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astrobei · 1 year

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thinking abt how mike and will have always found peace and safety at each others’ houses, but for different reasons.

how growing up, mike’s house would always be a physical sanctuary for will. somewhere he felt physically safe, somewhere he could go to get away from the turbulence and noise of his own household. when jonathan’s music wasn’t loud enough to drown out the fighting from the kitchen, when bills were due and tensions were high, when his mom wasn’t home yet and no one did the groceries and maybe lonnie was in a bad mood, will would go to mike’s house. and it was big and empty and mrs. wheeler always had his favorite snacks. they always had the basement all to themselves and mike would never ask any questions when will showed up a little quieter than normal, and he never got mad when will asked for a glass of water even if he didn’t have to. they’d just lie there together, with will scribbling away with the crayons mike never used but refused to throw away in case will wanted to draw with them. and it was a weird thing for will, who expected mike to toss the scraps of paper like garbage, childish clutter taking up space on the table where surely something else could’ve gone. it was like lonnie always said— there was no need to have that trash lying around. trash, trash, trash, will’s crayon-scrawled portraits and exuberant bursts of color, egged on by mike’s ooh’s and aah’s of approval, reduced to trash. and it was weird, after all that, to see mike tack up all his drawings onto the basement wall without even giving it a second thought, like it was instinct for him to want to make will’s art a part of his home.

and will was welcome to sleep over whenever he wanted, too. he’d get a good night’s rest for the first time in days, even though mike was a total blanket hog and he kind of snored sometimes. even if one of them started off in a sleeping bag, they’d both be on the bed by the time the morning light started coming through the windows, too early for either of them to even think about getting out of bed. and mike would be almost sideways on the mattress with his head smushed up against will’s side and his hair everywhere, but will would try his best to hold still so mike wouldn’t wake up. and mike never made fun of will if he asked to keep the light on, and he told will where all the creaky floorboards were after will confessed that he was scared of waking someone up by getting up to use the bathroom. and in the morning, mike showed him how to pour syrup over his eggs, and nancy was making faces at them from across the dining table and will kind of thought it was gross but also kind of thought it was great, so he made a mental note to tell jonathan about it when he got home. and jonathan thought it was disgusting, but he was never all that adventurous when it came to stuff like this. and plus, this meant there was another thing that will got to share with mike, and only mike, so maybe that was okay in the end.

and it always confused him, how mike would complain about the quiet— how the house felt empty a lot, how it was lonely, how it was too quiet and that’s why mike never liked being at home alone, not unless will was there too. and that made will smile, made something unknown and foreign and warm swirl around in his chest, even if he didn’t fully understand. because how could silence be a bad thing? he was used to being silent, at propagating it with every tiptoed step around the house and lowered voices at the dining table. he was used to staying out of the way, not causing trouble. when the shouting began, he’d close the door to his room and focus very hard on being quiet, at not making noise that would make anyone even madder. it wasn’t until later, until jonathan got into the clash, that will even entertained the idea of cacophony— noise as rebellion, noise as a way to announce your presence instead of apologizing for it.

but either way, at his house, silence was rare, treasured in those brief moments when everyone was asleep and he and jonathan would stand in the kitchen and stir the cocoa together, not saying a word, the entire place quiet except for the soft hissing of the gas stove. will didn’t get it at all, actually. calm, peaceful, silence— how could someone ever get tired of that? why would someone want him around when they could have that instead?

mike was a weird kid, will decided. and he also decided, at that same moment, that he still liked it at mike’s house a lot more than his.

and mike—

after lonnie left, mike went over to will’s more. and will always apologized about the mess— the dishes in the sink or on the table, maybe the living room wasn’t too tidy, and will had tried doing his own laundry and it kind of worked and kind of didn’t, so his room was a bit of a mess too. but mike never cared about the mess. the byers’ place felt so lived in, like a real family lived there that talked to each other over breakfast and watched movies together and shared each others’ things without yelling at each other and stomping around the entire house about it. and at home, everything was quiet. it was even quiet when people were angry, just doors slamming and chairs being pushed back at dinner. angry silences instead of explanation, being ignored and being given more silence when mike just so desperately wanted someone to talk to. and they weren’t even mad at him all the time— his mom would be mad at his dad and she wouldn’t talk to any of them. and nancy would be mad at their parents so she’d huff and slam her door in his face. and holly was a baby, so she never talked at all, and most of the time, she didn’t even feel like a real person and mike didn’t even feel like an older brother. and at the end of the day, it was really crazy how his house could have so many people living in it but still feel so empty all the time.

joyce always had to work late, so she wasn’t around a lot, but when she was, she always remembered to ask mike about things. whether he’d liked that movie they’d gone to see together, the newest developments in their campaigns. she’d ask about their halloween costumes, tell mike that she’d be happy to make him one like she was doing for will, and mike would start chattering away— talking about sam and frodo, the new ghostbusters movie they went to see last weekend, and he wouldn’t realize until he was halfway through the plot of the movie that no one had told him to shut up yet, in some variation of the phrase or another. not nancy, with a tried and tested, teenage-certified roll of her eyes, not his dad trying to catch the morning news, not his mom who was always preoccupied with something or the other. “that’s great!” mrs. byers would say, like she actually meant it, or something, “is he your favorite character then?” and then will would snort and chime in with something else— “no, mom,” he’d say, looking back at mike and grinning like it was an inside joke between the two of them, and mike would feel the last vestiges of some long-lingering anxiety ebbing away. it was a strange feeling for him, having people want to listen. a small house with not a lot of people in it but feeling, somehow, like it was overflowing with all the best things in all the best ways.

and the byers maybe didn’t have all the snacks that he did back at home, and the power went out sometimes and mrs. byers and jonathan would get really embarrassed about it, but mike didn’t know why— secretly, that one time the power went out while he was at their house was one of his favorite memories at will’s. mrs. byers pulled out the blankets from the hallway closet and they lit all the candles in the house and got out will’s box of board games and the four of them hung out right there in the living room until it was time for mike to go. and mike didn’t know jonathan very well, because he was nancy’s age and kind of quiet, and he didn’t say much to mike except to lord his monopoly win over him for a bit, but he and will would joke around and it made something sad and heavy sink down low in mike’s stomach. it was new to him, the idea that maybe siblings could get along after all, that they could have things in common and be friends, that you could spend time with your family and come away from it laughing and happy and wanting to do it more, instead of just wanting to hide away in your room and fight down some frustrated thing in your chest threatening to boil over at any moment. it was all so new to him— having adults and older teenagers listen to him, ask him about things like they cared, remembering things about him that sometimes mike even forgot he said.

when his mom came to pick him up, he’d always be more disappointed than he should have been. he’d be back in a few days at most, he knew, but it was those few days in between that were the worst— going from the worn-in warmth of the Byers’ house to his own, where his mom didn’t like it when the good sofa pillows got too creased, made him feel weirdly empty and tired inside.

he liked it better at will’s, he decided. people seemed to like him more there too. his heart felt a lot happier in the four yellow walls of will byers’ bedroom than it ever did in his own house.

#byler #will byers #mike wheeler #um #byler fic #i Guess #anyways guys this was supposed to be one paragraph #thinking abt mike feeling emotionally safe at the byers’ and will feeling physically safe at the wheelers’#but i have never been able to stick to a word limit and i sure wasn’t starting now #/astro posts #enjoy if u Want

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monty-glasses-roxy · 1 year

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What’s cool about Rebuild AU is that you can introduce Spike the Wet Floor Bot as an emotional support bot that becomes a little guy with feelings over time. Like, think about it! (Under a read more because I got carried away and yes this is relevant to the Roxy tag I promise)

Roxy has been unable to search the rubble due to a fault in her battery giving her massive power fluctuations that are fucking up all her other systems. Sunny finds a severely damaged Wet Floor Bot and brings it back for her to have something to entertain herself with instead of just organising stuff. She did always say she’d love to try and repair one of the little guys! Sunny hopes it will keep her distracted since they still haven’t found the Minis yet and she can’t search for them herself, and he promises to find anything and everything she needs for it.

So she fixes it. Slowly but surely. She puts her every waking hour into this, trying to ignore the hundreds of problems going on with her and the world around her. Monty gets repaired, promising to double down on the search for what she needs to be able to get out there too but she tells them not to bother. Just find the Minis, that’s the most important thing.

A few days later and the little Caution Bot powers back on, repaired to the best of Roxy’s current abilities. It remembers what happened. It watched as it’s whole world burned and caught glimpses of everyone else struggling to find a way out not cut off by the flames. It could understand then. That was an emergency programmed into it’s AI. It knows what a fire looks like...

But now one of the animatronics it’s seen almost every day of it’s life is talking to it, gently, softly, only to moderately chastise herself for it afterwards. It’s curious. It doesn’t understand as other animatronics come and go but she stays beside it. The animatronic is having difficulties but it can’t report them to the main office. There is no connection available. It will be fixed soon. It always is.

As days go on, it watches, unsure of what it should do with itself. There are no spills to warn people of here. There is no designated area to wait for one in. The charging station is turned off for the majority of the day. What else is it supposed to do but observe?

The animatronic never leaves. It never found that weird before. Maybe there is something wrong. It tries to report it to the main office. There is still no connection. Will it ever be fixed?

She seems so tired. She tinkers with machinery and spends so much time on the floor, asleep or not quite there yet. Her paws shake sometimes when she reaches to pat it on the head. Why does she do that? What does it mean?

She talks to it. She claws the walls and growls, snapping sharp words to the others or often just herself, but those claws never touch it and she always stops to talk to it. Sometimes she will talk for hours whilst sometimes she will just sit and stare into nothingness. It wonders whether it should approach her when she does that. Does she need help? Why doesn’t this happen when the others are here?

It receives what the animatronic – Roxanne Wolf – called an upgrade. She worked slowly on it, having to stop and rest her head against the wall for a while several times in the process. It wonders if this is how it was for the entirety of her time repairing it. She certainly wasn’t like this before the fire. The main office is still unreachable. When she’s done, it’s given a new range of motion. It’s neck feels much stronger than before and it’s head can now tilt and turn separate from it’s body. It liked this new upgrade. It had never seen the ceiling before. For the first time, it looks up into green eyes that used to be a deep gold. There’s something else different though. Emotions it can’t yet understand but it knows they aren’t negative. It wants to know what those emotions are. Maybe watching will help?

Roxanne Wolf shows the others the upgrades, tail swaying seemingly on its own. They pat it on the head. They tell it how wonderful it is. They tell Roxanne Wolf how amazing she is for her work. They tell it how cute it is. Montgomery Gator asks if she has given it a name yet. She tells them no. It doesn’t understand. It is Caution Sign No. 26675. Is that not it’s name? Why does the number feel wrong? Like it doesn’t belong? The words don’t sound like theirs. But why is that a problem? Why is there so much it doesn’t understand now?

They stop their compliments as Roxanne Wolf asks them for news about names it doesn’t recognise. It listens in closely, trying to work out why her voice always sounds so different when she says those words. The animatronics and the night guard shake their heads and tell her there is nothing. There is a difference again. Her mood has changed. They apologise to her. They tell her they’ll find them soon, or find what she needs so she can get out there with them too. It doesn’t want her to leave.

That thought stuck out in its mind. It doesn’t want her to leave. Please stay. Please don’t go.

Why would it feel this way? When did it start to feel anything on this level? The emotion is so strong it doesn’t know what to do. It has seen the others speak to each other, heard Roxanne Wolf talk about and cry through her troubles. But how does she do it? How can it do the same? How can it tell her?

It rolls up to her side as everyone settles down. She had instructed it to make sure to charge as she turned the charging station on, but it didn’t move away from her. She sits down in her usual spot in the corner, very close to the charging station. It stares at her, unsure what to do. She gazes right back with a tilt of her head and a raised brow. It bumps gently against her and searches every inch of it’s programming for something, anything that will help it tell her what it needs to say. A buzzing noise emanates from it. Small, stuttery, but with as much of this feeling it can possibly push into it. Roxanne’s ears perk up and her eyes go wide. She doesn’t speak, listening intently to the buzzing and the beeps as if it were all as clear as an empty glass to her.

Please don’t leave. It wants to say so desperately and it’s then it recognises something. An emotion in her eyes they’d never been able to read before.

It’s worry.

It realises with a start that this is the only time that she’s ever looked at it with worry. She watches the door sometimes, the worry growing on her face until she’s blinking back tears. She’s spoken to the others with her voice laced with worry about those four names she’s always asking for news on. She always seemed to worry about the Night Guard in particular when she swayed or when she spoke with her hands in her hair and her eyes to the floor. It must be a common emotion for her to feel, but why could she feel that towards it?

She patted it’s head again before holding the side of it’s face with a gentleness that didn’t match what it had seen her do with her claws before. She spoke softly, apologising that she wasn’t entirely sure what it was upset about but it must be important. Whatever it is it’s feeling, Roxanne says it’s okay. She’s here and she’s not leaving any time soon. She wraps an arm around it. A warmth floods it’s insides and the reassurance soothes it’s fears. Is this what she feels when Daycare Attendant Moon and Glamrock Chica The Chicken hugs her? Is that what this is? A hug? What does all of this mean?

It doesn’t want to leave. It stays in the embrace as long as it can before Roxanne smiles and nudges it to go and charge. For once, it wanted nothing more than to ignore the low battery alerts and to stay where it was. But she insisted, carefully guiding it with a paw back to it’s charging station before settling back down. This time, she’s right beside it, close enough for her tail to brush against its side. It’s not safe for her to do that while it charges. It doesn’t care. It has a feeling she doesn’t either.

The days go on and on. They’re different now. Roxanne – Roxy – has changed her routine. She curls up against it now when she sleeps during the day. She pats it on the head and praises it when it pushes things it thinks she needs towards her. When she cries, it bumps against her and she hugs it with her snout between it’s ears. She tells it she can’t wait to introduce her to the four who’s names she speaks so solemnly. The more it learns about them, the more it wants to meet them too. She cares so much about them, it wants to care about them too. It wonders if she will ever care about it as much as she does them.

They sit outside together one day. It has never been able to see the sky before. Everything is so bright and the breeze is an assault on it’s sensors. Roxy lays beside it and it wants to as well. It finds the nearest object on the ground, a rock it presumes, and runs over it at an angle. It doesn’t work the first or the second time but on the third, it’s on the floor. Barely a second passes before it’s view of the sky is eclipsed with Roxy’s face. The worry is back again, her voice full of alarm and concern. Her paws cradle the back of it’s head and she guides it back up onto it’s wheels. It gives a flat, irritated buzz and she seems confused. The moment she lets go, it tries again to tip itself. She catches it as it falls and it buzzes loudly, urging her to let it lay beside her. When she lays it down, resting it’s head on her arm, it buzzes happily and a small laugh escapes her. It’s an achievement to hear her laugh. It seems so hard for her to do, yet so easy for others from before the fire. She lays beside it and they watch the clouds go by for a while until it finds itself trapped in a hug. She’s asleep again before much longer. It tries to send a report to the main office that she is still in need of repairs. It doubts there even is a main office now.

Another week goes by. It buzzes so excitedly as Daycare Attendant Sunny and Montgomery Gator burst through the door with a large box held high above their heads. They’re finally going to repair Roxy! Now, maybe she won’t be so worried anymore! Maybe she won’t be so sad! Maybe she won’t be so frustrated! She seems just as eager for these repairs, but she still asks for news on those four names again. There is still no news. Maybe this will help her get the news she wants!

She is powered down as Daycare Attendant Moon replaces her battery with Night Guard Vanessa’s supervision. Tampering with animatronics is against the rules. It ignores the alerts to report it to the main office. It has seen the Mega Pizzaplex. There truly is no main office anymore. Instead of sending a report, it stays pressed against her side. It will always be by her side. She’s too important to leave.

When they’re done, she doesn’t wake. It’s told it will take a few hours before she does. So it waits. By her side. Never moving, never even thinking about leaving. It begins to buzz. A tune she had mournfully sang to herself a few times before. It had always been her favourite. When she wakes up, it’s to that same song. It sees her tail wag when her eyes land on it, a smile creeping across her face. She feels better she says. She feels awake and alive again. It buzzes in joy and relief, even as it struggles to keep up with her now. The others are just as happy for her, wrapping her in hugs and telling her how great it is to see her smile again. They tell her that now they’re all together, they’ll find those four names in no time. It hopes they’re right.

Exploring the ruins of their former home is difficult for it. Roxy flies over crumbling walls and mountains of debris with an ease it could never hope to replicate. She still stumbles, she still falls, and her body still trembles when she does too much but she has yet to power down out of the blue again. This is the longest it’s seen her awake since before the fire. She searches, digging through charred plushies and broken glass, desperation growing with each passing minute. She calls those names over and over, again and again and again. She still diligently clears a path for it to follow her. Despite the growing worry on her face, she never forgets it’s following her. It wonders if this is what it means to be cared for. It wonders, as it watches her weave around the many, many other Caution Bots just like it, if she sees it as any different to them at all.

It wonders what makes it different to the others of its kind. Does it look as damaged as they do? It’s noticed several patches of colourful metal it has isn’t shared with the others. Is that because Roxy repaired it? Is that because it’s different? Is this all that’s different? ... Does it want to be like the others? It was connected to them all once. They all thought in much the same way, all of their minds linked via a network that no longer exists. It didn’t remember any of the others feeling like this. It doesn’t want to ever lose these feelings. They’re too important now. It wants to be just like the animatronics that called it cute and pat it on the head.

Roxy grows tired much quicker than the others. Perhaps she still needs repairs. They have reached where Roxy Raceway once was. There was barely anything left. So much of it had sank below the ground they stood on. She was quiet, staring at what remained in silence. Was this place as important to her as the four she was searching for? It starts to buzz her favourite song, pressed against her leg in it’s best attempt at comforting her. She doesn’t react to it at first, and when it looks up, it sees she’s crying to herself again. It bleeps louder to gain her attention and she slowly looks down at it. It spins in a circle before pressing against her leg again, buzzing all the while. She kneels beside it and holds it tight to her chest. It feels the pain making her body quake with sobs and though she tries to stay quiet, it’s only a matter of time before DJ Music Man arrives to help it comfort her. When she finally calms, she doesn’t let go of it for a while longer. It hopes that means she knows how much it’s trying to care.

Roxy is quiet for a while after that. It bumps against her more and more, buzzing a little louder in the hopes it helps her through this. She pats its head with another weak smile. But then she calls it Bumblebee. It doesn’t understand. It buzzes in confusion but her attention is elsewhere. Her eyes light up with hope at something behind it and she nearly bowls it over by how fast she runs past to see whatever it is. She calls those names again, digging through a pile of melted childrens toys with an incredible burst of energy. It buzzes curiously as it catches something moving within the heap, Roxy quickly spotting it soon after. She pounces on it and after a few seconds, it sees her tail start to wag. She pulls a spider-like robot from the mess, followed by another, and another. A fourth soon follows, clearly on it’s last dredges of battery life. The tears are flowing so fast down her face and yet she’s smiling wider than it’s ever seen her smile before. She howls an alert to the others before bundling them up in her arms and rushing them back to the shed.

She’s fretting over them constantly. She works and works and works on them, pouring as much of her energy as she possibly can into them. It watches in fascination, curious as to what she’s doing but not understanding a word of what she says about it. She says their names, explaining the small, visual differences between each of them to everyone with such care and such detail that it wonders if she could do the same for it one day. If it was completely yellow like all the others of its kind, would she be able to tell which one it was? Maybe she would...

She had left them to charge now. There was nothing more she could do for them but wait. Roxy returned to her corner and offered an arm out to it for a hug. It accepted without any hesitation, having quickly become reliant on the comfort that washed over it every time they did this. She chuckled and once again called it Bumblebee. Her Bumblebee. Was that a name? Was it like her name? It craved that individuality. It wanted so badly to be seen as someone rather than just another Caution Bot. Would the four friends of Roxy’s see it like that? Would they see it as someone worth the time Roxy gave it? Did anyone else see it as someone worth all the attention at all? It buzzed and bleeped, trying to convey how it felt in a way that was similar to Roxy’s growls and barks, the language she rarely used around anyone but DJ Music Man. Did it even count as a language?

She listened, as she always did. She watched it nervously roll the length of the room a few times and hugged it close when it buzzed and bumped against her side. She didn’t always understand, but maybe this was one of the times she would. Roxy asked if it was nervous about her little friends. It buzzed in affirmation. She reassured that they were friendly, if a little shy and that they were sure to love it. She didn’t seem to understand this time. It’s attention fell to the door. But maybe it could show her what it meant.

Whilst clearly hesitant to leave her sleeping friends, she reluctantly followed it into the ruins of their former residence. It buzzed and beeped, pushing around a deactivated Caution Bot. She asked question after question, steadily getting closer and closer to the right answer until finally she seemed to understand. Roxy smirked and crossed her arms. There was nothing but confidence when she told it that no one could ever mistake it for anyone else. It was her little Bumblebee and everyone knows it! It learns then that Bumblebee is not a name. It wants a name. It wants an identity. It wants something other than Caution Bot No. 26675. Bumblebee felt so right, so perfect in ways it could never hope to describe but it knew it was only one piece of the puzzle. There had to be more!

Roxy hummed and it worried she hadn’t understood again. She was quiet, her head tilted thoughtfully to the left. After a while, she shifted her stance and her head tilted over to the right. Her eyes suddenly lit up in that telltale sign that inspiration had struck. She clapped her paws and bounced on her feet before rushing past and urging it to follow her. They picked through the remains of Rockstar Row where she forced the metal door to her former room open, pretending to hold it open for it as she waved it to go on in ahead of her with a smirk. It was a mess, just like everywhere else, but there was still some semblance of what it used to be. She warned it before lifting it up onto the ruined chair in front of the desk. The mirror was cracked and broken but still reflected perfectly fine. It stopped paying attention to what she was saying as it stared at the bot in the mirror.

It looked broken. It looked damaged. It looked... hurt. It looked like it once was but worse. Like all the others the fire touched that fateful night so long ago. It wasn’t sure what to think. Was that really what it looked like now? Beaten and broken, patched back up with mismatched scrap metal and peeling yellow paint? It... wasn’t what it had expected. But then, what had it expected to see? Roxy nuzzled the side of it’s head affectionately. Perfect she’d called it. Beautiful and unique. She was nothing but proud of it. That familiar warmth, the mix of comfort and something else flooded through it again at every kind word she spoke. In her eyes, it was nothing short of brilliance.

But maybe they could make it better. She was digging through charred draws, tail swishing gently as she pulled out what little had remained unscathed. She held a few items up to it, humming and ha’ing about what would be the best and holding random objects up in the mirror so it could see for itself what it would look like. A few of the things she found made it buzz with delight while others made it buzz so low it sounded like Roxy’s mean growls. It seemed to amuse her to no end before she gasped and pulled something new out of the draw. A spare, she’d said it was as she fastened a black, silver spiked bracelet around it’s neck. She still had one after the fire but she’d lost the other one. Maybe instead of her having it, it would look better on it?

It stayed quiet for a long moment. It sat like a huge collar around it’s neck, falling loosely around it, until Roxy found a way to shorten it more than it was supposed to be shortened. It saw the two of them, side by side, matching spiked collars and both looking a little worse for wear, and decided she was right. This was perfect. Roxy gave a toothy smile as its excitement grew. This is what it wanted! Something that set it apart from the other Caution Bots! Something that linked it to the one that had changed everything for it!

Spike she offered then. Spike the Bumblebee.

With a few tiny magnets on its ears and a few more suggestions, Spike the Bumblebee stared at herself in the mirror, right beside Roxy’s prideful smile and knew for certain, what all of those warm and fuzzy feelings were called.

What else could they be, but love.

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