Chapter Text
Generally, their routine stayed the same. After saving Miitopia, and everyone in the team went their separate ways, Chat and John stuck together, whether or not it be out of any sort of emotion they would refuse to name.
Every morning, John would wake up first as soon as the sun rose above the horizon, just like a flower blooming. He usually admired his beloved Chat sleeping peacefully beside for a few minutes, before getting up to start his day. Which usually consisted of tending to his meticulously crafted garden and abundance of plants. Chat just let him go wild with it, as long as they got to do the interior (as he had awful taste, in their opinion). Each plant has specific needs, and some needed boosts of magic to flourish properly, and it's not like he was using his magic for much else in his retirement from adventuring.
Around noon, Chat would crawl out of bed, never getting enough sleep for their liking, and John would make them both a small lunch (or breakfast for the newly arisen hivemind). Chat would eat it in seconds, and then partially watch John eat as they shared all the crazy dreams their head came up with. Usually it involved fire and various forms of destruction. John found it awfully endearing. He would then drag them outside, showing Chat what he got up to that morning while they slept. Chat always took interest, because it's their home too, and would use their limited knowledge on plants to give suggestions or feedback on anything that could be more aesthetically pleasing. Once this was done, they parted ways for the rest of the afternoon.
Right before the team parted ways and RT turned off Miitopia for good, he gifted Chat with a sewing machine and a frankly insane amount of materials, as he argued that Chat would start going insane if they didn't have a new robe every few days, but he couldn't give them money to fuel the addiction anymore. Of course, Chat would have gone insane from only making robes, so they took it upon themselves to decorate the interior of their little home. Pillows and blankets were on every soft surface available, all their secondhand lounge furniture was carefully mended with pleasing embroidery, and every time John ripped another shirt they would begrudgingly fix it for him (he kept refusing Chat making new clothes for him, and honestly one day they were just going to throw him clothes that weren't hanging on for dear life).
Chat would do these various creative projects to improve the home all afternoon, until it was evening. To keep chores even between the two, they would each cook a meal per day. Since John usually got fatigued when the sun set, Chat would use their limited cooking knowledge to make something. They had gotten much better over their time alone together, of course, and could now make a much better meal than when they relied on food to appear from thin air. Of course, their portion sizes were disproportionately larger compared to Johns, and used up more food subsequently, but it's the thought that counts.
Then John would head to bed, completely worn out from the day, leaving Chat to do whatever they wanted until they slept at a time far too late to be conceivable by their flower. Usually, they just continued whatever projects they had going on, with exceptions for birthdays or holidays around the corner. Once a majority of the chat went to sleep, their body became fatigued, and they crawled into John's warm and comforting arms.
That was their routine. Sometimes, they would get a call from a team member who was just making sure they were alive (no one wanted to travel that far out to visit!), or an invitation to an event closer to the Travelers' hub. The two of them were completely content to have peaceful, domestic lives in each other's company after the whole ordeal of defeating the Dark Lord and subsequent variations. Chat would never truly get over their hatred of John, but nowadays, it was much easier to love him than to hate everything he stood for.
Of course, their routine had to be disrupted someday.
John got the idea to grow some kind of food that grew on a vine, he wasn't sure on what yet, and that would require setting up some anchors for the vines to attach and grow on. Additionally, every plant required different amounts of sun, special soil, conditions, and so forth. He knew Chat would have a variety of opinions on the fruit colour and where it grew, so before starting anything John was going to take them to every free section of wall outside their cottage to pick the perfect place (though at this point, there was barely any free room with how many projects he had started).
After going to the first potential spot (which would have been too sunny for every plant he had in mind) and John was leading Chat to the next place, they suddenly got a disgusted look on their mask, facing the ground.
"Ugh, why would you plant that?" they started, stopping in place. "It's such an eyesore, I thought we agreed on nothing too bright."
John paused, looking to where Chat was now distracted. Tucked into a corner, just under their bedroom window in fact, was a way too large flower bud. It looked young, not yet mature enough to bloom, but far larger than any flower species that John knew of… and he knew of way too many to be normal.
"III… um… diiidn't plaaant thaaat onee, Chaaat," he whispered, taking their hand in his. Chat blinked at him, then glanced back at the flower, before looking back at him with a grumpy expression. They pulled their hand away, putting it on their hip instead.
"Okay, you plant fucking everything in this place. If it 'wasn't you'," they quoted the air, "then who was it?" He just stared past them, right at the newly discovered flower.
Shaped more like a bulb than the usual flower bud he would see every day. Additionally, it really did not match any flower he had ever seen. It was distinctly purple, with a vague pattern that reminded him of constellations Chat loved to point out on the rare nights he didn't fall asleep the second it was dark out. And the weirdest factor: it was way too big to be a normal flower. How did he not notice it growing before? He was out here every day!
The flower was quite literally snapped out of his trance by Chat aggressively snapping their fingers in his face. "Helloooo? Are you in there? Ready to explain why this is here?" They scowled, on the verge of shaking him if he wouldn't spill.
Instead, John ignored their frustration and walked right past them, towards the flower, pushing the bottom leaves up to find the roots. It seemed to have only one, really thick root, that barely exited the soil. That explains why surrounding plants required more watering recently, he presumed. The leaves themselves seemed to exist solely to hold the bud upright, firm and almost leathery to touch… and of course, the bud in question.
He poked it. It wobbled, like it wasn't housing more petals and and the usual organs but liquid instead. Against his usual way of treating plants, John attempted to peel back a petal prematurely, only for the petal to be seemingly glued shut. Chat had moved to stand behind him, impatiently tapping their foot, but their silence indicated they believed his excuse. Although, he could hear their tiny voices going haywire with theories as to what it was.
The colour was a weird, deep purple speckled with white. Any sort of theory as to the type of plant it could be completely left John's head, and the more logical question of what type of creature it is instead. He attempted to pick it up, using both hands at the base and trying to pull, and while it came off the ground a little, the plant didn't budge much further, and John dropped it with a disgusting sloshing sound coming from inside. Chat suddenly perked up.
"Hey, what if it's like an egg?" They shook his shoulder to grab his attention, eyes locked to the bud. "Like, a snake egg. They have squishy shells. It's really gross, actually." John stood up from kneeling in front of it, staring at his dearest, who was now going on about snakes. He didn't know when they learned all that, they knew a lot of weird things, but it was hard to listen with the rate they were speaking.
He blinked at them, still trying to listen intently. "Aaand… hooow dooess thaaat relaate to…. thiiis?" He gestured at the flower.
The hivemind snapped out of their ramble and put their hands on their hips. "Well, when snake owners go to see if the eggs have snake babies in them, they put a torch right up against it and it shows whats inside," they twitched a little, laughing halfheartedly "or at least that's what we think happens. We don't know much about snakes, really."
John looked between Chat and the flower. "Weeelllll… It couldn't huuurt…" They instantly perked up and rushed inside, giggling the whole way. He could only watch in fondness, before they triumphantly returned with the torch they mainly used for going to the bathroom at night, and scowled at his love-struck face. Chat knelt in front of the flower, and wordlessly signalled for John to block out the sun. Once there was enough of a shadow for the torch to have some effect, Chat pushed it against the thinnest part they could find of the flower.
The deep purple now glowed faintly yellow from the inside, with the light puncturing the fragile petals. The pair squinted to look inside. From around the edges, it didn't look like much, seemingly full of nothing. But when eyes focused towards the middle, that's when the anomaly appeared. There was a large, dark mass in the centre of the bud, outline fuzzy yet distinctly there. Chat put the torch in a few different angles, seeing if the mass was just the light not reaching part of the flower, but it stayed put as is.
Finally getting off the ground, Chat turned the torch off with a click and faced their personal flower. "What do you think it is?" They tilted their head at him, watching as he thought. They liked that face, it was so much better than how he used to stare at them without blinking for hours. Now he still stared, with frequent blinks and an adorable smile!
John fidgeted with his hands, "I'm nooot suuure," he dropped his hands, looking at them, "buuuut I'm leaaaving iiit." He really wasn't sure what it could be, but there was something deep inside him telling him it was important it stayed alive and healthy.
"Are you insane!? That could be anything!" Chat snapped at him, "What if it's some kind of all-powerful monster, growing right there in our garden? And you could have prevented its uprising, but no! You had to love all plants equally!" They had started pacing circles around him now as they ranted, John fighting the urge to scoop them up and tell his darling Chat how adorable they were when they did that.
He shook his head. "Oooor," Chat stopped in their tracks, "iiit's juuust a wiildfloowerrr. Aaand we have nooothing too wooorry aboouut." Ignoring the frustrated sigh from Chat, John beamed as they took both his hands in theirs and started up at him.
"If you're wrong about this, we're killing you." They glared directly into his eyes to drive home their promise, although they did this when he wouldn't let them eat rocks too, so John knew to just smile and nod.
That was about how things stayed, for a short while. The two returned to their usual routine, although now with John checking up on the flower every day and occaisionally watering it, or Chat peeking out the windows to check for changes. It seemed to only get bigger over the few weeks they left it alone, and every time they checked on the dark mass inside it would only become clearer. A few times Chat considered burning it, but every attempt was shot down as fast as they'd thought it up.
("Please John, it'll never worry us again if we kill it!" They would plead at their nightly check-in. "Then we don't have to find out what's inside!"
John would shake his head. It was adorable, their lust for fire and violence, but in this case he didn't have any good feeling about burning an innocent plant to a crisp. "Chaaat, weee'vee beeen oveeer thiiisss."
Chat would just huff and wack him with their cane/staff, "You're no fun.")
John noted that some outer petals had begun to thin and begin to wilt, however the inner petals stayed strong. Chat would bug him for any updaes, even though they claimed to not care about it and hope it died painfully. At some point, it just became part of the garden to them, as John refused to remove it and Chat wouldn't go against that.
Until one morning.
As usual, John had awoken bright and early, ready to do his rounds before Chat woke up. He checked his root vegetables, some fruit trees, touched up where some bugs had eaten his lettuces, then made his way to have a quick glance at the flower before moving on… except this time, one petal had neatly fallen open.
It wasn't like it was wilted. It looked like it was about to finally bloom. John cautiously approached, briefly poking it like he'd done weeks before. The flower didn't bounce, it almost squished under his touch, like how a normal rose petal would.. A second petal fell open, almost in response to his touch. He elected to stop touching it after that. Best not rush anything. There would always be time to come back to it later.
He checked on his flowers next, first the one next to the blooming bud, then some more needy ones inside, which is when Chat finally arose from their slumber, approaching silently and wrapping their arms around his waist. A soft "good afternoon" was whispered between the two, and John got started on their lunch. Although he would usually listen intently to Chat's rambles about their dreams, his mind kept wandering to the plant unravelling outside. If he could, he would watch it all day, just to see it freshly opened, but Chat was getting upset with how slow he was now, so he got back to work.
"Oooh, byy the waaay," he started, finally putting an elaborate breakfast sandwich in front of Chat. "Thee floooweeerr staaarteeed openiiing." Chat barely looked up from their food, already nearly finished "Yeah? What's it look like?"
John hummed for a second, before shrugging. "Dunnoooo, it oonlyyy juuust staaarted wheeen IIII loooked." He watched as they finished off their brunch and crawled out of their seat to find seconds. "And how long ago was that, big guy?" "Feeww hooooururs agooo, whyyy?"
Chat greedily stuffed a chocolate bar they had stashed in their mouth and turned back. "Can we go look now? Pretty please?" John giggled, "Giiive iiit tiiime, maaaybee iiit haaad staaage friiightt!" The hivemind grumbled and dragged John to the nearby couch, settling in his lap.
"Check before dinner then?"
"Suuure."
They wished they didn't wait before dinner.
In their garden, framed by the flower petals, was a child. An infant? The semantics didn't matter right now.
The problem was that it looked like the two of them.
Deep hair, pale skin, sprinkled with teensy tiny flowers and limbs soft and nearly mossy in texture. It looked like someone had slapped the most defining characteristics of the couple onto a baby that they most definitely did not create. It wriggled where it laid, eyes closed and seemingly unaware of the world. Completely unnatural.
Chat spoke first. Or rather, they screamed and ran back inside, rambling something about how dinner was waiting to be made. John stayed, just staring. How, in all of what he knew about magic and gardening and magic gardening, had he never heard of this? He approached slowly, in case it was some kind of monster using cuteness to its advantage, but the infant didn't stir, peacefully napping in the embrace of the soft petals.
It only woke up when John picked it up, cradling it in his arms. Way too small, he thought as it clung to his tall frame, but he figured he'd never seen a newborn before, Gilbert and Jefferson were more toddler shaped. After making a few noises that could only be compared to a kitten, the baby finally looked up at him.
Four eyes. Okay, it was definitely, somehow, related to the both of them. John had to admit, he'd always liked kids, but he never thought he'd ever have his own. Mostly due to how unlikable he was, or how his ex-wife was too godlike to reproduce, or that Chat gagged every time they thought about being around Gilbert. Their hatred of children was something they bragged about, so clearly asking for any was out of the question.
But now he held one, and it was clearly his, and he had never felt more like protecting something in his life. Speaking of, the outside was no place for a newborn, and he swiftly took them inside to find a blanket or something soft to wrap them in.
What he walked into was Chat more stressed than when they fought the Darker Lord, They had tried to start dinner, but their coordination was all messed up, and they kept frantically running in circles. It was only made worse when they saw John walk in with the thing from outside. "Why do you have it." they deadpanned.
John shrugged, "Theeey loooked cooold." He had one arm cradling the infant as he searched a closet for an appropriate blanket. Chat could only stand, staring, at him and it, finally getting a good look. Their hands twitched. "…Okay." was all they could muster.
After John had successfully swaddled the tiny thing and settled down on their couch to further observe them, Chat finally snapped out of their trance.
"We're calling someone," they murmured, finding their phone in a nearby drawer. He'd never seen them so quiet, usually they would have an outburst and calm down a few minutes later. "Who?" he whispered back.
"Whoever picks up first," Chat flatly responded as they dialled a number. John heard one call go to voicemail, with his hivemind muttering something like why do we even try, then the next call recipient answering. I Want Die's voice crackled through the phone, before Chat moved away from John into another room.
He tried to listen in without moving from his spot, but Chat kept their voice uncharacteristically low. All he heard was Chat informing IWD of the situation, that they needed help (they had gotten so much better at asking) and to please come over immediately. John also thought he heard something like 'you're interrupting my mealtime' but eventually he agreed, and would be at their cottage as soon as possible.
After a few minutes, Chat silently slumped down onto the other side of the couch from John. He frowned, they were never this far apart. The infant wriggled in his grasp, and he brought it up to his chest them hopefully soothe them. Maybe they were hungry? He had no idea what they would eat.
"Soooo… whaaat'd heee saaay?" he questioned. They leaned into the soft cushions of the couch to face him, fiddling with a loose string on their robe. "Uh, he was going to come over after he eats. Speaking of, we should get back to that…" Chat curled in on themselves more, continuing, "and he's going to bring some of Gilbert's old stuff. Don't know why, it's not like we'll need it, right?"
John tilted his head, clutching the tiny flower. "Whyyy nooot? Thaaat's veeeryy thooughtfuuul of hiiim." Their eyes widened and they shifted around again. At least John knew why the little one wouldn't stop squirming. They were adorable, really. Weird and mismatched, but the cutest thing he'd ever seen.
"Well, we're not going to keep it, right?" Chat scoffed, "We're unprepared, there's no space, we didn't discuss this, neither of us even like kids-"
"III dooo…" he whispered, and they stopped. It hadn't even crossed his mind to not keep them. Why wouldn't they? So what if they were unprepared? They have a storage room that goes mostly unused, and he'd been meaning to clean it anyway. He couldn't just get rid of it like a used toy. He must have looked upset, because Chat's face twitched between a few expressions, and he'd only seen that happen when he would get badly hurt during their adventures.
Chat got up from the couch, moving back towards the kitchen and restarting their dinner without another word.