Work Text:
Wild Strawberry stood there, abandoned payphone clutched in her hand. Raising it to their ear, the teen gently spoke into it. “Hi mom. It’s me… Wild Strawberry Cookie. I’m sorry. I’m sorry you have to see me like this.” There was no answer on the other side. There never was.
A skeleton sat in the other seat, fingers still curled around a porcelain cup, tea left to cool and rot. Its jaw hung loosely, the bones leaning back in the chair. Cobwebs and vines covered almost every inch of the small garden table. Strawberry sat at the other seat, slowly taking bites out of a peanut butter sandwich, occasionally looking up at the body. The peanut butter stuck to the back of zher teeth, making hxm want to claw at it and get it off. Recently, a jellywalker had torn off her left ring and pinky fingers. Well more accurately it had bitten them off. Thankfully, its saliva hadn’t gotten into the wound and infected Wild Strawberry, but it was painful nonetheless. The wound was wrapped in gauze, before they had tugged their fingerless gloves back on. The gloves in question were really just repurposed long black socks with a hole cut in it for their thumbs. They helped provide an added layer of protection, plus the compression helped when you were swinging a heavy mace around all hours of the day. She quickly finished the sandwich and hoisted their backpack and cracked lollipop, setting off back into the apocalypse.
They sat in a dingy, dimly lit cell, arms wrapped around themselves. Wild Strawberry had found a camp, but was quickly deemed too unsafe and was locked away. And there she rotted away. Suddenly, out of the darkness, a hand emerged. Chipped neon green and black nail polish decorated the scarred hand. The hand led up to a cookie wearing a black tank top and dark green cargo pants with a lighter green waistband; a pair of green pliers sat connected to the waistband, and there was what seemed to be a large black zipper. A gas mask was connected to a tank on the cookie’s back that seemed to be separated into two, one part—the part the mask and its tubing was connected to—being lighter than the other. The cookie themselves had a tan dough with neon green hair and a white star patch over one eye. A gun was equipped in one hand, a line of tubing running to the other section on the tank
“kshhh…Do you want..skrsh…to get out of…hssss…here?”
Wild Strawberry nodded, for a better lack of words. Smart Pocket Strawberry quietly vibrated in their pocket, alerting them of something, but the teen paid no notice to it. The cookie unclipped the pliers on its belt, reaching out to bend back the bars of zher enclosure enough so that hx could climb through. “I’m khhh…prhhh…Energy Drink Cookie. What’s your…pshhh…name…?”
“Wild Strawberry Cookie.”
“Nice to…prhhhh…meet you. Come…!”
The teen quickly followed after the other, boots slapping heavily against the concrete floor. As they emerged out into the harsh daylight, Wild Strawberry saw that the camp had been ransacked, the place now a mess, with jam slowly drying on the walls and floors. “Khoooo…Get everything you can…carry,” Energy Drink ordered. Its voice sometimes cut out weirdly due to the mask, but thankfully it was easily decipherable. Wild Strawberry complied, shoving first aid kits and other helpful things–like rations–into her bag. Wizard–before he had been killedturned into a Jellywalker–had enchanted the bag to basically be bottomless. That enchantment had been the best thing to ever happen to that jade green backpack as it could now store anything and everything its owner came across. It even had a few other items like the pocket and ultra pocket strawberry–a last gift from their twin–and a speaker sandwich. There was Wizard’s Book of Wisdom, Gingerbrave’s skull buttons, and Gingerbright’s lollipop bites. As well as pain meds, multivitamins, basically anything you could ever want or need. Not like there was much to want here in this jellywalker apocalypse.
Spotting a notebook, Wild Strawberry grabbed it, looking it over. The open pages detailed the infection of jellywalkers from stage one to stage four. Looking from side to side, zhe quickly pocketed it. It felt like it would come in handy down the line. After successfully looting the place for everything it was worth–rations, first aid kids, extra clothes, etc.–Wild Strawberry followed Energy Drink to a heavily modified pickup truck. An arrow turret stuck out of the top and the cab was always raised on its wheels. Plus there were a few other modifications (read: a shit ton of modifications) that Wild Strawberry just didn’t really feel like listing and the author really didn’t feel like planning and writing them out.
Strapping herself into the shotgun seat, the teen watched as Energy Drink Cookie started the car and pressed a few buttons. “Hold on…tight,” he ordered, slamming his foot on the gas. The truck tore off, speeding down roads and swerving around obstacles. Wild Strawberry clutched onto her seatbelt, resisting the urge to squeeze hxs eyes shut. At some point, their brain began to blur everything out, the teen starting to disassociate; a common thing in this day and age. I mean, when you’re constantly fighting jellywalker and witnessing the horrors, your brain tends to start dissociating pretty quickly.
When Wild Strawberry came to, they were parked under a bridge. Energy Drink was in the back, rummaging around. “whrrr…We’ll be staying…in here. No home. pshhh…Easier that…way,” Energy Drink said, lifting a wrench. He had been reorganizing a toolbox, methodically placing each tool in their spots. “Get…khooooo…comfy.”
The teen nodded, pulling their legs up to their chest and letting their tail wrap around them. Zhe began to dig through the mess that was her storage, handing things to Energy Drink to store away. Extra rations, first aid kits–not all of them, she wasn’t suicidal–, and more were tossed unceremoniously into the back. Tugging out hxs smart pocket strawberry and a can of white peach redbull (author’s fav redbull flavor, it is superior to all) and pulled up YouTube. Jerry rigging a WiFi that still kept up even throughout the apocalypse allowed her to watch videos for entertainment, even though there were no more uploads. Zhe pulled up a video of an archeologist watching Ancient Aliens and playing a drinking game. Wild Strawberry also had pirated basically the entire internet, occasionally updating it with their knowledge. Not that it would be helpful to anyone but them. And maybe anyone she encountered.
Wild Strawberry occasionally watched the video and its part two whenever they didn’t have the motivation to drink or eat. It also allowed her to have their very valid archeology nerd crashouts. The sound of fabric shifting made itself known, before Energy Drink poked its head over her shoulder, watching the video as well. And occasionally piping in with his own thoughts.
Slowly, the hours passed one by one, slipping by unnoticed. The sun began to set, painting the sky in myriads of yellows and oranges and purples and blues. Wild Strawberry’s eyes were drooping, hands growing slack. It was honestly the first time since before the accident she had been able to slip into sleep this easily. And Energy Drink noticed. Because of course he did. This teen was emotionally compromised and it was obvious that their cracked lollipop was a comfort item. A weapon shouldn't be a comfort item. Plus it genuinely looked like Wild Strawberry was terrified of letting go, terrified of relaxing. Terrified of being vulnerable. Her head eventually lolled, eyecings closing.
Energy Drink pulled out a quilt, many crocheted granny squares stitched together lovingly. It was a chunky thing, but it had a feeling that the feeling and weight of the blanket would provide some much needed comfort. They tucked it around WIld Strawberry’s shoulders, easing the device out of zher hands. Thankfully, pix had rambled about how the different devices they had needed to be charged and how she was charging them–portable solar powered charging bricks–so he plugged in their phone and started the car. The truck purred to life, rumbling comfortably beneath the two. He carefully pulled out of the area they were parked in and set off down the road. Constantly staying on the move–with many canisters of gas in the back–made sure they were never at risk of being ambushed by jellywalkers. Normally they’d be tearing down the streets, but with the sleeping kid–who desperately looked like they needed it, her eyebags had eyebags for Witches’ sake–Energy Drink chose to take it easy this time. Pressing the button for heated seats, he made sure it wasn’t too warm, just enough to ease the pain that it knew would come from sleeping curled up like that. After all, this vehicle was their home.
The truck rumbled down the road, a comforting purr to its inhabitants.