Work Text:
Alright, let’s do this one last time, yeah? His name is Mane P. Frags. He was bitten by a radioactive spider. And for the last ten years, he’s been the one, the only, Spider-Man. You guys know the rest.
He saved his best friend, graduated high school, saved the city, maybe a little too much. He got an apprentice, started being hunted down by the corrupt government. He… couldn’t stop his best friend from leaving for their hometown once he learned that Mane was Spider-Man, so now he doesn’t tell anyone else. He really doesn’t do friends anymore, just to avoid any distractions.
And sixty-three days ago, Spider-Man died.
-*-
Wemmbu is panting, his strings are erratic, and he hopes that his one remaining web-shooter doesn't jam while he tries to clean out the other one with his teeth. He tastes old cobwebs that cling to inside the mechanisms and tries not to swallow them.
His legs parkour across glass windows and rooftops while cops trail from below in flashing cars, yelling for him to come down and surrender. Wemmbu is way too exposed, and he can only pray that they don’t get impatient and start shooting at him.
His legs are flailing as he swings around another building and the wind whips against his suit, sewn on hood rippling with motion. The veil over his mask, midnight strings, is pristine and ruffled, but it’s just a cover-up.
Wemmbu should be at home right now, he should be doing his homework or scrolling Tiktok, he should be doing anything but this. Egg is probably watching the news and freaking out, trying to call his cell that sits in his zipped up pocket, all while Minute busts his ass off at his company.
It’s insane how he even considered staying as Spider-Man’s apprentice. He’s never been particularly attached to the thought of being a hero, because calling yourself a hero makes you a “self-mythologizing narcissistic sack of shit.” Wemmbu is plenty egotistical enough, even without the fancy titles.
Still, he found joy in helping citizens and doing what he could to protect the city he loved. And if Wemmbu can’t honor him with a proper burial, then this is the least that he can do. He tries not to think about it too much. Thinking too much makes him cry, and that is unneeded complication when being chased by the police.
So, he thwips from building to building until he makes it around a corner and recognises one of the windows, with potted plants on the balcony and an elephant watering can.
He remembered being there, when they first started being hunted by the LAW and didn’t know what to do. Running across the city, panicking with a twisted ankle. Mane ushered them into the small apartment, saying it belonged to someone he knew.
There is no one there when Wemmbu ducks onto the balcony and slides past the door, just as there was back then. It’s not very well decorated. The walls are plain, the only source of decoration being a graduation diploma and a framed picture of a brunet standing in front of a shop.
He sighs, collapses on the ground, and his web shooters are properly cleaned with his fingers. Sure, toothpicks probably work better, but he’s got none and isn’t exactly going to rob the guy living here. It’s testy enough to be in a place that hasn’t been confirmed safe in years, but Wemmbu doesn’t want to end up leading the LAW to his front porch.
He doesn’t usually get sloppy enough to have the entire police force after him, especially when he can whip away from stopped gun fights and robberies in seconds. Today was just… bad. There have been a lot of bad days since his mentor died.
They’re clear and usable, so he moves to the bathroom. There are bruises forming all over his left side after he hit a concrete wall, so he tries his best to run it under cold water. The suit stays on, pieces of skin barely uncovered as drops go over cyan and matte purple patterns.
The markings are going to stay on, even days after such an incident, so he plans to wear warmer outfits when the suit is finally off. At least they aren’t so visible on purple skin, but the magenta skin around his eyes certainly has to be covered up.
The tile is cold against his legs, which are sore with overuse. Sometimes, he wishes he didn’t feel the need to honor his mentor. Even if it’s a selfish thought, he’s had it for years even before Mane… Mane died. Mane died, and Wemmbu will never get to speak to him ever again.
He swipes the thought away, to save for the long nights without melatonin. He does his best to not think about it until he has to. That’s how he survives, because stewing in his own misery will get him killed—even if it’s all his mind wants to do.
The white door opens. Wemmbu flinches and blocks his face even with his mask on, an instinct. His senses have been going off, it’s just that he was too stuck in his own head to notice, how stupid.
There’s a person standing at the doorway. His eyes are covered in black cloth, and dreads fall nicely above his shoulders. He’s in plain-old people clothes, not the blue uniforms and yellow logos he’s become so used to. Just a normal guy.
“What the hell is Spider-Knight doing in my bathroom?” His hands raise to his face, and from his stance, he’s had some self-defence training. Wemmbu is obviously more experienced in combat, but he’s also injured. This is a fight he can’t take.
“Hanging out with your rubber duck—can’t you tell?” He tries looking as non-hostile as possible, but that’s a little hard when he feels like shit. “Hiding out from the LAW.”
“So you just chose my apartment to camp out at?” He sneers, and swiftly grabs the toy animal by the bathtub. “Don’t touch that bro, it’s important.”
“Sure whatever. Look, don’t call the cops, I just… Got in a bad spot. I’ll get out of here, sorry for the intrusion.” Wemmbu starts rising from the counter, but he’s too slow and the brunet notices.
“Wait, don’t. I’m not going to call the cops, those guys are assholes. Tried sticking me in jail for breathing a little too hard, but the case got dropped.” His shirt is kind of smeared with dirt, black band shirt and baggy jeans. There’s some twine sticking to the fabric as well. “You can stay, just don’t move. Your shoes are dirty.”
“Okay.” He’s still on guard, even when the other leaves to bring him a bag of frozen fruit and slippers. The sneakers that go over his suit get removed to the doorway, and he sits on the couch awkwardly while the other sighs.
“How long are you going to be here? You’re not staying forever.” He sighs, washing his hands. Wemmbu notices they’re dirty and dry.
“Oh, definitely not. Just a few hours, until it's night and the cops stop caring.” He finally remembers to check his phone, unzipping his pocket lazily. “So, what’s your name?”
“Bro, are you goin’ make this a routine or something?” He stretches. Wemmbu spies how the stranger’s head turns to watch his fingers, but doesn’t acknowledge it. He is, in fact, one of the people rich enough to own two phones, and all the contacts on this one are coded anyways.
“I’m bored.” He complains. He lets Egg know that he’s alive and safe, and that he’ll make it later.
He huffs, and Wemmbu notices that his laugh is kind of snorty. It’s not the high-pitched giggle he’s used to hearing. “You’re the one who decided to break into my house! If you’re bored, then get out?”
“Nah. Besides, what else do you want me to call you? Mr. Apartment Owner? Guy with the Mother Mother merch?” His finger flicks up and down as the other tries to figure whether to respond or not.
“Okay, okay! I’m Flame, happy?” He leaves for a different room. “I’m going to the kitchen and making something. You’re not getting any.”
“Rude.” It hurts to stand for too long, so just so he doesn’t have to be alone with his head, Wemmbu drags a stepstool into the kitchen. His legs take up a large portion of the small area while he now looks like a toddler in terms of height, but it’s fine.
“I didn’t expect Spider-Knight to be so short.” He mutters, cracking an egg into a bowl. It gets mixed with a couple others, the brunet—Flame—fetching a stray piece of shell from the goop.
Wemmbu tsks, folding his arms over his chest. “Didn’t that Asian guy already make a video debunking my height? Leave me alone, I’m like, average.”
“I don’t keep up with drama, I’m actually employed.” He replies. Different unlabelled spices get tossed in, the only two that Wemmbu recognises being salt and pepper.
“Dude, that’s way overseasoned.” He cringes, but leans slightly so Flame can walk by him and grab a loaf of bread on the counter. They aren’t fully comfortable with each other yet, obviously, but Mane trusts—trusted him. He trusted Flame outside of being Spider-Man, and Wemmbu trusts his mentor.
“N-Nah.” Flame shrugs him off, but his voice waivers. “I… Someone used to say that if you think your food is overseasoned, add a little more.”
Wemmbu snorts. “Isn’t that the opposite of what you should do?”
“Well it works for me.” He serves them on pieces of bread. “Can you grab the blueberries from the fridge? I think I have some left.”
He drags his stool across the floor in screeches, and opens the refrigerator. It’s average, but pretty empty, even for a young guy like him. Most people can’t afford everything, Wemmbu knows that, but there are only a few things in there. Some vegetables, milk, and pre-made breakfast.
He grabs the blueberries, of which he only has half a packet left. “You have like, nothing in here. I think if I tried robbing you, I’d feel bad.”
“Don’t you literally stop robberies on the regular, bro? That’s like, your whole thing.” He washes them thoroughly, grabbing two plates.
“That was Spi—his thing.” Wemmbu stops himself. He’s not sure if he wants to say his name. It means that he has to think about everything, the car, the fear, the way he dropped from the sky in a flurry before Wemmbu could catch him.
The kitchen is awfully quiet. He doesn’t like it.
Flame turns to look at him. Even if he can’t read his expression through the black fishnet and webbed mask, he bets he looks awfully miserable right now. “Yeah, um… I heard. I’m sorry about that.”
He continues when Wemmbu doesn’t. “I work at a flower shop, you know, and umm… There were a lot of people. They were all buying flowers. Lilies and roses, all white, and I saw a lot of people wearing their own versions of your veil. No matter the gender.”
It took weeks to work up the courage to go out as Spider-Knight again. He could barely stop crying, Minute thought he was scared from the gunshots and civilians hurt in the incident, and Wemmbu couldn’t say anything. Eventually, he stopped crying long enough to finish the veil, cheap and hand-made from dollar-store items.
“Yeah, well, theirs are probably better.” His fingers feel the one over his face, the alteration to his costume. Fishnets clip to the inside of his hood, the edges clumsily sewn onto black ribbon. A simple thing, but it made the message clear with his solo arrival: Spider-Man had died.
Flame, instead of ushering him somewhere, gives one plate to Wemmbu and sits on the floor of the kitchen, eating from the other. “He was a good guy.”
“I know.” And I know you do too.
-*-
It’s not during a chase when he sees him again. The LAW is off dealing with the weirdo kidnappers he left tied up to a street lamp halfway across the city, fathers and mothers crying over their recovered children. Just an average day.
He’s just swinging by in the area, tired and in need of coffee, grabbing something sweet in cash while the teenage barista contemplates calling the cops. Luckily, they’re too tired to care. They just accept his order.
Wemmbu looks around the shop, seeing ivory roses on one of the counters. His mind wanders to Flame, his empty fridge, the flowers, and raises his hand to alert their attention. “Wait, can I add something to my order?”
“Yeah, sure.” They look irritated to be stopped in the middle of making his summer seasonal strawberry-lavender frappuccino with caramel sauce and extra sugar, an order he saves for when he goes out as Spider-knight and not Wemmbu. His unmasked self doesn’t need someone looking too deep in his incredibly sweet drink orders.
“An iced latte.” He adds. “Where’d you get those flowers?”
They continue working on the drinks while they talk. “I think my boss got them from a store on Farmer’s Street. Something about fire.” The drinks are handed to him, he slides twenty over and walks away before they can give the change back.
He takes care not to spill them as he swings on roofs, even if it means that his wrists bend in awkward ways and he has to use his thighs to hold his freezing cup. It’s left in Flame’s fridge, which is more restocked.
The next day, when he checks again, the inside has a sticky note. Thanks for the drink, but I like americanos. Hot.
-*-
He finds himself on Farmer’s Street a week later, having finished a test and stopped a mugging. He’s still as capable as ever, and crime activity has started lowering. Maybe they’ve finally gotten the hint that while Mane is gone, Spider-Knight will stay in his place. At least that weird bandit group paused their activities and released a public statement consoling him on his mentor’s death.
He spies a title while kicking his feet and sitting on a tattoo shop. Fire Flowers. There are flowers displayed in front of it, warm toned petals and a cheerful yellow sign. Wemmbu remembers the coffee shop. He jumps off the building into an alleyway, and walks to it.
The door jingles cheerfully with a daisy windchime, and a brunet looks up. Part of his hair is pinned back from his face with dandelion barrettes. “Welcome t—Spider-Man!” He recoils once he sees the blue and deep purple suit.
“What the?” He asks. His nametag reads “Lomedy”. It’s pinned to a yellow sweater-vest, sunny and warm just like the sign in the front.
“Just browsing. I don’t spend all my time saving the city and lookin’ tuff while doin’ it.” There are pots and flowers bundled in plastic everywhere. He thinks that Egg would like some of these, the blue ones with white and yellow pistols. They’re small, but they grow plentiful.
The owner looks nervous, bitten lip and hands behind his back. The door behind his counter, messy with string and paper, swings open. Out comes a dreadhead wearing an off-shoulder top and cargos, one Wemmbu lights up at the sight of.
“Loms’, I got the new batch trimmed and bundled. What else do you need—Spider-Knight!” The box of trimmed flowers crash to the floor. “What the fuck are you doing here!”
He stands up from crouching by the tulips. “What, treating a customer like that? You’re so rude!” They both know damn well that he’s not just a customer, but Wemmbu is glad to keep playing this game of charades for as long as the other wants. Plus, not really a good thing for a civilian to be associated with a known criminal.
Flame grits his teeth and picks up the stuff he dropped, a few of which are sunflowers. Wemmbu pauses for a little when he realizes, and then his heart squeezes. It’s almost like he was beaten up and tackled, just like the days of back when he started out as Spider-Knight.
He hates it. He hates how gorgeous they all are, the captivating golden petals and middles the same shade as the cake he had years ago, when he passed his test and Rejoice was proud. It isn’t supposed to sting when he thinks of him, but his eyes well up and his chest is haunted by phantom pains.
“Um, are you just going to stare?” Flame’s face crinkles.
Wemmbu snaps back and out of his treacherous head, and he bet he looks really shaken. His voice is far too lively for someone who’s experienced such loss at the young age of twenty-two. “Sorry, zoned out a little.”
Lomedy is quick to fill the gaps. “Do you like them? We could get you some, on a discount too.”
“Sure.” As much as they repulse him, it serves as a reminder that he lived. That his friend existed and the heart that beats in Wemmbu’s throat once sang in the same pulse as the decomposed one buried in the soil. He picks up a couple ivory lilies, the kind that Egg likes, and cobalt baby’s breath. Flame offers to bundle them all up along with the tiny flowers he saw walking in, Lomedy far too scared to hold a proper conversation.
“Alright, cut the shit. The backroom is soundproof and you can’t hear anything outside, it’s ‘cause I need a way to not punch the dumb customers we get sometimes. Loms’ isn’t going to know what’s going on unless there’s a bomb siren, so why are you even here?” Flame looks up from grabbing brown paper to wrap it in.
“Hey, can you change the paper to white? And split the flowers into two bouquets.” Wemmbu orders, and the other scowls so hard that it could almost be a meme picture. “Bro, I didn't even know you worked here, just came because someone recommended.”
Flame changes out the wrapping, switching to an ivory one with golden ribbon. “Fine. But you’re paying full price for this, everyone knows you’re rich. My feed genuinely has people talking about fifty percent tips and shit.”
“Fine, fine! So, the place here looks pretty nice. Is your fridge good, or should I tip more?” Wemmbu asks, the scent of roses hitting his nose and dulling his emotions.
Rough fingers go over white sheets and jade stems. “I don’t need your cash, Lomedy’s just too nice. You’re not going to start visiting me here often, right? Because it’s different from my apartment.”
“Nah. Someone will notice.” Wemmbu admits. He knows the risks of having friends as Spider-Knight. Someone will notice he’s spending too much time in a place, someone will get hurt. That’s just the way it is. “I’ll see you around. Bye.”
It’s nice to be able to talk to Flame. The bouquets are pretty, and Wemmbu leaves with a quick two finger salute. He wants to stick his tongue out, but the fabric that goes over his face and the black veil don’t allow that.
Strings of silk stick to buildings as he runs across rooftops and glides in the air. The bundles are pressed tightly to his chest, just gentle enough that they don’t crush. It’s a place that no one really visits, surrounded by trees and far off the side of the highway.
His mask is torn off his face, but the veil stays on. While he’s not dressed in typical funeral attire, Rejoice wouldn’t give a shit. His breathing becomes shaky, his hand wiping at his nose. The gravestone is made of smooth andesite, with a metal plaque.
He leaves the colorful bouquet on brown soil. It’ll rot and die, and all that’ll be left are withered flowers and decomposing paper. Wemmbu’s knees sink into dirt, his face becomes blotchy and tears leave wet stains on the petals.
He misses Rejoice. He misses being able to hang out with Egg, him and Loppezz in that one club, the one with the table in the back where they would always share a plate of waffle fries. They wore matching shirts, and it was fun, and he misses it.
Rejoice, like the responsible, kind, and wonderful person he was, was walking back home after another night partying. Some fuckfaces decided driving home after drinking was a good idea, and ran a red light. He died three hours later, in the hospital from a collapsed lung and internal bleeding.
Wemmbu doesn’t remember being nineteen. He remembers being scared, sad, and horrified, yes. But he was supposed to be an adult that could take care of himself, and all of a sudden he was barely even able to stand being in the shower because it was too cramped and claustrophobic. He was supposed to be an adult, he is an adult, and yet he’s such a mess.
Egg wouldn’t really speak or eat or sleep during the night, and it was almost like he was the little kid Wemmbu met when he was adopted. Loppezz flitted around from school to school and job to job even before Rejoice died, and last he heard she was working under LAW enforcement due to connections from an old friend. He hates how she stares at him with such fury when she chases Spider-Knight.
Wemmbu is Spider-Knight, but it’s more like they’re two different organisms. Spider-Knight is hated by the government and adored by the citizens, but he doesn't do enough good for the chases where he tries not to think of his former friend to stop. Wemmbu is the dumb rich kid that screams profanities when he rages at video games and is going into fashion. It feels almost icky to think of them as the same person.
He doesn’t quite remember Rejoice’s face anymore. Of course, Wemmbu knows what it should look like, but… it’s blurry when he doesn’t have a reference. Taking a picture of a polaroid over and over, until it eventually stops being a person.
His eyes swell and tiny, fickle noises come from his throat. Hours later, everything that seeps dries and all that’s left is a pile of white, blue and yellow flowers.
The other bouquet ends up on Egg’s nightstand, potted with a plastic vase pretending to be glass. Wemmbu doesn’t enter his room until they dry out and Minute presses them in his notebooks.
-*-
When he visits late at night to bring Flame a gift, the first thing he can notice is crying. It’s muffled, and almost sounds like the person is choking on their own snot and dripping saliva. Wemmbu knows that he should probably be cautious and wait, scan around the area like Mane taught him to so he wouldn’t get in a fight he couldn’t win.
He rushes, door shoved open in a hurry and panic, because that’s what he wants to do.
Flame is crying. He’s curled up in his bed and the sheets are only halfway covering his body. His blindfold is left to the side of the nightstand, but his closed eyes leak streams down his cheeks.
Wemmbu is hesitant to approach, but he does when Flame curls up a little. His mask is still on, and he ends up standing over the other like a menacing statue. He’s a bit puzzled on what to do, because he should know what, he’s just… lost.
Egg cries, but he hasn’t really done so seriously in a while—he stopped about a year after Rejoice passed away. He cries over tiny things, like when the main characters rediscover family at the end of kids movies or when he loses his good pens for annotating books. That clearly is not the case with how Flame shuffles around and murmurs.
It would frankly be a shit idea to wake him up considering it’s too late to be reasonable, so Wemmbu refrains from patting his head like Mane would do with him. Instead, he hums. It’s a tune that Jaden likes to sing, some sea shanty that Wemmbu forgot the lyrics to. The asleep brunet stops rustling as much, and he will take that as a sign to continue.
A jumbled phrase makes its way to his ears, but Wemmbu thinks that he heard nothing from Flame. He falters a little, but continues until three lines of lyrics later, when he says it again.
“I miss you.” It’s slurred and low, but it’s so wretchedly real to Wemmbu that he stops entirely. Flame is fast asleep at this point, and Wemmbu is about to cry as well, and he can’t stand the tears that start soaking his blue and purple mask because he misses them.
He misses running around the school, trying to help Zam get votes for student council president. Wemmbu wishes he could live another day of the short month spent going to the bar with Rejoice every couple of days, even though it was eating at his assignments and liver. Manepear thwipping across the city, the afternoons spent sitting on the tops of roofs and eating macarons with the lower half of their masks up, the grandma from two years ago who thanked them with strawberry hard candy after they recovered her stolen purse.
Wemmbu doesn’t take off his veil, but his mask does slip off and into his hands. He tries not to be too loud as he bawls into his wrists. The necklace is left at his bedside table, bought second-hand and given behind some restaurant, and is decorated with a titanium charm of a spider. There’s a gem in the middle, and it’s purple.
-*-
Black, green, purple, red. Wemmbu examines the hairclips in his hand. They’re from a small pack that costs a couple dollars, but there’s also another one with pastel clips that he kind of likes. He’s only here to buy one, so the choice is a bit hard.
The second one is in the shape of flowers, in soft shades of brunnera and marigold petals. A fiery rose balsam, a sunflower, a bell heather. There’s also a buttercup and delphiniums, arranged in a neat pile inside the bag.
Wemmbu supposes looking through books and websites on flowers was a bit helpful. Even if only to know a little more about his friend and keep up when Egg starts rambling about that one historical medicine manga.
He picks the second one. It has more hairclips and only costs a little more, so what’s the harm?
“Spongs. Yeah, which brand.”
Wemmbu turns right to the noise.
“No, I don’t know which brand of shampoo you have because I don’t go around memorizing people’s haircare products like a weirdo. Yeah, I’m pissed, if you don’t answer I’m getting you two-in-one.”
He feels his face smile and almost wants to walk to him, thank him for the flowers.
“I know. Which flavor?” He asks into the phone. It’s a normal phonecase, the only thing on it a lion sticker. “Shut up, it’s basically the same thing. I forgot what scent is, okay?”
He doesn’t move a single step. Right now, he’s Wemmbu. Wemmbu, the kid with the dumb fancy outfits that studies fashion design and lost his friend in a car crash. Wemmbu, the person that has not once heard of Flame.
Spider-Knight does not stand in the store. Wemmbu does.
He continues milling on that floor tile until Flame’s right about to turn around, walking away to a random aisle. It turns out to be for food, so he picks a popsicle out of a cooler and rushes to the counter. No reason to stick around longer and possibly slip up.
A quick tap of his card, and he’s out. The ice cream is in the shape of a bunny, white chocolate dots for eyes. It’s raspberry flavored.
-*-
He wakes up shaking. He doesn’t scream, he has no reason to scream, at least, Wemmbu doesn’t have any reason to scream. Rejoice died years ago, Loppezz is living the good life working down at the station, he and Egg are almost through their degrees, Wemmbu should be fine.
His mask is off, and so are the lights. He’s in complete darkness, the full-length mirror to the side of his bed only shows a figure and not his face. He can’t tell if it’s Wemmbu or Spider-Knight in the reflection, like how sometimes he’ll see Mane’s face when the lights are off and start hyperventilating. He can’t breathe right now, just like those times.
(They're thwipping around, the red and blue lights below them are loud, and the air feels good on his face. They’ve done this before, dozens of chases, and it’s normal. He hears gunshots, but they’re fine. Then, Mane drops from in front of him, the web going slack and snapping in front of him as blood stains his suit.)
It’s Wemmbu. It’s Spider-Knight. His pulse is racing against the fingers touching his throat, and his knees tremble from under the blanket. He has to force himself to breathe. His lungs feel numb like his heart.
(They’re next to the crushed dumpster, hiding, and Mane’s bleeding, his shoulder has a literal hole in it and he can barely stand on his own, Wemmbu has to help, they need to get to his car, they need to run, the LAW is after them, they need to run—)
His head is jumbled, his memories are messy and he almost doesn’t remember where he is. He’s in his room. His throat feels like it’s trapped beneath a covering of burning metal. He counts on his left hand, pressing his fingertips together in hopes to calm down.
(“Wemmbu,” He’s in so much pain that his voice sounds quieter than ever, “I need you to grab the blindfold in my pocket. You’ll find out later who to give it to, I just need you to give it to him. He’s got these eyes like fire, you’ll know it when you see it, just tell him I love him—”)
One, two, three, four, five. Five little fingers, five painted nails. Four patches of hair along his knuckles, each thinner and smaller than his eyelashes. His heart starts to slow until it no longer hurts every time it beats inside his torso, and he only twitches every so often.
(Fire. Fire. Fire. There’s so much fire, and Mane’s in it, except that’s not really Mane because he’s dead—)
As soon as he gets control over everything, he tugs on the suit that sits under his bed and jumps out his window with his back to the mirror. The tiny sound of shooting spider silk is a nice background noise that accompanies him while he travels around the city and above the golden lights.
It’s a freezing, lonely hour to be sitting on the edge of one of the highest buildings in Unstable City. Typically, people rarely ever come up here due to the risks associated with the height, but Spider-Knight doesn’t need the permission of any CEO or cleaning company to mope where he wants.
He’s just moping. He’s fine.
-*-
Sweet dried apricots and peaches, that’s what he smells. The cabinet is stocked with dried foods and healthy things, and the fridge isn’t as barren as he once saw. He tries his best not to smile. It peeks through in smidgets.
Flame has a tiger onesie on when he sees him, and he’s sitting on the couch while some movie plays. It’s clearly horror, judging by the screaming coming from the screen.
“How do you see things through the blindfold?” Wemmbu watches his head turn to his position, and flops down next to him on the couch. While running again—he really does a lot of cardio these days—from the cops he ran into a tree and scraped the back of his leg, but it doesn’t hurt. He’s fine. He’ll think about it later. He always does.
“It’s just mesh.” Flame comments, scooting a little to the left. The movie is about a serial slasher that looks for the main characters with a whistle, turning over chairs and wearing a clown costume.
“Dude, I don’t know why everyone’s hiding. Like, if they locked in, they could curbstomp his ass.” Wemmbu comments. “The knife might stab someone, but it’s better than all of them dying.”
“Bro, it’s for the plot. Besides, the killer has like, a demon working with him or something.” Flame thwaps his arm with the back of his hand gently, but it still hurts. He doesn’t know exactly where it’s from, but his lifestyle of ramming into buildings on a weekly basis is probably a factor.
Wemmbu holds back a wince. “Dude, you just spoiled me.”
“It was referenced in the beginning of the movie, you just weren’t there.” He comments. The main character hides in a closet while his brother gets stabbed in the other room, waiting for the killer to get out of the area so he can dash out the window.
“What, is the killer going to have some super duper tragic backstory that makes the mass murder okay?” He scoffs. “That’s always so boring.”
“That’s what makes them interesting, you’re just dumb.” Flame retorts. The killer bursts through the door loudly, and he screams like a crying child.
“What? Dude, that’s not even a jumpscare!” Wemmbu laughs. He doesn’t know when he stopped laughing, but it hurts now. It’s louder than he has been in a while, enough that Flame shuts the hell up and it bubbles faintly past the walls.
“It was scary! What the hell is wrong with your laugh anyways, it’s so loud.” He mutters, clearly embarrassed. He’s smiling though. “Has anyone ever clipped you laughing?”
“Nah, not much to laugh about on the job. Funnier to get to see you scream like a baby, anyways.” It’s kind of like how he used to yell. Wemmbu ignores the blood seeping into his costume.
-*-
Mane is dead. He knows this. Wemmbu doesn’t understand why Bacon of all people has to show up, though. It might be a bit harsh to judge him, especially after his former best friend died, but who wouldn’t judge the man that scorned their mentor?
“What the fuck are you doing back in Unstable?” Wemmbu’s words are clipped, as they should be. “Thought you ran your ass back to Lifesteal City.” They’re sitting on opposite ends of a bench, holding coffees after Wemmbu recognised him at a cafe and needed to know why he was here.
He’s taller. His hair is still the red and white mess it always was, but his glasses are for a lower prescription. The waffle hairclip has moved from always being to the right to the left, and he’s wearing black. “I… I’m back for a while, just because…”
“What?” He feels like shit, and his hatred is clear in the scowl on his face and the press of his eyebrows. Bacon’s never seen his face, but they know damn well who the other is. After all, there’s only one person who would hate him that much.
(“I’m sorry. I didn’t… Look, you know I didn’t do that, I’m not the type to just fuck around and hurt people. The government is filled with liars, you know this!”
“Well I don’t know what you would or wouldn’t do anymore! How am I supposed to know anything about you when you’ve been lying for eight years!” He’s loud enough that Wemmbu can hear him even without his ear pressed against the wall.
“Bacon, I’m still me. I’m Mane, I’m supposed to be your best friend.” His voice is strained. “Please, I’m not a bad person, neither is Wemmbu, just li—”
“Who the hell is Wemmbu? Don’t tell me that’s Spider-Knight.”
“Bacon. You can’t tell anyone. Not the cops, not your parents, just…” Mane sounds more serious than Wemmbu’s ever heard him. “Please, like, I-I… I can’t do that to him. He’s just a kid. He can’t get roped into legal shit, his friend just died a couple months ago too and just… He can’t handle that shit.”
“I… Won’t tell anyone. I promise.” Bacon backs away, the footsteps and shuffling loud in the silence. “I’m moving back to Lifesteal. And after I leave, I better not see your face again.” The door opens, and Wemmbu stays as still as possible in the bushes so that he doesn’t get caught.
He wanted to take him to get ice cream as civilians after Minute gave him some cash for landing an internship. Wemmbu tries his best not to pry, but he ends up hearing it anyway. He leaves when he can’t see Bacon on the street anymore, thwipping away.
Mane knows that he knows either way and they lie low until the moving trucks are on the highways and it’s been confirmed that cops won’t show up on their doorsteps. Wemmbu pretends not to know anything, and Mane doesn’t bring it up.)
“Look, you never contacted me and told me that Mane died. You know damn well I live in Lifesteal, you could’ve… Yeah. I had to find out a month later. His family hosted a funeral after the police couldn’t find him. His civilian identity, not Spider-Man.”
“Well sorry, I didn’t think the guy that ditched him wanted a heads-up that he… Died.” Wemmbu feels like shit at the memories. “How long are you staying? And why?”
“His family and friends. Most of them moved to Lifesteal and Strength, but some still live in Unstable. I’m only going to be around for a month more to, y’know, reconnect.” His hands curl around the cup of cheap shitty coffee like it isn’t going to melt his fingers off. “Can… It wasn’t a peaceful death. He got shot, right?”
“Yes. Wasn’t some peaceful, hospital sob story.” The news wasn’t very sensitive with how they worded it in the papers. Wemmbu doesn’t follow headlines anyways, but he stopped looking up the latest fashion trends to clown on them with Egg.
“I’m sorry. I wish I could’ve… I should’ve just talked to him one last time.” Bacon isn’t crying, probably because Mane is the type to do something stupid, get himself killed and he’s accepted that. It’s not a rare possibility that someone getting chased on a regular basis would eventually get caught. Wemmbu just didn’t really think that possibility would be real.
It’s silent. Wemmbu drinks from his strawberry latte, of which he didn’t bother to add extra sugar, so it tastes too bitter. He doesn’t know what to say, not when his head is filled with water, dark swirling ink shaken up again after this conversation. The end of the lion-fur brush has washed off its muck in his head, and the colors of the world have dulled to grayscale.
“Bacon? What the hell are you doing here?” He looks up, and so does Wemmbu. His vision is painted in cherry alstroemerias and strawberry crimson, tinged with tiger lily orange. Flame is standing a few meters away, holding a bag of groceries and a dog on a leash. “And who’s that with you?”
Bacon looks surprised he’s here, and Wemmbu doesn’t like that his first instinct is to joke around with Flame. Wemmbu has no idea how he knows Bacon, and he almost feels cautious of his former friend. Not to mention, he’s getting too lax with his interactions with Flame. While Wemmbu is pretty sure he wouldn’t rat him out, there’s nothing to say of what their relationship would become.
“Just a… I used to know him.” Bacon settles on that phrasing, which is a bit funny when this is the first time they’ve ever even had a conversation. “Wemm. That’s his name.”
“Yeah, I’m Wemmbu,” he corrects, trying not to sound too hostile or inquisitive. When everyone at the local station’s gunning for your capture, you learn to control your tone. “So, how do you know Bacon?”
Flame looks confused, and he sets one of the bags down on the ground. The right part of his lip sucks in a little, and Wemmbu can see faint imprints in it when he lets it go to speak. “He’s friends with—used to be friends with my brother. Don’t you know Mane?”
Wemmbu steels at his name. His shoulders start trembling from how tight they’ve become, and his hands start sweating. He didn’t hear his name much in the first place, and he hasn't heard it since—
(The car is silent. The radio doesn’t play music because he can’t escape his thoughts. There’s no one’s breathing but his own. It’s so empty. He can’t stand it. He doesn’t want to look behind him. There’s an orange blindfold he gave him in his pocket, and there’s a stream of water building up in his tear ducts.
There’s no one around on the highways. He swerves off the road and onto grass, trampling it down. It’ll leave tracks, but no one will find anything of value in the overgrown field. He keeps driving until he’s out of sight from the road, steps out of the car, and punches the hood so hard he dents metal.
He’s already quite strong, being a freak of nature with inhumane abilities, but the screaming in his brain lets him sink fist after fist into metal. His hands should hurt. He’s not sure if they do. It’s a wretched anger stuck inside his head, so he keeps beating the metal up like his hands won’t be bruised and he won’t need to sneak more painkillers from the pharmacy.
He can’t care anymore. To care is an awful, awful thing.
When he finishes breaking Mane’s car, he starts dumping oil all over the entire thing. He grabbed the thing out of the groceries in the trunk, and pours yellow fluid on the wheels and over the hood. His hands are slick and it’s a weird feeling over his suit, but he continues until it’s all empty and tosses the plastic jug on the hood.
A lighter is flicked on and kisses the cigarette in his fingers. Minute kicked the habit a long while ago, but sometimes when things get stressful at work, Wemmbu will find a pack or two in his drawer.
With bleeding hands and a face as dead as the life in Atlantis, he throws the thing on the car and backs up. It explodes into a pile of fire along with the dead body inside it, and Wemmbu explodes into sobbing.)
—that. Wemmbu forces himself to stop thinking about it. He feels really damn exposed without the mask. “Heard of him, yeah. I… I’ve never met him.” It’s vile how carefree he sounds. He doesn’t know what to say to Flame. All he can do is act like the memories don’t haunt him.
Flame looks kind of uncomfortable, and Bacon looks like he would leap out of his skin if he could. It’s probably horrible for him. “’Kay. Um, see you around, I guess.” He walks past the two, and the puppy on the leash tries to go up to Wemmbu for pets before they get dragged away.
“Again I… I’m sorry. I really am, and I know that doesn’t mean shit, but…” He keeps trying to apologise to a man that deserves no apologies and wants none, because it doesn’t mean anything in the face of a corpse. “I miss him. I’m sorry. I hope that I can make up for it, one day.” He gets up, and waves goodbye.
While he walks away, Wemmbu remembers a critical detail that he failed to notice because of the panic inside his head. He almost feels sick.
Mane is Flame’s brother. He wasn’t just some estranged friend, a cousin, he was his big brother. The day his mentor died, Flame’s sibling, someone he’s known since he was a baby, died. Wemmbu was the one who saw his brother die.
He knows why Mane was so sure that Flame’s apartment was safe now. Wemmbu wants to throw up.
-*-
He’s a bit more hesitant to joke around with Flame and he keeps pausing for a second or two before retorting, but that can easily be shrugged off to the fact that he’s literally bleeding out as of current. It’s hard to understand what he should do. Does Wemmbu tell him? It’s pretty damn awkward to find out the guy you’ve been hanging out with for the past month and a half is actually the brother to your dead mentor.
“Don’t move!” He scolds again, adjusting the bandaid and peeling the adhesive apart from each other. Part of it has stuck together, creating an awkward lump of coated paper. After he tries separating the sides and just getting them more stuck, Flame peels the rest off of Wemmbu’s knee before throwing it away.
His suit is rolled up and the damage is of thin tears. While Wemmbu can whip up a new one within a week or so, being a fashion major and rich as fuck, he can’t exactly deal with the bruises and cuts in the same way.
“Ugh, you keep twitching and it’s annoying!” Flame’s sat next to him on the wooden floor because the bathroom would be a far walk with a messed up leg, and he moves himself so that he’s sitting on his shin.
“Dude, get off me!” Wemmbu lightly presses against his stomach, but he’s far too gentle to knock him off. “You’re so heavy, I feel like I’m going to die!” Finally, he stops with a groan and flops back, letting his back hit the ground while the other snorts.
“You literally carry like, three different children on your back every day! I’m not that heavy, am I?” He asks, but he sounds a little too bothered for it to be a joke.
“No, you’re not.” He feels the pull of adhesives on his skin, and the warmth of the person above him. He lives up to his namesake, after all. “Are you done with the bandaids? I want to try something.”
“Yeah, but—hey, wait! You still have bruises that need to be iced, dumbass!” Flame is shoved off and Wemmbu flips over, adjusting to a push up position. He tests something first, moving his arms up and down and making small position changes, before he looks up.
“Alright, get on my back.”
Flame splutters and crosses his arms. “You literally just ran into a tree! What the hell happened to taking care of yourself!”
“Come on, I’ve done plenty of worse things. I used to drink more than every week, y’know.” He doesn’t know, but Wemmbu feels like he can just let this little piece of information slip. He’s not very cautious despite how he was taught by Mane, but…
He wants to trust Flame.
“And? That doesn’t mean you get to act like a stupid chud.” He keeps standing back, but just because he stands back doesn’t mean that Wemmbu stops pushing himself.
“Then I’ll keep acting reckless. I’ll do whatever I want and keep ramming into trees until you get on my back!” He’s smiling, and his eyes are pressed with delight. “Come on, I just want to see how strong I am.”
“Fine. If you start dying though, then tell me.” He steadies himself on Wemmbu’s back, hands balanced so that he doesn’t end up flopping off. Then, Wemmbu starts to do pushups, taking care to lean more on his better leg.
“Dude, how many are you going to do!” He huffs after a few.
“By the way, I heard you were walking a dog.” Wemmbu ignores where and how he came across this information, choosing not to let it slip. “Who’s dog is it?”
“Ashen’s mine. This place is too small for him, though. I can’t keep pets, so he lives with Lomedy. He’s a good dog.” Flame changes the topic so as not to sour the mood. “Dude, that’s like, ten already!”
Wemmbu acts like he isn’t withholding information about his brother. He doesn’t know what to do with it.
-*-
It’s another one of those nightmares again.
The ones where he’s still stuck at that dreadful day, the flashbacks that happen and choke him until he can no longer breathe, and the pain that subsides in his heart like a plague. How many times has this happened already?
Bitterness has woven and intertwined itself so deeply in his flesh that he almost wants to puke, because why is he acting like this? He’s supposed to be an adult already. He didn’t wake up like this when Rejoice died. He’s supposed to be the one who protects the city, not the loser who weeps in his sheets. It doesn’t make sense.
With a trembling figure, Wemmbu goes to Flame. He can’t shake the guilt, and if he doesn’t do anything about it yet, he’ll be buried in a heap of remorse. What he could’ve done better, what could’ve happened if he ignored his wishes, if he told Flame when he first knew what happened to his brother—
He forces himself out of his head. He’s of no use if he’s deranged and crazy. Wemmbu runs. He slips out of the window and leaves Minute and Egg sleeping, pulling just his mask over his head and a simple change to a sweater. It would be unsightly for Wemmbu to show up in pajamas, after all.
His shoulders are tense. He can’t close his eyes, and his nerves keep screaming for him not to do this. He doesn’t really want to talk to Flame about this. He fumbles quite a lot while scaling down the sides of glass and concrete, but he makes it there.
He’s awake. Good. There’s music playing from some rock band in his headphones, and when Wemmbu looks over his shoulder, Flame finally notices him.
“When did you ge—Spider-Knight? What are you wearing, bro, what?” He scoots back, and notices the deadness peeking through his mask. “Dude, I don’t get why you’re showing up at like, four in the morning.”
“Can I just… Wait here? I’m not running from the cops, I promise.” He slumps on the couch while Flame looks hesitant to approach. “I need to talk to you about something I’m just tired.”
“It’s early, of course you’re going to be tired.” Flame checks the time on his laptop, looking back to him. “Just tell me straight up.”
How am I supposed to say it? “It’s really bad. Like, really bad.” He tries not to look too tense, but he still puts his slippers up on the edge of the couch and curls into himself. While he isn’t particularly tall, just shy of average height, he looks even smaller like that. “Swear that you won’t hate me.” I can’t lose another person so soon.
“I swear that I won’t hate you.” He flicks the top of Wemmbu’s head. “Unless you say you’re secretly a mass murderer or something.”
“I didn’t kill anyone, it’s just…” He takes off the mask, tearing it off with a hand and bracing for the worst. He’s trying his best not to let his pupils slink to the window a couple meters away, but his nerves keep pointing it out to him. Even if he’s hated and reported, Wemmbu can run. He just doesn’t know whether he’ll be running with blood on his hands or not.
“Aren’t you that guy at the park with Bacon?” He looks confused. “Boo, right? How do you know him?”
“It’s Wemmbu, dumbass.” He still has the gall to be a snarky little shit even at a time like this. “I knew Mane. I… Mane was Spider-Man.”
His lips part a little, and his eyebrows squish together. “What? B-But… There’s no way.”
“He was Spider-Man. He’s gone.” His hands hurt so much from the nails digging into them. “H-He’s not alive, or hiding, like the media likes to speculate, he’s…”
“Mane went missing.” Flame’s shaking. “Mane went missing and got declared dead, a-and he was actually Spider-Man. Mane’s been lying. How… How did Bacon…”
“Mane told him, I don’t know! I just showed up and f-found out that Bacon knew, and that Mane told him and he hated him and, and…” Wemmbu can’t keep going without crying, so he shuts his mouth like the tears don’t come down his face.
“But he said Bacon moved because of his job, so he lied… How long have you known that I was his brother?” Flame’s arms are twitching, and he takes off his blindfold so that he can wipe the tears from his eyes.
“Wemmbu,” He’s in so much pain that his voice sounds quieter than ever, “I need you to grab the blindfold in my pocket. You’ll find out later who to give it to, I just need you to give it to him. He’s got these eyes like fire, you’ll know it when you see it, just tell him I love him—”
Red and yellow pupils, so vibrant and bright that they look like cindering fire. Wemmbu realizes that the person Mane was talking about was Flame. Flame, who just had his older brother die for a second time within not even six months.
“I only knew from the park, I-I genuinely didn’t know. I just knew that this was safe because once he brought us here while running from the LAW, I didn’t know you were his brother!” Wemmbu’s panicking, and he really doesn’t want him to be angry at him.
“He… How did he die? Like, I know he got shot, but, just what happened! How could he have died like that! It was a gunshot, I know, but like, he could have gone to the hospital!”
Snot is piling in his nose, and every time he’s forced to breathe it hurts. “I’ll show you, I promise, I just… I’m sorry, okay? He didn’t want me to, how was I supposed to tell him no!” Who was going to disregard a dead man? They would’ve either rotted in separate cells or Mane would’ve bled out on the streets, and Wemmbu isn’t strong enough to disobey.
“What was I even supposed to do? He got shot and fell out of the sky, i-into this alley and I had to do something! We got in his car, I drove, a-and…” He doesn’t quite feel twenty-two, he feels like he’s nineteen again and reliving the car crash all over again. Reliving standing at a grave that’s far too fresh and watching Loppezz start sobbing because nothing good happens when she goes somewhere, and holding Egg when he throws up at the smell of alcohol.
Flame is sobbing while Wemmbu tries to muffle it by pressing his face into his shoulder. He’s a mess, and Wemmbu cries too, because he wishes Mane was still here. The touch feels better than being alone, and it slams its way down before sinking in gently and working its way into the crevices of his grief-stricken heart.
They both wish he was here. It’s human instinct, after all, to miss someone you loved. “I’m sorry I didn’t know how to tell you.” I’m sorry he’s gone and that Mane lied to you. I’m sorry.
“I didn’t get to say goodbye.” His arms are limp, swaying by Wemmbu’s hips. “I w-wish, just—I want-t tell him I love h-him one last time.” He’s too tired to keep himself upright, and leans on Wemmbu while he tries his best to stop trembling.
-*-
They wouldn’t be able to get there by bus, so Wemmbu borrows Minute’s car with the excuse that he’s meeting a friend. Egg doesn’t ask why he’s holding his black veil and just tells him that tomorrow, they can go to that bubble tea place on Capital Street run by those two avians. Wemmbu hugs him.
“Are you Wemmbu’s friend?” He hears Minute ask. “I’m Minute, his guardian and Egg’s father. He said someone was coming over. I don’t get why you’re holding flowers, though, Wemmbu doesn’t—”
“Bro, Minute, shut up!” He yelps, coming down from the stairs. “We’re going somewhere fancy, I already emailed my professor about an extension on the dress.” The bag on his back is slightly tighter on one side, and he races down the stairs while trying to adjust the straps. He finally makes it to the door in all his overaccessorised glory, almost stumbling from the shoes he’s wearing that are too tight on the tips.
“Who brings a backpack somewhere fancy?” Minute comments, handing him the keys. “Besides, you already had an extension on half your assignments. It’s not good to keep putting them off, you know.”
“I passed, okay? Get off my back,” he complains, “it’s fine. This is Flame, he doesn’t know Egg.” He fidgets with the white blouse around his torso and pulls his golden bracelets tighter so they don’t slip off his wrists.
Minute looks confused. “How’d you meet if Egg doesn’t know him? You meet everyone with Egg.”
“I don’t meet everyone through Egg! I met… Shut up!” Wemmbu spits out like a child when he realizes he has no examples.
“Stop being immature in front of Flame.” He looks Flame up and down, and then offers a hand to shake. “You… You used to intern for Ashswag, right? I used to work there.”
“Uh, yeah.” Flame nods, and Wemmbu almost wants to cringe when Egg walks by from the kitchen holding a popsicle. What is this now, a family gathering? Is having friends really such a big deal that they all have to show up?
“Yo, is this the guy you’ve been talkin’ about?” Egg points from his place inside the house, holding an apple and strawberry confectionary. “He’s the guy you got the flowers from, right?”
“Flowers?” Minute frowns.
He shuffles backward a little, despite Minute being several inches shorter. “I’m a florist and work at my friend’s shop. Wemmbu came in and caused a scene.”
“Hey, hey, that wasn’t even my fault!” He protests, shooing Egg away with the back of his hand and pushing—attempting to, anyway—Minute from the doorway. “Okay, that’s enough! We got to go, stop embarrassing me! And I didn’t even start that at the florist shop, Lomedy just freaked out!”
Flame scoffs, but lets Wemmbu fist-bump the old man and make it to his garage before speaking up. “You started it by coming over in that stupid suit.”
“Bro, I literally just walked in.” He hesitates and steps back after opening the driver’s seat. “Can… Can you drive? I know that this all only really happened to you a couple days ago, and I’m a shitty guy for making you drive out like, two hours on your day off… It’s just…”
It’s the logical decision. Wemmbu isn’t exactly the most stable as of current. Some people shouldn’t drive cars. Drunk drivers—Rejoice would be alive if they weren’t so fucking stupid—and young teenagers are the majority of people in this category, but people like Wemmbu shouldn’t be behind the wheel either.
Flame nods, understanding that. “I have my license, yeah. Used to, um, drive around with him.” He doesn’t have to specify who he is, because that name has been ringing through both of their heads for so long.
It’s a quiet drive. They don’t talk, Wemmbu just directs Flame on which streets to go and grips his seatbelt when they pass that alley. When he looks, the blood left on the road has been lapped up by rats and wiped away as if nothing happened. He tries not to tense too much.
“Is that where he landed?” Flame asks, and takes a left to the highway. Wemmbu nods and fiddles with the thin chain around his neck.
Wemmbu starts noticing little changes in his vision on the highway. He’ll see Mane’s air freshener instead of Minute’s beaded keychain hanging from the dash and whip his head around, only to realize there’s no reason for his heart to be pounding so fast. The sound of the wind being mistaken for Mane’s pained breathing, the road being just as bare as it was that day, they keep messing with his head.
Finally, he gets Flame to stop the car when there’s a tree with graffiti telling the LAW to go fuck themselves, stepping out and remembering the landmark. “This is the place. Um, park the car, we have to walk a bit.”
“You walked all the way out here?” He asks, but Wemmbu can hear the unease in his voice.
It’s a pretty open field, a spot of clear land surrounded by a ring of trees. It’d be a cool picnic spot if it wasn’t so tied to his nightmares, with the golden dandelions and springy grass. There aren’t any tire marks except for a faint imprint on a patch of dirt, as if nothing ever happened.
“I just drove the car through the field, but unless you want to trash Minute’s, we need to walk.” He adjusts his socks so that ticks don’t get him, and Flame follows him to the edge of meadow. “‘Sides, you know I can fight off any bears or evil squirrels.”
“Okay, I’ve benched like, two-eighty. I’m not a complete wimp!” He shows off by rolling off his sleeves and flexing, Wemmbu laughing and failing to one-up him. Despite his impressive strength, his arms are still scrawny and boney. The chatter they make is light-hearted, but Wemmbu can’t help but feel his nose clogging up.
It’s not a very hard walk for people as active as they are. The ruined car is to the left and top edge, and only parts of the car are still intact after the massive explosion he caused. It’s too far from the forest to burn it down, but a ring of grass around the vehicle is only composed of young, new sprouts.
Wemmbu stops Flame from walking any further, pulling him back by his shirt a dozen meters or so from the ring. “There could be diseases. It could also explode if you tried to touch it.” It doesn’t smell as foul as he’d think—because the corpse is burnt up—but there are still hints of metal and rot leaking into the air.
“So this is it?” Flame breathes in a little, and Wemmbu can hear how the air gets caught in his nostrils. “He… Mane’s really…”
“Yeah.” He digs into his bag and grabs the black veil in there, clipping it to his hair instead of his hood. It’s the last time he’ll ever wear it. They’re certainly not in funeral attire, Wemmbu in blue jeans and a pretty milkmaid top while Flame stands slightly more proper in his collared shirt and sweater, spider necklace dangling from his neck. He doesn’t think Mane would really care.
Flame takes off his blindfold before it gets ruined, and Wemmbu tries not to stare too much at his colorful pupils. The bouquet in his hand is left on the grass, a final gift. “I… I started taking Ashen on walks more. He’s not a little doggy anymore and I didn’t really do it after you were gone. I started watching that show you really liked even though it’s for kids, and I-I stopped eating as much takeout.”
“I made a new friend, his name’s Wemmbu. We met when he broke into my apartment and I think he’s my second good friend ever. He’s really annoying and he does a lot of stupid stuff, but you liked him. It really sucks that you couldn’t introduce us, though.” Said guy in question scoffs a little at the insults, but he doesn’t interrupt him. He kind of needs it, to just get one last goodbye out there.
“Mane, you’re always going to be my brother, and I’m sorry that I didn’t get to tell you that enough when you were alive. I love you, and I miss you. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you that enough.” He wipes away the tears on his face with tissues that Wemmbu pulls out of a little pack, before he starts his own final words.
“I don’t really have much to say, Mane.” Not like I did with Rejoice. “It was really, really bad when you died. I think it’s still really bad, and I get these crazy nightmares and I don’t know if they'll ever go away. Flame’s fun to hang out with though, and he’s kind of dumb, but… I’m going to be okay, I think. I miss you. You were less of a mentor and more of a guy that just stuck around me, but I don’t think I’d ask for someone else. I miss you.” He doesn’t cry that much, somehow. His eyes blur with tears and a few roll down his face when he blinks, but it’ll dry up and he’ll be okay.
He turns to Flame, who’s left dealing with the aftermath of his reddened and swollen face. “Um, I have something for you. He… Mane gave it to me and told me to give it to you.” He reaches into his bag and carefully pulls the orange blindfold out. It’s been sitting under his bed for months, but this morning he finally washed the dried blood splatters off and redid the stitching on the ocean-themed patch by one of the ends.
Flame takes it with trembling hands while Wemmbu rambles. “I washed it and made the patch not so crumpled, and there are a couple blood stains, but as long as you don’t use luminol or anything, it’s fine. It’s not mine to keep anyway, he… He wanted to give it to you. Mane told me to tell you he loves you.”
“Yeah, that… Thank you.” He ties his dreads, which fall to his shoulders, into a ponytail. Several fall out and it’s very short, but it reminds Wemmbu of the ponytails Mane would always tie his bleached dreads into. “Do you want to go? I think I’m done now.”
“Yeah.” He tugs at his arm and they walk, occasionally slamming into each other when Wemmbu steps over an uneven patch of grass and his ankles shake. Flame will just elbow him back, snickering and shielding himself from an onslaught of spit when Wemmbu blows raspberries. He makes a note to change back to his original white veil, but add in a black hairclip on the side of his hood. “There’s this bubble tea shop back in the city on Capital Street, you want to go there? The day isn’t over.”
“Sure, but you better not order anything stupid.” He laughs.
His face isn’t quite so clear anymore. When he double-checks with a photo on Flame’s phone, Wemmbu will notice that his memories shaped his nose wrong or they moved his hairline forward a little. Eventually, Wemmbu and Flame will forget, he’ll forget his name and his voice and his face, and all they will remember was that he was loved.
Because Mane P. Frags was a man that was loved and loved in turn. And in the end, aren’t humans all about love?