Chapter Text
Berdly was not homophobic by any stretch of the word, but right now, having lunch with his (somewhat friendly) rival and their two mutual friends, he was starting to think Susie and Noelle finally getting into a relationship may have unintentionally been equivalent to a plague being unleashed upon Hometown.
Well, it hadn't been all that recent, really - they'd gotten together not long after the stuff with the Dark Worlds had been resolved, and it had been well over a month since that had happened, but with the way they still looked at each other like they went on their very first date the day before, no one would ever guess.
Which quickly became a problem in group hangouts where there were people other than the two of them around, because suddenly Susie and Noelle were the only two people that had ever existed and Berdly was inadvertently forced to fraternize with his rival.
“Susie!” Noelle giggled sweetly, a high-pitched noise that would have been quite endearing in any other situation. “You're not supposed to eat the wax casing!”
“The hell is it there for, then?!” Susie huffed, grinning widely. “'Sides, it adds flavor!”
The bluebird picked at his very unappetizing-looking slice of pizza with a fork, scrunching his beak at the grease that glistened in the artificial lighting. He didn't know why in the world ICE-E's had become their designated group lunch spot, but he needed to make sure to object at some point. Democracy had been failing them for far too long - if Noelle went along with Susie's idea one more time even though Berdly knew she disliked the food at this place just as much as he did, he might go insane.
Plus, all the noise. Angel, the noise. He didn't know how Kris could handle it, with the two of them having the same sensitivities when it came to that. Every time he left the building, he felt like he'd been hit over the head with a gong while he was inside and was only now beginning to feel the side effects. In comparison, QC's was much more pleasant to have lunch at, despite the fact that it also had more patrons. At least at QC's you didn't have to hear the entire pizza-making process while you were just trying to enjoy your meal.
Speaking of his rival, they'd been hovering in his peripheral vision for quite a while now, almost seeming like they were deliberately trying to get his attention in the most vague way possible. When he turned to them with an unimpressed look, he was met with their typical “eyes hidden by bangs” deadpan look, though he felt like they were staring into his SOUL. He looked at his disgusting pizza, then back at the human.
“Do you want this?”
Kris nodded fervently, batting their eyelashes under their bangs as if in a plea. Berdly found that they sort of looked like a puppy, the way they were resting their hands on the table and waiting patiently. He pushed his plate their way.
His rival immediately swiped the slice off the plate and shoved half of it in their mouth, signing a lazy ‘Thanks.’ with their free hand. Berdly tried not to look too grossed out. How could Kris and Susie eat that? Noelle needed to raise her standards, if only a little bit. He had no issue with her dating Susie, but the least she could do was try to get her girlfriend to have more refined tastes.
“-so what do you nerds think?”
Berdly turned to look at Susie. She was looking expectantly at him and Kris, awaiting their reply. Before the bluebird could give the girlfriends a piece of his mind over the blatant disregard for their existence until then, Kris replied.
‘About what?’ they signed, seemingly feeling a lot more reasonable about the clear inconsideration than the bluebird would have felt.
“Who wins in a battle between the main Dragon Blazers team and one of each Critter in Critterkit!” Susie explained. “Noelle n' I think it's the Dragon Blazers team, but it's a hell of a question.”
‘Critterkit has God.’ Kris signed, then started fiddling with the straw of their drink.
“Well, the Dragon Blazers cast killed God in DB IV!” Noelle countered. “That's gotta count for something!”
“Right you are, dear Noelle!” Berdly chuckled. “But don't forget; Critterkit has multiple gods!”
“If they've done it once, they can do it again!” the reindeer insisted with an excited, somewhat manic grin. She was clearly very into this specific argument, and Berdly knew that Noelle being very into something meant that she'd done extensive research to stand her ground. He'd lost the battle before it even began.
“You know, it's quite funny how Kris and I are suddenly included in the conversation.” the bluebird snarked, using his jab as a way to hide the fact that he most definitely did not hear Susie's question because he was preoccupied with Kris's eating habits. “Honestly, we're overlooked so much in these hangouts lately, it's like we might as well not even be here.”
Berdly was being overdramatic, he was well aware of that fact, but he couldn't help but prod them further. It was the least they deserved, for consistently dragging him out to ICE-E's of all places.
“It's called “having a partner”, smartass.” Susie sneered with faux sweetness. “You should try it sometime. Maybe then you'll see how easy it is to fawn over someone so much everything else fades into the background.”
Noelle gazed dreamily at Susie with wide, sparkling doe eyes (literally and figuratively), looking an uncomfortable amount like a shoujo protagonist. The saccharine of it all made Berdly want to hurl almost as much as the deplorable food.
(And no, it was not jealousy he was experiencing. He'd tested it.)
“I have a partner.” he grumbled in response, maybe a little defensively.
Everyone seated at the table shot him a disbelieving look. He fluffed up his feathers, flustered. Never mind the fact that he'd lied through his nonexistent teeth; did his friends really have such little faith in him?!
“What?!” he snapped. Now he sounded really defensive. “I do!”
“You? A partner?! Hah!” Susie cackled. “What, does your reflection in the mirror count as a separate person all of a sudden?”
Kris snickered, which was to be expected, but surprisingly, Noelle giggled a little as well. Berdly shot her an appalled look. Oh, the horror! The betrayal!
“Noelle!”
“It was a little funny!” his cervine friend insisted.
“Nah, nah, I should be more fair to him.” Susie shook her head lightly, a grin plaguing her features. “Maybe he's been lucid dreaming so hard he's convinced it's real!”
Berdly glared at the saurian, cheeks burning with humiliation. He couldn't come clean now! What in the world was he supposed to say?! “You wouldn't know them, they go to another school”?! That's ridiculous! It's such an obvious lie, even Susie, oblivious as she is, would catch it! He needed something more believable.
Noelle swatted her girlfriend on the arm, still giggling like some lovestruck idiot.
“Don't be so mean!” she reprimanded lightly. “Remember the first time we entered the Dark World? I also thought that was a lucid dream!”
“Yeah, but you're smart enough to know the difference! That lonely little fuck wouldn't know fantasy from reality if it bit him in the ass!”
Berdly's brain, the wise, actually helpful part, told him to just admit he lied, that he was embarrassing himself. His pride did not allow him. So as a compromise, he screeched the first thing he could think of over the noise of the restaurant and Susie's wild cackling.
“KRIS AND I ARE DATING!”
As soon as the words toppled out of the bluebird's beak, an unsettling, almost eerie silence settled over the table. Susie paused halfway through taking a bite of her pizza, mouth agape as she stared at Berdly. A rogue slice of pepperoni slid off the greasy, disgusting food and fell on the table comically.
Berdly managed to fight off the overwhelming urge to slap his wings over his beak in horror. How the hell was that the first thing he could think of?! Him and Kris?! They were nothing more than his rival! The distant third place in class! Their intellect was far below his in every facet! Honestly, how absurd would that be?! Susie and Noelle would never believe that! Plus, Kris was right there! Why would he blurt out such a thing when they were right there?!
He needed to die. He needed to be struck down by the Angel itself stat. He needed the Roaring to actually happen. With every second that passed without a single damn person seated at that table saying anything at all, he was closer and closer to enacting it himself.
Belatedly, he noticed Susie and Noelle turning their heads to look at Kris with an agonizing slowness. He followed their gaze, perhaps a little too quickly in comparison. For a split second, the human seemed equally as surprised as them, before their face slowly melted back into the typical blank expression they tended to wear.
They sent Berdly a terrifyingly good impression of a fond, couple-ey sort of look and raised their hands to sign something.
‘Seriously, bluebird?’ Kris clicked their tongue, sighing playfully under their breath. ‘They weren't supposed to know yet.’
They calmly returned to their self-imposed task of bending the paper straw of their Juice (Red Flavor) into an unrecognizable shape, the ghost of a shit-eating smile etched across their face. The rest of Susie's pizza fell to the table with a splat and her jaw dropped even further, if that was possible.
Oh Angel above Berdly did not think this through.
“What-”
“WHAT????????”
Noelle's hesitant, high pitched question was quickly drowned out by her girlfriend's loud roar, the tone of which had landed somewhere between confusion, intense amusement, hysteria, disbelief and horror.
“…D-did I read those signs right, Kri-” Noelle tried again, her smile wavering.
“AND YOU DIDN'T FUCKING TELL ME?!” Susie bellowed, snapping her head towards Kris. The few patrons that were seated around them looked their way. Berdly ignored both them and the way his feathers had fluffed so much he'd likely almost doubled in size.
‘Sorry.’ the human signed lamely, now busy shredding a napkin into a neat little pile in the middle of the table. They did not look sorry at all.
“You think you know a guy.” Susie had already begun her spiel, draping herself over Noelle dramatically. Noelle made a noise oddly reminiscent of a rubber chicken being put through a hydraulic press. “In fact, you think you're besties for the resties with a guy. And then they start dating the goddamn Credditor bird-”
“I'll have you know, Creddit is actually a great place to gather information-”
“-and they - shut up, Berdly, this isn't about you - don't even let you know in advance so you can make fun of 'em for a while!” Susie finished, shaking her head in profound disappointment at Kris. “Wow. Wooooow.”
‘I wasn't ready.’ Kris signed briskly, rolling their eyes as if to say “jeez”.
“I-indeed!” Berdly interjected awkwardly. What was he doing. He needed to shut up. “They had told me to, er… keep the relationship under wraps. They're actually quite shy, you know.”
“What?” Noelle wheezed, voice so breathy it was more of a hiss than an actual word. Her “customer service” sort of polite smile, one she tended to wear when she was forced into awkward situations and wanted out as soon as possible, began to slip.
Susie slammed her left forearm on the table repeatedly, narrowly avoiding her long-forgotten slice of pizza. She was breathing heavily with the monumental effort not to laugh, and her face was scrunched up in amusement and delirium.
‘He wants me so bad it makes him look stupid.’ Kris nodded their head towards Berdly, smirking lazily.
Berdly let out an offended squawk, unable to prevent his face from heating up. He didn't say anything in response, though; whatever option he chose from his dialogue tree was sure to blow their cover, and it was far too late for him to stop now.
“What??” Noelle asked for the third time that noon, high-pitched like a referee whistle. Susie lost her inner battle and began cackling wildly yet again.
“Oh my fucking god.” the saurian moved to wipe a tear from her eye. Berdly could not for the life of him figure out if it was real or fake. “This is too good. Too. Good.”
“So! Um.” Noelle tried as Susie fought to regain her composure next to her. “How… How long has it been now?”
Berdly froze up, mentally filing through possible amounts of time that seemed feasible. Before he could squawk out an attempt at a believable answer, Kris beat him to it.
‘Three weeks as of yesterday.’
For the first time in his life, Berdly internally congratulated his rival. Of course! About three weeks ago, they'd had one of their typical Smashing Fighters hangouts at the Dreemurr residence, which Noelle and Susie were likely aware of due to Berdly casually letting them know that he'd won not one, not two, but three out of twenty-seven matches against Kris! That was perfect!
“…W-wow!” Noelle said, visibly surprised. It had seemed like she was going to follow that up with something else, but no words left her mouth afterwards.
“Nugget boy managed to keep quiet for three weeks?!” Susie hollered, hitting the table with her fist. “I call major bull.”
“It was a strenuous task, to be sure.” Berdly, for some asinine reason, was still dedicating all of his precious brainpower to keeping this lie going. His beak quirked into a fraction of a smirk as he said his next line. “But it was worth it to see m'theydy happy.”
The bluebird gauged his rival's reaction, smirk growing a little when Kris scrunched up their face in a way the bluebird didn't know they were capable of. Perhaps it was worth it to maintain the ruse, if it meant he got to openly taunt them like that.
“M'THEYDY?!?!?!” Susie screeched, almost delirious. She turned to Kris, now definitely teary eyed, and reached over the table to give their upper arm a solid right hook that made them wobble like a roly-poly. “And you just let him call you that????”
The human merely sighed, the sound somehow falling between dismayed and faux-dreamy.
‘Love's weird.’ they signed.
“You can say that again…” Berdly thought he heard Noelle mumble, but he couldn't be sure, seeing as her entire face was mostly hidden by her hooves.
“I can't fucking believe this.” Susie stated, smiling manically. “This can't- you've got to be fucking with me, dude!”
‘Not fucking with you.’ Kris signed, crossing their SOUL with their hand before they added ‘/srs.’
His rival had signed each character separately. Berdly suppressed a tired sigh, if only to keep up the ruse they'd for some reason both been fighting to maintain.
“Nope. Don't believe you at all.” Susie scoffed. “If it really is “slash S-R-S”, then riddle me this-”
What followed was a series of rapid-fire questions about Berdly and Kris's very real romantic relationship, clearly still in pure disbelief. His rival answered all of them at an absurdly fast rate, barely stopping to think between them and still coming up with an extremely believable answer.
“First date spot?”
‘At the lake. Berdly didn't know it was a date.’
“Favorite couple activity?”
‘Gaming together.’
“Shoulda known. You share a Minecrap world?”
‘Obviously. Our beds are next to each other.’
“Pet names?”
‘I like “birdie” the most.’
“Who confessed first?”
‘Me. Duh.’
“How did you know you liked… him?”
‘Saw him do something cringy and realized with horror that I wanted to kiss him.’
“Hah, 'course that was how it happened.” Susie elbowed Kris harshly, but the human seemed content with it.
“What is happening…?” Noelle whispered under her breath, her eyes wide but her stare vacant as she read each and every one of Kris's signs and seemed to grow more and more distressed as it went on.
“Got one last question for you…” Susie said ominously, tapping the tips of her claws together like a cartoon villain. Berdly suddenly felt very much not at ease.
Kris gestured for her to ‘Shoot.’ very literally, via miming shooting a gun.
“…How was your first kiss as a couple?” Susie delivered the killing blow, grinning evilly. She'd been clearly saving that for last on purpose. “Actually, have you even had one? I doubt it. I can't imagine birdbrain's much of a kisser, heh.”
Berdly didn't even have time to wonder why in the world Susie was so incredibly confident in that, too focused on Kris's response. Would they make up another lie? Leave it inconclusive? Or would they finally give up and admit they were committing to a prank?
They held their hands up to answer, but ended up just placing them back down and drumming their fingers on the table, apparently drawing a blank.
“What, too shy all of a sudden, dumbass?” Susie sneered playfully, grinning at her best friend. She turned to look at Berdly and her grin suddenly felt crueler. “What about you?”
Berdly spared one last glance to Kris, trying not to appear too put on the spot, but all his rival did was return it uncertainly. Which was incredibly unhelpful. Had they already exhausted their dialogue?! They were doing so well!
Bah. He had to do everything himself. He cleared his throat.
“W-well… Y-you see-”
Berdly's alarm rang out, the bluebird jolting in place and fumbling with the phone in his wings to turn it off. He pushed his seat back and jumped out of it quickly, incredibly grateful for such an easy escape opportunity.
“Oh wow would you look at that my shift at the Librarby starts in five minutes hahaha!” he forced out hastily as he started walking off. “Goodbye everyone!”
Thank the Angel for the alarm he had set to notify him about the start of an event in his favorite gacha game. No one needed to know.
Well, except Noelle. Noelle knew. His best friend absolutely knew he was lying. But that was a problem for Future-Berdly.
Meanwhile, Present-Berdly rushed out of the restaurant, talons scraping on the floor and making an uncomfortable noise that he was too delirious to pay any mind to. He needed to get home and rethink his entire existence. Or, at the very least, decide how he was going to tell his friends he'd lied and that had been the first thing that came to mind.
[…]
Kris uselessly smothered their head with a pillow, trying to drown out the hysterical, vaguely demonic laughter of the entity that shared their body with them, currently locked in its cage. They failed, of course, seeing as said laughter was coming directly from inside their head.
(Dude, oh my god-) YOU wheezed, sounding as if doubling over with laughter, which the SOUL definitely could not achieve. (This is too fucking good-)
“Having a good laugh, are you?” Kris grumbled, making sure to sound as sarcastic as possible.
(The best, kiddo.) YOU cackled. (Oh, Jesus Christ, this is so much better than the festival.)
Kris bit back a groan. The festival felt like it had happened ages ago. The entity had roped them into taking Berdly as their date, them reluctantly going along with it both to avoid whatever fiasco would occur if Berdly actually tried to make going with him to the festival into a competition and to allow Susie and Noelle to have a little date without a third wheel being dragged along - they were a “real one”, after all. Frankly, they still hadn't forgiven YOU for that. Even if they did end up having a pretty decent time, all things considered.
(Got you thinking back to your little date, huh?) the entity teased.
The human flipped it off wordlessly, attempting to call Berdly on Bedlam for the umpteenth time. Finally, finally, the bluebird picked up, after definitely allowing it to ring for several seconds on purpose.
(Kris knew he wasn't busy. It was far too early for his Librarby shift, though the use of the alarm was a valiant attempt at worming out of the conversation, and he was never busy unless he was at his job(s) or studying with Noelle.)
“Salutations, my rival whom I harbor no romantic intentions whatsoever towards!” the very clearly rehearsed voice greeted, sounding more like a squawk than usual due to the layer of awkwardness and embarrassment. “Here to get beaten into the dust in Minecrap Sleepwars?”
Kris huffed playfully. He was really bad at acting normal after doing some majorly stupid shit (well, he was bad at acting normal in general, but especially in that case). Maybe that was hypocritical of them, seeing as they weren't the pinnacle of normalcy, either, but any opportunity to make fun of Berdly, internally or otherwise, was a good one.
“Care to explain what that was?” they asked, a teasing lilt to their voice.
The line was silent for a couple of seconds. Kris could almost feel the panic from the other side of the screen.
“What what was?” Berdly asked in the most inconspicuous way he could muster - which was to say, not at all.
“Don't even, Berdly.” the human told him with an exasperated sigh. “You know you suck at gaslighting.”
“Okay fine look.” Berdly immediately caved, sounding agonized. “I truly have no clue why I said that. Susan's jabs were growing frustrating, and… I said the first thing that came to mind.”
“The first thing that comes to your mind is dating me?” Kris teased.
Berdly made a series of impossible to identify noises, sounding extremely flustered. Kris bit their lip to avoid smiling, even though the bluebird wasn't around to witness it.
“Not like that in the slightest!” he snapped, before sighing. “It's just. You are a person that I know. And also not in a romantic relationship. And I am on decent terms with you. The way I rationalized it, it was more believable than merely saying “you don't know them, they go to another school”. By a nanometer.”
“Huh. That logic actually does track.” Kris mused. “Any idea what you're gonna do about it, though?”
“What I'm going to do about it?!” Berdly laughed humorlessly, maybe a little manic. “My dear rival, we're in this together now! This is no longer solely a me-problem!”
“And whose fault is that?”
“Unimportant.” the bluebird mumbled under his breath. Kris could hear shuffling coming from the other side. It sounded like… sheets of paper? “But we need a game plan.”
“What's stopping me from just telling them you instinctively lied 'cause you're a lonely loser and didn't wanna feel left out?” the human jabbed.
“Your deep enjoyment of pranking others.” Berdly countered instantly, as though he'd been waiting for that question. The shuffling increased.
“Fair enough.” Kris shrugged. They narrowed their eyes at the sound of paper ripping. “Dude, what the hell are you doing?”
“Devising a plan, of course.” he replied matter-of-factly. Now the scribbling of a pen could be heard. “Now brainstorm with me, since you insisted on calling me.”
“Seriously, why don't you just suck it up and come clean?”
“Because!” Berdly hissed pointedly. “I'm far too deep already! I can't just give up!”
“Sure, that makes sense, yeah.” Kris replied sarcastically.
“It does, does it not?!” the bluebird snapped from the other side of the line, fully missing the sarcasm. His scribbling turned into the noise of an eraser and the scrunching of paper. “Besides, you certainly didn't help by going along with it!”
“Well, what was I supposed to do, stay quiet?” the human snickered. “I love a good prank.”
“That's exactly the problem!” Berdly made a strangled noise like he was pulling at his own feathers. “Arghhhh, what are we going to do?!”
“You know, I really don't appreciate getting dragged into this.” Kris tutted.
Berdly's scribbling stopped for a while. Whatever he was using to write clacked onto the table as he sighed.
“…I apologize.” he murmured. “Even if you have some fault of your own.” he added between coughs.
“Yeah, fair enough.” Kris snickered. “Sorry about that. It was simply too funny.”
Berdly audibly scoffed from the other side of the line, harrumphing as he wrote. Kris allowed a wide smile of amusement to cross their face - it's not like he could see it anyways.
“Alright, fine.” Kris placed their phone next to them on their bed, leaning on a pillow. “Let's get this game plan started.”
(Look at you, resident weird kid!) YOU teased from the cage. (You're carrying that extremely difficult conversation like a champ!)
Kris rolled their eyes exaggeratedly. They didn't appreciate the patronizing tone, but they appreciated the bodily autonomy the entity's temporary prison gave them, at the very least.
“I'm glad we're finally on the same page.” Berdly said, hmph-ing proudly.
The line went silent. Kris had expected the bluebird to start firing ideas at them, but he said nothing, the only sounds being the occasional scribbling on paper.
“So, any ideas?” the human prompted.
“Of course.” Berdly spoke quickly, in the way he tended to do when he was drawing a blank and didn't want anyone to know. “But I would like to hear yours first.”
“Sure you do.” Kris rolled their eyes. “Well, mine is pretty simple, really: we commit to the bit, as they say.”
“Hm.” the bluebird on the other side of the line seemed to ponder it, tapping his pencil against a surface. “And what would that entail?”
“The classic.” Kris said. “Step one: We fake date for however long we think it's funny. Step two: we fake break up in the most over the top way we can think of. Step three: profit.”
“…And you're sure that's a good plan?”
“No, but I'm sure it's a funny one.” they shot back. “Plus, I'm not a coward; I can handle pretending to date someone for shits and giggles. Even if that someone is you.” they added playfully.
Berdly squawked in offense.
“Well, for all intents and purposes, I'm not thrilled to be your fake gamer boyfriend, either.” he grumbled.
“You were the one who blurted out you were my real gamer boyfriend.”
“Quiet.”
Kris stifled a giggle with their fist. They loved pissing him off over minor things like these. It was a shame they weren't having this conversation face to face - seeing his feathers fluff up in real time until he looked like a ridiculous ball of fluff was the best part.
“Do you accept these terms and conditions?”
“I do.” Berdly replied. “But if something goes awry, it's your fault.”
“I take full responsibility.” Kris crossed their SOUL for an added layer of sincerity. “Visualize me crossing my SOUL right now.”
“Splendid.” the bluebird spoke, tone reminiscent of a businessman closing a deal. “Good talk, dearest Kris. Or should I say… m'theydy?”
Kris audibly groaned, though there was unfortunately still a tiny little smile on their face. “You've gotta stop with that shit. That's my first fake dating boundary.”
It was the bluebird's turn to cackle slightly, the noise making him sound sort of like a magpie. The line was silent for a couple of seconds after.
“…Er, would you actually like to play Minecrap Sleepwars with me, perchance?” Berdly asked hesitantly.
Kris snickered a little at how timid he was suddenly acting. They pondered the request. A quick game to mop the floor with him didn't sound half bad.
“You know what?” they turned to look at their brother's half of the room. “Sure, why not?”
They made their way to Azzy's computer and turned it on, hearing Berdly doing the same on the other side of the call. Without noticing it, their mouth curved into a satisfied smile, which immediately dropped once the entity decided to make its presence known again.
(Hey, buddy? You know this is gonna backfire on you tremendously at some point, right?) they heard YOU chastise from inside their subconscious with faux hesitation. (I give it two weeks max, to be honest.)
Kris disregarded it. It had no idea what it was talking about. They were fully confident nothing could truly go wrong.
This was a great plan. And it would be a funny one, too. They'd make sure of it.