Chapter Text
“We have a kid!”
The voice vibrating in his skull shook Bob awake. He grabbed the pillow to wrap over his head with a groan, not like it would’ve done anything against telepathy. His other hand reached out for the ball that should’ve been sitting by his side. It was instead rolling back and forth in the bed, with figments popping in and out of existence that would not let Bob go back to the bliss of sleep
“Helmut, slow down”
“We have a kid, oh god we have a kid how did I forget that? I'm a horrible father!” it continued bouncing about “I couldn't sleep because you know I can't like sleep sleep like this so I was back in my mind palace trying to find what else could I remember, so I was looking around and I find this—vault? Yes, vault, and it's us with a baby, so I wondered ‘huh, who's baby is that? Compton's? And then it all came back to me like a bus, the waiting and the preparations, and actually holding him in my arms and—” he sped up to his husband’s face until hitting against his forehead , “Bobby, why didn’t you remind me?!”
The weight of his abused body, of the lack of alcohol, and years of regrets all settled back in. They would’ve had to have this conversation eventually, yet Bob had hoped he’d have more than a few days. The vines that called to him with their familiar siren call told him to never speak of it again, to ignore his lover’s panic, to just find yet a new place to hide in. Helmut wouldn’t let him, though; the comfort of his cocoon no longer was as appealing as the warm embrace of their home. Why didn’t he remind him, what an awful thing to answer out loud.
While he pondered upon this, Helmut continued making the closest he could do to an exasperated expression, being limited to a hamster ball with a hat with floating hands, his thoughts running too fast to distinguish from each other, turning into a cascade of sounds that just managed to wash him with worry. Realizing he wouldn’t be able to stop on his own, Bob bit the bullet and sat up, catching the brain in his arms to force it to stay still for half a second.
“Love, please.”
“I just—” he ‘looked’ up, finally starting to channel all his rushing questions into a single, desperate one: “Where’s Dallas?”
Those two words knocked the wind out of his lungs. All he could do for a moment was heave, struggling to even make a sound. When was the last time that name had come to haunt him? It wrapped around his throat, choking the words out without mercy. Why didn’t he remind him sooner? Perhaps because he knew this would be his exact reaction. What an awful husband he is, to stay in the selfish world of forgetfulness that had already caused so much damage to all of them. Helmut caught up to his distress quickly, which changed the direction of his panic into something worse.
“Is… is he alright?”
At least that much he could answer, sort of: “Last I heard, he was”
The relief was short-lived once the implication fell through, “last you heard?”
Bob held onto the ball tight. A reminder to not just stand up to go get a drink (a drink he wouldn’t even find, the cleaning had been through).
“We don’t talk much. We… he sends me letters, sometimes, and sometimes I answer”
“Oh…” the rush of energy slowly fades out, along with the light of figments, until the room becomes far too silent. He takes a moment to ask, not quite hiding his awkwardness, “did you guys have a fight? Like with Truman?”
Helmut deserved to know. Helmut deserved the truth of the kind of man his husband really was. And if that made him realize he wasn’t the man he once loved… well, Bob could only thank the heavens he at least got two days more with his beloved before losing him forever once more.
“No. No, we didn’t fight,” he took a deep breath, trying to swallow that knot. God, a fight would be easier. There would be a clear thing to apologize for, something that could ever so slightly alleviate the responsibility from his shoulders. There was no such thing here, maybe some rough meetings, but those weren’t the root. Even if there was, would he be so vile? All those awful things he thought of Truman for firing him, would he have said the same of his sprout? “When you… I knew the last thing I should do was drink. I should’ve just focused on Dallas, on what I had left, but—it was too much. He’s so much like you, Helmut, he was such a lovely kid, so full of creativity and personality and he didn’t deserve to be stuck with me. If only one of us could raise him, that should’ve been you.” No, he doesn’t get to cry about this, not yet.
While he tried to get back the ability to speak, a part of him still listened. Waiting for any indicator of Helmut’s reaction, of his anger, his grief, anything.
It was dead silence.
Aside from a light, static-like feeling that prodded at the back of his head, there was no input from the brain. He couldn’t recall the last time Helmut had retracted his thoughts like this, when being near him was enough to fill up your mind with music and all the colors of the rainbow, even when he was under the weather. It had to hurt so more to restrain what came out of his brain when that was all he had. It was probably meant to be a kindness, maybe it was, but it felt like twisting further in the dagger he was already stabbing himself with. However, to point any of this out would make it all worse, either because Helmut would then become self-conscious or because Bob would lose any capacity to not break down right there and then. No way but forward.
“When the others began to leave, it got harder. It was my mistake, trying to work as something like an agent while having a kid at home, it was a bad idea from the start. That’s not what I was, we were potheads opening each other’s minds, not that. I tried to hide it from him, but that’s still—that doesn’t make it go away, does it? When you can only rely on two people and one of them is Otto, that should’ve been enough to call it quits. I was just too stubborn. Fuck, I waited so long, when I couldn’t even look him in the eye half of the time. Then I got fired. I went back home ready to get wasted, but he was there. Right there, waiting for me with big eyes, asking if I was alright. He thought I was sick, Helmut, and that's why I would leave.”
Despite his efforts, a tear managed to fight the battle against his eyes. No ghostly hand came to wipe it off.
“So I… I told him to pack his things. The next day, I took him to Truman so he'd take him back to his home. If he was so much better than me, he could raise my son better, right? It was only until I got better. I thought I'd get better, I really did. I was too stubborn again to get help. It just ended up with me stuck here.”
His shoulders started shaking. It was harder and harder to keep his composure, the shards of his mistakes in the back of his mind dug in deep with each memory, every single one telling him how he could’ve fixed everything. Now that he was sober, that he had spoken his peace with his nephew and old friends, it all became so obvious. A tired gaze begged for his attention, his love, and his support, all of which should’ve been his birthright yet were taken by the bliss of alcohol.
“Alright” Helmut thought, how stressful it was to have no body language to go off of. The silence pressed on for a while, until he spoke again, “have you seen him since?”
“He’d visit sometimes. We couldn’t stand each other for long, though”
“You said you didn’t fight”
“We didn’t, at—at least not like with Truman, but it was uncomfortable. I last saw him a couple years ago. I think he wanted help, I don’t remember. I wish I could’ve helped”
Unable to actually move, the brain swirled around in its liquid.
“Is he a good kid?”
A hiccup, followed by a weak strain of voice, “Yes, yes he’s a good kid. A real good artist, too”
“He is?”
“Yeah! A painter. I think— I have some old paintings he’s sent, if you wanna see,” he finally gathered enough strength to let go, if only wipe off his face. Then another hand helped him, filled with that ethereal warmth that could, for a single moment, make him feel whole again. “I’m sorry,” Bob muttered, leaning into the not-quite-there touch he doesn’t deserve. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”
“It’s alright.”
“It’s not, I failed you, I failed Dallas. Our family—”
“You did what you could. You kept him safe in the end. I can’t ask for much more, given everything I’ve learned so far”
That did it.
Bob clung to his husband for dear life, letting those bottles of repressed emotion shatter on the floor. The other’s emotions came crashing against his own in an explosion of grief, anger, relief, pride, yellows, honey-buns, greens, softness, roses, everything mixed together in the realization of his own guilt. They simmered in this pot of misery. If they're to be denied crying out in each other's arms, or the comfort of knowing they've done well for their child, the least they can get is this. Until every emotion was exhausted, they let it all out in whatever mangled way they could, a new funeral for a lifetime of ‘should've been but never was’.
At some point, so distant they couldn't believe it still was dark, they were people once more, aching, tired, but people. It was far too loud when one of them broke the silence.
“I’d love to see those paintings, actually,” his voice was weak, so close to crying with eyes he didn’t have.
“Okay… sure, let me…” A few climbing vines retracted from the wall, making its way to the back of the greenhouse, where he had stuffed all that was too much to bear. While it scavenged for the art, Helmut prodded:
“You should write back”
“I know. I’ve been meaning to, it’s been— It’s been a lot”
He gave a humorless laugh, “fair enough. We can deal with that in the morning”
“… Do, uh do, ya want me to tell him you’re alive?”
He swung back and forth, before settling, “yeah. Let’s get it out of the way. If he does visit, I don’t want him freaking out about how you married a brain.”
“If you say so,” it felt a little too grand, like getting his hopes up for a reunion that would never come, but lying and hiding had done enough damage. He’d come clean, then lick his wounds afterwards.
The plants slithered back into the room, most carrying different canvases of varying sizes that are displayed in a makeshift gallery, but one held in its branches a pack of crumpled-up papers. Letters, some had come with the paintings, some stand alone. Each had been read. The stains of tears and liquor proved so.
“Whoa!”
“I’ve never been the creative type. I knew you’d have a better eye for… this”
“He did this? Our little sprout, he did all this?”
Bob nodded, sniffing, “and who knows how much more”
The brain ball was surrounded by a new lineup of sparkling figments. “Look at that! Man, the colors! The emotion! how did he use that…”
Bob was indeed getting his hopes up, he knew that. This was too little too late, for all of them. Yet, for just this second, it might just be enough to think he has a family again.
“Huh, I don’t think you've ever shown me this one. It’s kinda neat, I guess”
Dallas turned around, and cringed once he realized what Mirphy was talking about. “Ohhh no, that’s an old piece, missy. You can throw that one in the trash pile”
She paid no heed to his, soon joined by Flower Child in the staring of the painting, although they seemed to be more analytical of it.
“I dunno, seems just as messy as your other work”
“YAUCH, right to the heart!” He asked for help deep cleaning his home, not for criticism on his art! Then again, maybe he needed some humbling. That’s what led his home to become such a mess in the first place
Flower Kid tilted their head, “they seem familiar,” they pointed to the faded figures in the background, “who are they?”
“Ugh, they're my dads. I was, uh… kinda going through an emo phase. Tooootally bogus”
“What you mean?”
It didn’t feel good to touch back on that wound. Too much drama. Too much… self-pity. But it was the first time in a while someone had asked about that ordeal, perhaps looking back with fresh eyes could give the image some new light.
“Him,” Dallas pointed at the ghastly being at the right, barely recognizable as a humanoid, rather a collection of swirling the colors of the rainbow that only muddied each other, “I don’t remember him much. He died when I was, like, 2. A shame, I’ve found some of his old records, he seemed like a siiick dude.”
“And that’s Pops.” He turned to the left, where stood a blurry visage of a man, this time discernible from the background yet little more than a distant memory. Well, that was the idea. He couldn't help but wince a little at how smart he thought he was simply using sponges to paint and refusing to give him facial features. “He gave me up to my uncle and auntie a few years after that. Losing his husband got him super gloomy about, well, everything”
Once he dared lay his eyes on the centerpiece, the painter softened up a little. How old was he when he made this? 15? 16? If he was in his head when he entered the Habitat, it was far worse in his teens. Such an over dramatic depiction if himself between people he didn’t really know, and a terrible use of color to boot. “I used to be gloomy about them, but I’m over it by now. I write to pops sometimes, no clue if he even answers, but it’s oddly therapeutic.”
“Wow,” Mirphy’s response didn’t sound quite that interested.
Flower Kid, however, remained staring intensely at it, their face twisting in a funny frown as if stuck in a hard riddle.
Suddenly, their eyes went wide. They shuffled among their inventory, dropping a few things (why did they always have so much stuff? He was sure he’d seen them pick up papers from the trash) until they took out a magazine—ah, that’s a title he hadn’t seen in a while. The florist rushed through the pages until they landed on one that made them gasp, then lifted it up to put it side by side with the painting. Their head shifted quickly between the two, focusing on the man on the left, comparing them to the closest match on the presentation gallery of the comic. This got Mirphy’s attention, who leaned in to try and find out what the commotion was about, reading over the name.
“Robert… Zanotto?”
“That’s my old man,” Dallas chuckled awkwardly, getting close to take a good look as well, “and uuuh… there! Helmut Fullbear. So you’re one of those Psychic juggernauts, huh? I guess it fits”
Their jaw almost dropped to the floor.
Feeling out of the loop, Mirphy took a peek at the cover, “True Psychic Tales issue- hold on, isn’t this from the Psychonauts?”
“Yep, they helped found it. My cousin Truman is like, the CEO or something? I don’t know how that works”
Her reaction to this information was that of stupefaction. She turned to the painting, pointed at the signature, and looked back at him, “Isn’t your last name Smuth?”
“You know what a artistic name is, babe? I just took my auntie’s last name 'cuz people kept trying to tie me back to the whole psychic stuff. I wanna, like, make my own name!”
“So—your family is running an organization that’s all about minds or whatever, and you still ended up The Habitat?”
He shrugged, “It was closer”
That didn’t satisfy her. Dallas sighed.
“And I guess it felt like I’d be asking Truman for help, and I haaaaated it. Runs in the family, huh.”
Mirphy groaned, “well, before we throw it, let me take a couple pictures of it. It's a nice composition.”
“You’d do it either way”
At least that whole talk of the past got his creative juices running. Nothing like old wounds as a new muse, after all! Before he could focus on those new ideas, though, there was a more prominent issue.
“Uuuhhh, Flower Chiiild? You OK, lil duude? It looks like you’re gonna explode.”
They were literally vibrating, their hands holding onto the comic book so tight they might just rip it, babbling on sounds of excitement that weren’t even close to real words. It was impossible not to laugh.
“Heh, you know, I haven’t reached out to Tru in a while. Maybe I could get him to give us a tour at HQ? We have at least one ‘special case’ they’d be glad to take. How does that sound?”
Flower Kid nodded their head so quickly he feared it would go flying right off.
“Sure thing, then. You coming, Mirphy?”
“Nope, I don’t need to know more about you. It’s getting a little creepy,” with that, she takes a picture.