mrsklover: (Default)
BeepBeepRichie ([personal profile] mrsklover) wrote in [community profile] revivalproject2022-05-09 06:31 pm

Beep Beep, Richie

WHO: Richie Tozier and the poor soul here with him
WHERE: Calibrations
WHAT: Also Calibrations
WHEN: Guess. It starts with C and ends in Alibrations
WARNINGS: Homophobic slurs/homophobia/internalized homophobia, child neglect, bullying, drug use, alcohol use, suicidal ideation, and CLOWNS

The room is an arcade. When you first walk in, you see that it has been abandoned, likely for years. There is dust on all the machines and half of them are just blinking 'GAME OVER' without any way to start it again. But near the back, you can hear something. The sound of a fighting game. Street Fighter! And there playing it is a small boy with a grey ringer shirt, thick black glasses, and extremely messy dark hair.

It's Richie. Richie at twelve years old, playing his favorite game and ignoring you completely. There is a blinking button beside him to activate two-player mode. But if you don't want to do that, there are a few other options.

Some other game machines have buttons blinking as well. The closest machine to him is called The Secret and sings almost a circus song in 8-bit. A few aisles away, another game has a button lit up and this one is called Homeward Unbound. It has no music and nothing on the screen except a house, no lights on in the windows. The last game with a play button is all the way in the corner and looks like an old beer tapper game. The screen has a cartoon of adult Richie's face on it, smiling until, for just a second, it changes to him crying. Weird.

There is more in the room that seems to almost glow among all the dust and debris. A token sits in the tray where kids once could get more for the games. A red balloon drifts along the floor with the words 'I <3 Derry' on it. And finally, for the person searching the hardest, they might see a bloody knife stabbed into a carved heart on one wall.

Welcome to Richie Tozier's head. God help you.
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Default)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-10 01:55 am (UTC)(link)
Arcade. Gladio wants to groan. How many of these sorts of places had Noctis dragged him to? Far too many. But hey, there's only so much a guy can do about that. You take it in stride and move on sometimes. He looks around for a while before moving to follow the noises.

The kid wasn't expected. What a weird dream.

"Hey, kid. Where am I?"
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Default)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-10 03:01 am (UTC)(link)
Sounds like Noctis as a kid. Damn lazy punk.

"I'm not blind, kid. At the moment. Seriously, where are we? Beyond the arcade."
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Default)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-11 01:29 am (UTC)(link)
Well that doesn't sound like a very good place to be. Gladio sighs as he steps forward, watching the kid play.

"This your home?"
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Default)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-11 02:49 am (UTC)(link)
"Insomnia," he answered. "It's a city in Lucis. The capital."

He moves closer and his hand touches the cabinet, the player two button. He's got no clue what he's just walked into.
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Touch Him And Lose A Hand)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-11 04:19 pm (UTC)(link)
The memory ends and Gladio is practically growling from it.

"Doesn't matter if you just wanted to play another game or if you were interested in him, or if you just wanted to hang out with someone that might be a friend. Who the fuck even uses that sorta fucking language?" Gladio snaps in anger.

Back home a comment like that, even when he was young, would have had Gladio in a fist fight. That wasn't cool.
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Would You Just Relax)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-11 08:51 pm (UTC)(link)
"Bullshit," Gladio counters, arms crossed over his broad chest. "Only assholes don't wanna be around queer people. And do I look bad or sick to you?"

Weird that the second person in his life he's ever come out to intentionally is this kid, who clearly needs some reassurance.
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Soldier Through And Through)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-11 09:45 pm (UTC)(link)
"Bi," he corrects, and then he rolls his eyes.

"You think guys can only have those if they're straight? Fine, let me spell it out. The ink is a family thing, legacy related to the duty of the line of Amicitia. The muscles are my choice."

And part of that legacy too.
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Long Haired Pretty Man)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-11 10:25 pm (UTC)(link)
"Yeah, well there's plenty of stupid shit on television all the time. Reality television first and foremost. I dated a chick who aspired to write for those things. Because a lot of them have very generalized scripts. It's so fucked."

Wait, thin and girly? Gladio's eyes really do roll at that.

"Yeah, some gay guys are like that. Some are twinks and some are twunks and you've always got your bears and otters and all that. But it doesn't matter in the end. Some people are thin and prefer to present more femme. Some are big and strong and like to present butch. And some cross those lines and some don't care. And if you suggest being feminine and small is bad then I wish you luck if you ever meet my sister or Ignis. She's strong as hell, used to fight with a war hammer before she switched to a katana. And Ignis? Lean as a whisper, elegant and fancy, and more a man than some people I've met."

And he thinks Ignis might lean that way but they've never talked about it. In the end he points right in Richie's face, a final comment.

"And no one can tell me what to do with my body. If I hadn't wanted the ink, I wouldn't have gotten it. But there is also no one that could tell an Amicitia not to get the eagle. It's our birthright. Don't know what any of that has to do with blood donations, but I donate every eight weeks, which is as often as you can safely do it when you're doing whole blood donations. And they'd let me do that even if I was out."
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Default)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-11 10:42 pm (UTC)(link)
"Better than even money says it isn't only affecting gay people," Gladio answered immediately. No disease was like that. Illness wasn't that narrowly focused. "If someone told you that, they're lying."

At last he reaches out, clapping the kid on the shoulder.

"There ain't nothing wrong with you, and there ain't nothing wrong with me. You got that? Someone says that to you and I'm around, I'm breaking their nose. But yeah, I won't blab. Hell, only my sister knows about me."

And the few dudes he's hooked up with. You don't come out to one night stands.

"People can't help when they're sick, right? They can try and avoid whatever it is that makes them sick, but that doesn't make people more prone to it because of their sex lives. Except people with uteruses, if you count being pregnant as a type of sickness. WHich I don't. It's a fucking miracle."
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Default)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-11 11:08 pm (UTC)(link)
Um... Okay, that's a thing that's happening. But he's got a kid sister, so he gets what it's like. So he isn't awkward. He just does his best to hug the kid back.

"You come from a place that isn't worthy of you, kid. My advice? Be careful growing up, and get the fuck out of there. Don't stay where you won't be appreciated. It won't be easy. Fuck, it'll be hard as shit. But you'll get to be more true to you, and that's worth it. I've seen what fear can do to people, and you don't deserve that fear. All you deserve is your own damn life. And never, ever listen to a 'they' you don't gotta."

Kid doesn't have to deal with royal and nobility politics most likely. So fuck public opinion.
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (Default)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-12 12:58 am (UTC)(link)
Well, he wasn't expecting a dude like that. Still, he looks the guy over then nods in approval.

"Ain't nothing wrong with you at this age either. But yeah, you deserved someone back when you were a kid then. But now you know better, right? Have for a while. You've got close enough to dad-bod, and that scruffy 'experienced artist' look. Gotta be rolling in the young twinks, right?"

Come on, man, tell him you're getting laid. Poor thing.
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (The Clothes Make The Man)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-12 02:07 am (UTC)(link)
A clown stole his memories? Yeah, that sounds crazy, but he's not arguing.

"Never too late to start," Gladio points out. "My mentor, Cor, didn't get in a relationship until he was in his fifties."
ziedrich_bearer: Gladio from FFXV (The Campfire's Light)

[personal profile] ziedrich_bearer 2022-05-12 02:41 am (UTC)(link)
Gladio looked toward the knife and he sighed. Yeah, he gets that.

"The man I love was fated to die by the will of the chief of our gods. I spent a decade of my life fighting to make sure he'll survive. Survive and forever be out of my reach."

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