Chapter Seven
~ T ~
Ramb’s expression seems a lot more smug when they scramble back into the Green Room, having gotten back just after the news ended. He can’t know, right? Before leaving Spamton’s room, Tenna made sure that he was fully dressed, completely put-together, the epitome of collected. There was no way he knew. “How’d the show go?” one of the stage-managing Pippins asks during pre-show checks, thankfully distracting him.
“Oh, it was amazing!” Tenna beams, sipping his coffee and trying to hold back a grimace. Spamton didn’t click his chest plating back quite right, given that they were in a rush to get back to TV World. He’ll have to do a little self-maintenance later. Later… ugh. He and Spamton are going to have to talk about this. There’s a huge difference between playful flirting and, well… what they’ve done. He recalls a tongue tracing his fangs and can feel his screen tinge pink, so he forces it out of his mind. “Anyway! What’s on the schedule today?”
Tenna is good at a lot of things. Throwing himself into work to avoid thinking about other things is near the top of the list. And they have to scramble a bit to make sure everything happens on time since he wasn’t here early enough to look things over. But eventually, the TV turns off, the Dreemurrs go to bed, and everyone in TV World breathes a little easier. “A professional showman through and through.” Spamton creeps up on Tenna in the Green Room with a knowing smile.
“Try hosting a variety show when you’re hungover and half-dead. Compared to that, a little schedule mishap is nothing.”
Spamton glances around before asking, “Just a schedule mishap? You sure you’re not a bit tuckered out from some… extracurriculars?”
Tenna flushes and hushes him. There are still a few people lingering in the Green Room, and although a few of them have been giving him glances all day, they don’t seem to have heard anything just now. “Not here! We’ll talk about that. Later. For now, I, uh… have to do some cleaning up. See you in the morning, partner!” He high-tails it out of there, slams the door to his dressing room, and pulls off his shirt. There are little bite marks all over his shoulders, and—yep, the bottom right corner of his chest plate didn’t snap in correctly.
With a sigh and a grimace, Tenna gets to work clicking it back in place, trying to ignore the weird flutter in his chest at the memory of much smaller hands in place of his own.
~ S ~
“Oh, you screwed up this time.” Spamton stares at himself in the mirror, fingers pressed against the surface to point accusingly at himself. Smoke wafts from the cigarette pinched between them. “[The] kiss would’ve been fine, Spamton, but did you have to go and [Refreshing night’s sleep] with the guy? [Right now!] he’s probably wigged out. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.”
He stops, stares at himself for another second, then finally pulls away. He collapses back into the vanity chair and drags his free hand through his hair. He’d seen the opportunity. He really had just wanted the excuse to kiss Tenna; he hadn’t expected the TV host to ask for seconds. Or to welcome him unbuttoning his shirt, or… a flash of conversation replays in his head:
“Did you just lick my teeth?”
“How [The] hell can I resist when you’ve got those fangs?”
“Haha! I always thought Shuttah was having me on about the fangs being popular.”
“Well, trust me, [Big] guy, they’re definitely boosting your approval ratings.”
Spamton tilts his head back. “Stupid. You couldn’t’ve been normal about it, at least?” He stares up at the ceiling, the spackled tiling, and mumbles, “…God, it was worth it, though.” Because how else would he have learned that his tongue can’t quite wrap around one of Tenna’s fangs, but can get damn near close? He smacks his forehead with his palm. Things are already awkward and potentially partnership-ruining, there’s no need to make it worse by reminiscing about sleeping with his cohost. He needs a distraction. So he grabs his blazer and slings it on as he heads out of his dressing room and to the Green Room.
“Oh, that’s cheating!” He hears Lanino cry as he rounds the corner.
“No,” Elnina laughs back, leaning over to pinch his cheek. “You just need to learn how to boost.”
Spamton stands in the hallway and watches. They’re fixated on a racing game, and judging from the way she’s gloating, Elnina’s in the lead. He can see Lanino’s shoulders tense, focused on trying to catch up. The way they giggle and nudge each other is sickeningly cute to watch. He’s heard their slogan from pretty much everyone who works here: “The weather always sticks together.”
“Up for a game?” Spamton jolts slightly at hearing Ramb’s voice from the bar. The Plugmookboy is leaning against the bar top to look at him. “They’d probably tag you in. That one’s four players.”
“Oh—nah,” Spamton says, waving his hands. “Always appreciated racing [MORE] as a spectator sport.”
Elnina cheers when she wins, throwing the controller down and pumping her fists before reaching over to smooth over Lanino’s pompadour. “Oh, my sunshine, you did better that time! You know I’m happy to give you some tips.”
Lanino leans back. From his body language, he’s sulking a little. “…Please.” When Spamton approaches the couch to watch, they both greet him with pleasant smiles and nods before focusing right back on the game. She points out when to press buttons for boosts and how to time certain jumps, and it’s so horribly domestic that Spamton can’t help but smile, too.
~ T ~
Queen has requested Spamton’s presence for some financial advice, so he packs up for a day and heads back to the City. Tenna has still done a glorious job of avoiding talking about what happened the night of the show. Still, Spamton’s only gone for an hour or two before Tenna tries to ask him something and, hearing only silence in return, looks down and sees no one is there. And, worst of all, he dares to call his absentee cohost ‘Spammy’. The nickname has been private, just between them, but when he hears a Pippins mutter “Oof” under their breath, he knows he’s messed up.
“H-hey, it happens! Easy mistake!” Tenna says defensively, his antennae bending indignantly. “Whatever. Back to work!” The rest of the show goes by without a hitch, and Tenna waits until the stage clears out before tilting his head up. “Mike? Got a minute?”
There’s some shuffling before a sign drops down from the ceiling. There are three options with little boxes next to them: Talk, Listen, and Security. Just as Tenna starts patting his pockets for a pen, a red Sharpie drops down next to the sign. He swears, Mike thinks of everything. He ticks off ‘Listen’, and the sign shoots back up to the ceiling. Then, a red neon checkmark sign drops down next.
He doesn’t talk to Mike much outside of stage directions. Mike has been around since Tenna started this whole thing, an omniscient presence that helps ensure things run smoothly. But sometimes, it helps to have a neutral ear about things, and Mike… well, he seems to know exactly when Tenna wants a sounding board or if he needs actual advice. Tenna heads towards the closed-off, secret dressing room tucked away in a deep corner of the studio and thanks his lucky stars that he has the best stage manager ever.
Mike’s wearing the cat costume today, which Tenna has always found a bit odd. But hey, in show business, who doesn’t have weird quirks? “I swear I didn’t mean for things to go this far,” Tenna says once he’s settled onto a couch, propping his head in his hands. “I really thought it would be easy. Just sweet talk him a bit, get him to sign the contract, and we both win, right?” Mike’s only response was a little tilt of his head, his multi-colored eyes staring blankly at him. “But he had to go and be so… so…” Tenna sighs, letting himself start downright pouting. “Now I… genuinely want him here. I like sharing the stage with him. He’s flashy and new. He’s… the future, I suppose.”
Mike idly scratches behind his ear with his wrist, and the sounds echo through the speakers set up in the corners as a quiet brushing sound. It’s not quite loud enough to be grating, thankfully.
“Just… what would people say? Mr. Ant Tenna shacking up with his most popular collaborator?” Tenna sighs again. “…Maybe it’d boost views. People paid a lot just to see us kiss for some reason.”
He hears something clatter in a back room. Mike sits upright, stiff as a board, as the speakers rustle for a moment. “Sorry, Tenna,” Mike’s voice says from the speakers—one of them, anyway, because some days he has an accent, and some days he doesn’t. “I swear we’ve got ghosts here. Anyway… either way, you’ve got to cover your bases. Whether you break it off or not, make sure the show’s not going to suffer for it, right?”
“Right.” Tenna gives himself another couple of seconds to sulk before sitting upright. “I’ve never been great with the whole interpersonal confrontation thing.”
“Just treat it like a regular contract deal.”
Tenna stands up, adjusting his tailcoat. “…Okay. Thanks, Mike.”
“I know you said you just needed me to listen. I hope you don’t mind the advice.”
“I never mind your advice. Have a good night.”
When Tenna leaves Mike’s room, he swears that someone whisper-yells “WHAT???” from the back room.
~ S ~
It’s… bittersweet, walking back into his room at Queen’s Castle alone. The bed’s still a bit messy from his and Tenna’s quick escape the night of the live show. Spamton sighs, throwing his keycard on the desk before getting to work undressing. It’s too late to go back to TV World; he’s dead tired from a day of crunching numbers, dodging too-invasive questions about how his business runs, and… well, when he’d arrived, one of the Addisons had set up a stall by the castle, trying to toe the property line. Their eyes had met for just a second, and he’d seen a flash of something in their face.
He was briefly filled with the misguided hope that it was regret. That, perhaps, they’d approach and say something, anything. But instead, they had looked away, plastered that fake smile back on their face, and kept on selling.
‘Good riddance,’ he’d thought as he adjusted his coat and headed up the red carpet to Queen’s Castle. ‘Good riddance—good riddance—good riddance—’ He’d come to a dead stop just outside the Castle’s entrance and smacked himself in the temple with the palm of his hand. After assuring his Swatchling guide that he was okay, he’d continued onward as normal. But now that he's free of work, alone with his thoughts, terror rises in the back of his throat. What the hell was that? It was like the thought had caught in a feedback loop, echoing in his ears, an error sound beeping underneath the flow of words.
He’s barely in his room for ten seconds before the phone rings. He steels himself and answers, although it’s the same kind of call as before: status update, reminders of his job, and statements that sound vaguely like threats. Although when he asks if there’s anything else, the voice pauses. “…no distractions.”
“Of course not. I’m a professional!” Spamton laughs weakly, but the voice on the other end doesn’t say anything else. Instead, there are a few seconds of silence before the line clicks and goes dead. Spamton sets the phone on the cradle and collapses onto his bed with a groan. No distractions. And Tenna… is a distraction, he figures. Although is he, really? The longer they work together, the more natural it feels. The less he really has to worry about trying so hard. Sleeping together is definitely a turn of events, but it’s nothing they can’t come to some kind of agreement on. ‘Assuming [[You too can]] get him to even [LOOK] at you again,’ he thinks to himself with a groan.
He barely sleeps. On the bright side, it means that he can set back out to TV World first thing in the morning. He beelines for the coffee maker and chugs two cups down while the other stars filter in. Despite his polite greetings to them, he internally steels himself for a very, very long day.