilight. But I mean, I can’t help but empathize with the kid. I just thought maybe he could use some… affection,” Sunset said with a soft sigh.
“I kind of get it,” Twilight agreed quietly.
“You know I can hear you, right?” Spooks called across the room.
“Wha-HOW?!” Sunset yelped, blushing furiously.
Treble pushed aside the last of the pile he was working on, shoving it into the designated discard pile. “It’s a gift,” he said. “Kid can pick out a conversation from the other side of a crowded cafeteria. Hiding in the corner and being the only people in the room saying anything? Not gonna help much.”
“Also, I don’t need a girlfriend,” Spooks said simply.
Dusty and Treble traded glances, and bust out laughing. “Oh my god, that’s what you were being all hush-hush about?!” Treble howled. “Come on, who were you trying to set him up with, anyway?”
“Yeah,” Dusty jumped in. “You got Wednesday Addams on speed dial?”
“Nobody uses speed dial anymore, Dusty,” Spooks groaned. “And no, Sunset seems to think Twilight and I would be a good match.”
Which was Twilight’s cue to turn a few impressive shades of red. “Which is nto happening! I mean, I have a-”
“Boyfriend, yes I know,” Spooks drawled, finally looking up from his table to address Shimmer. “Look, Shimmy, I appreciate it, but really, I’m sixteen going on like, a hundred. I talk to dead people. I fight ghosts and monsters and apparently I’m a walking jump scare. If you could find someone not immediately put off by all of that I would be very impressed.”
Treble tapped his chin. “I dunno. You and Sci-Twi here seem to get on okay. Not that I’m saying you two need to hook up,” he added, cutting off Twilight’s protest. “What I’m saying is, if you two can get along, there might be a girl out thee for you yet.”
Dusty shrugged. “Hey, weirder stuff has happened. I mean, Rubble got himself a girlfriend, didn’t he?”
“Yeah, but he doesn’t pop out of the woodwork and scare people,” Treble joked, giving Bones a friendly elbow.
Spooks grinned at his friend. “No, he just openly terrifies anything with a pulse. Which kind of makes sense that he’d hook up with a girl like Indigo. I mean, if the chick can make it through the garbage in the Inkwell house without running scared-”
“To be fair, she didn’t really have a choice there,” Twilight pointed out.
“Eh, details,” Dusty said dismissively. “She stuck it out and even ran with us a little at the end. I mean, if the first conversation you have after you get outside is with your dad about how damaged your van is? You’re running with the right crowd.”
“Honestly I thought he’d end up with someone like Aria or that Gilda chick,” Sunset mused, taking her crowbar to another nail, having finally pulled free the first one.
Treble laughed. “Please. He hates Gilda! You remember the anti-bully tirade he went on a couple years ago?”
Twilight shook her head. “No,” she said.
“...oh, right. You weren’t here for most of that. Well, long story short, Rubble got his rep from picking fights with people like Gilda, and Hoops, and all kinds of unsavory characters,” Sunset explained. “He and I even butted heads. He’s one of the few people I decided not to blackmail or manipulate, lest he come to my house and stuff me in a garbage bag he would then hang from a tree in the woods.”
“I remember that,” came a tomboyish voice, as Rainbow Dash and Applejack walked back into the room, the later carrying a rather impressive piece of metal on her shoulder. “Wasn’t that Blueblood he did that to?”
“WHAT?!” Twilight yelped.
“Nah, Blueblood he jus’ stuffed in a trash can and rolled down the hall. S’where he got the rep for it,” AJ recalled. She put down the new piece of shiny metal on the ground. “Got a new gutter, Spooks. You said you wanted to see it first?”
“Wait, back up, he stuffed a kid in a trashbag, in their own home, and hung it from a tree?!” Twilight shrieked. “How did he not get arrested?!”
Sunset rolled her eyes. “Because A, the cops here are kinda garbage. I mean, with all the crap we deal with, do you see even one cop car? And B, nobody felt bad for the kid. Which, by the way, was Lightning Dust, after she tried to cheat in that one soccer game and broke a girl’s ankle with a bad leg-sweep.”
“Oh yeah,” Rainbow said fondly. “I remember now. Good times. Oh relax, Twilight, he didn’t actually hurt her. I don’t think.”
“Nah,” Dusty added. “He wouldn’t be able to pull it off if he had. You gotta roll them up gently in their sheets, tuck the bag under the roll, and then you can drag them out.” When the group at large gave him a look, he said, “Oh come on. Who do you think he learned it from?!”
Sunset kneaded her brow. “Remind me why I started hanging out with you again.”
“So,” AJ asked, trying to change the subject. “What did you wanna see this gutter for anyways, Spooks?”
“I wanted to test a rite that would turn any water that flowed through it into holy water,” Spooks explained, pulling out a small text with some religious icons on it.
“...of course ya’ did.”
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Personally, I blame the comments. Probably got the idea in your subconscious and this is the result.
That's not to say I didn't enjoy it, of course. Can't believe I let this story go unread for almost twenty chapters.
Wasn't Dusty the one with the dysfunctional parents? Or is there some other, unnown reason why they can't?
You know what would be an interesting cameo to see in this setting? King of stairs Sombra.
That’s a really good idea, with the line of work that they’re in.
This chapter almost made me consider Sunset for Bones, but I don't know that he'd go for the sporty type. Though, who knows. Stranger things have happened (literally).
But Sci-Twi is still the best.
8806878
She CARES. For all of them, but for Spooks more, I'd guess. It wouldn't be too much of a stretch for her to actually date him... but then again, she might just care as a friend. They'd complement each other nicely though, she's smart as hell and even if not nerd central she can be unflappable enough to be beside him in the thickest of the fray.
Ya know, I can't help but feel the conversation with Twilight and Sunset was solely to get people to stop pushing you for Spookylight.
Spookylight for life!
8806652
Trebble's parents constantly fight and want divorce because they want more money out of the other. They were described as pretty terrible people. We don't actually know what the situation with Dusty's family is, he hasn't once revealed anything, which is kind of telling in itself really.
8807006
I can definitely see the potential in it, but it just doesn't feel as... natural as him and Twilight. They just don't seem to fit together, and I'm not just saying that because I totally ship Sunset and Treble.
...I ship it. Which one? ALL OF THEM.
8807166
But if the parents are a lawyer and a top inventor, shouldn't they be living in a bigger place than a 2-bedroom apartment? A lot easier to avoid each other in a McMansion.
8807163
I know... #Spookylight. (What have I done.) And Timbersproose is a tad of a tool.
8807199
Thank ya sister.
8807289I got the impression they are serious tightwads as well, greedy and never wanting to spend on anything they don't have too. They aren't 'rich' so much as well off, but they don't spend that money freely
Also, I like the idea of Rubble getting into so many brawls with bullies that nobody at school messes with his smaller friends (though Dusty sounds like he'd come off better against the vast majority of the kids in the school), and won't go too far messing with random people lest our teenaged Tank Abbot take notice.
SHIPPING YESahem I love these characters so getting to just watch them hang out and interact is a treat. Also, I find the tangential intros in each chapter tend to break the flow in the middle of a tense sequence, so this is refreshing to not have it.8807166 true
8806668
Especially considering that if they miss some trouble (not Trouble) and it comes looking for them. Running holy water would give them a safer area to shelter. :)
8806642
I admit that reading the shipping comments is highly entertaining. And I let about 30 chapters build up so I really can't say anything about someone else letting a few chapters go. But it did let me enjoy a whole arc in one go so I can't complain.
I know a guy who could really help them with the ghost and demons and stuff.
Just... don't get him too upset...
cloudedanime.files.wordpress.com/2016/07/mob-psycho-100-01-01.jpg
He has some emotional repression issues.