Work Text:
Zooble was sitting in their bedroom, sifting through their box of pieces for what felt like the thousandth time. Continuing to work towards their goal of feeling like themselves, whatever that is supposed to mean to them at this point, is still very much up in the air.
While turning over another polka dotted horn they noticed something that seemed out of place in the box, and no the irony of that thought isn't lost on Zooble, they just shrug and reach towards the non plastic object.
Upon further inspection it seemed to be a notebook of sorts, or more specifically a sketchbook.
Zooble was quick to narrow down who the owner of it was, because obviously the only person that even owned one of these things would be none other than their friend Gangle.
Not wishing to breach into Gangle's privacy, the living tinker toy quickly decided to return the book to its rightful owner.
That was going to be the case at least, until Zooble noticed something was signed onto the cover in black sharpie.
NSFW
Private
That means You Jax
Zooble really didn't want to pry into their friends' privacy, especially after the cover specifically told them not to.
Not to mention what was such a thing doing in their bedroom in the first place. Their best guess is that Jax probably had something to do with that.
Upon further thought, that idea was so likely that Zooble straight up couldn’t think of a single other satisfying explanation for how this could have ended up in here of all places.\
Well regardless of how said object appeared in their room, the fact of the matter is that it is currently in their possession, and now they have to decide what they want to do with it.
After grappling with their own curiosity, Zooble was just about to put the book down and tell Gangle they found it.
But curiosity won out over caution, and they figured that Gangle would only find out if Zooble decided to tell her.
Also Gangle might already have assumed they would have done so at that point anyway, so with that backwards logic fuelling their intrusive thoughts Zooble tentatively opened the book to the first page.
The page had a cute anime girl blushing and wearing a maid outfit. Zooble chuckled to themselves, already being partially aware of Gangle's cliche preferences, having seen quite a few of their friends' other drawings, you tend to notice a few patterns start to emerge over time.
They flipped over to the next page, which immediately earned a laugh from the mess of shapes. This one just had Jax tied to a railroad track, as if he were in an old cartoon and had gotten kidnapped by the villain.
“Serves him right,” Zooble joked to themselves.
Why such a drawing was included in this notebook was beyond them, maybe it was so Jax would get annoyed and stop snooping, given the fact that Gangle singled him out specifically when writing the warning on the cover.
Also maybe she just wouldn't have drawn such a thing while in the common areas, which would leave this book, or any other private book for that matter, to be the perfect place to put it.
On the next page was…
What the #$@%. RAGATHA.
Not only was it an artistic rendition of their cheerful dolly friend, she was wearing, well, far less clothing than normal.
She had drawn a rather curvaceous version of Ragatha wearing a two piece bikini. And Zooble could only assume those were not the dolls actual proportions, but they weren't able to see otherwise so it was anyone's guess they suppose.
Zooble, now blushing, nearly decided to just return the #$%@ thing already, but they were now in too deep, and honestly insanely curious about what could possibly be next.
Three more pages.
Three more pages and they were done peeping, Zooble promised themselves.
The next page was another anime girl in a frilly outfit. Zooble decidedly didn't care to linger on this one. Not because they didn't appreciate the ribbons artstyle, because they certainly did. Zooble loved supporting their friends' creative endeavors.
But simply because it wasn't as unexpected or surprising as the former piece that had starred Ragatha.
The next page featured Pomni, Zooble would've been more surprised by that had the precedent hadn't already been set with the previous drawings.
Pomni was also drawn in an extremely exaggerated way, having a bigger bust, bigger curves, and far rounder hips.
Zooble should've been more shocked about their friends' perverted fantasies, but couldn’t exactly chastise the girl that harshly due to the fact that these weren't meant for anyone else's eyes. If anything, Zooble was the far more creepy one here, going through their friends' personal belongings.
Zooble sighed, but regardless they still promised themselves one more freebie, so despite the growing guilt at looking at such a personal catalog of sketches, flipped the page one last time.
As soon as their gaze landed upon the next page, Zooble dropped the book onto the floor.
They were blushing furiously now, they could practically feel the heat radiating off of their face.
Very slowly, the hodgepodge of shapes bent down to pick the book back up.
And now allowed themselves to look at the piece far more thoroughly. It was an anime stylized depiction of them kissing Gangle, kissing how you may ask, well Gangle took the artistic liberty of giving them human bodies with features that referenced their digital forms.
Namely, she depicted me having a prosthetic leg and arm, and herself having a red ribbon like dress.
At the very least Zooble’s body was drawn in a far more realistic way, well at least normal for Gangle’s standards.
Actually the entire piece was clearly intended to be far more romantic than sexual. If the loads of hearts that floated around them weren't a dead giveaway already.
They drew their claw over the page, truly taking in just how carefully constructed this piece was when compared to the rest of the other ones in the book.
There was an incessant yearning that was palpable on the page, and that confused the cobbled together being to no end.
Yeah I treated her well enough, well that was a bit of an understatement, I was clearly the person in the circus who went out of there way to show Gangle the most genuine appreciation, and Zooble would be lying if they said that they didn’t very much enjoy the puppets company.
But this, they gestured to the page that was currently plaguing their mind, this was clearly overstepping a boundary of sorts.
Right???
Zooble placed the notebook back down on their desk with a frustrated groan.
“Gangle w-why, why are you…,” they let out a big sigh.
“Why would she have drawn this, this is…”
“This is clearly an, a… ugggh.”
“Why are you like this, it would be so much easier for both of us if…”
“If what? W-Who are you t-talking to Zooble,” they nearly fell over with how quickly their body tore around to identify their sudden intruder.
“G-Gangle, what are you doing in here,” Zooble let their current frustration at the situation show in their voice.
The harshness in their tone made the girl shy away slightly, “W-well I was looking for my…” Gangle looked over at the desk and identified the item they were currently on the hunt for.
She limply gestured towards the desk with a ribbon, “W-well that,” her expression dropped, which was quite the feat considering the fact that ever since their ‘adventure’ at Spudsys, she basically refused to wear her comedy mask anymore, being seemingly more than content with her sad mask.
“Looks like you found it,” Gangle continued mirthlessly, “Yaaaay,” she cheered in the most drained, sarcastic way they thought physically possible.
The mask now decides to stand awkwardly in their doorway, her eyes flicking constantly between looking at the floor and at the tinker toy.
Zooble was very torn between asking their friend if she was doing alright, and asking a more biting question, their curiosity won out, “H-How much did you hear?”
“How much did you see?” the doll sadly asked back.
Touche.
Zooble took a deep breath, understanding that they weren’t going to get an answer to their own question without first answering Gangle’s, “I, I only looked at the first couple of pages,” They answered without struggle.
“Oh,” Gangle looked away for a moment, before looking back at them, “Did you see, ummm, well you know…” she trailed off without really saying anything.
Despite that Zooble understood precisely what she was referring to, they sighed again, deciding that if they wanted to retain this relationship they currently had with her, she would have to be honest.
They didn’t like being dishonest with her, at least not in ways that were actually important to them.
“Y-Yeah, well, I think I did at least,” they chose not to elaborate any further for the time being.
Everything was impossibly still for what felt like the next few minutes. Or at least they assumed as much, time was weird in the circus.
Then Zooble saw a drop of water hit the ground.
Then another, and another, they then heard a muffled sniffling noise coming from the doorframe.
Zooble finally lifted their gaze to meet that of the mask’s, and what they saw was heartbreaking.
“Y-You, you weren’t s-supposed to,” another sniffle, “N-No one, was, was supposed to s-see t-that,” was all Gangle could utter before collapsing on her knees.
Only hesitating for a moment, Zooble soon found themselves hunched on their knees in front of the bawling woman.
They weren’t that experienced with comforting anyone, that kind of thing only becoming a more recent thing for them.
But god damn it, now was not the time to doddle around doing nothing, they had to do something for their friend.
“Hey Gangle,” they decided not to offer any sort of physical comfort, at least not yet, “I know that this must be, well, a lot for you right now, and I…” they were cut off.
“I RUIN EVERYTHING,” she yelled, “I ALWAYS RUIN EVERYTHING,” she screamed while smacking her ribbons across her porcelain face.
Zooble knew that she wasn’t able to harm herself, well at least using her own ribbons. But that wasn’t the point, the point was she shouldn’t be attempting to hurt herself at all.
They grabbed her arms in their hands, holding onto them gently, “HEY, hey, none of that.”
That finally got the mask to look at them, “Why, why are you…”
“Because I care about you %$!?@$$, and I don’t like seeing you like this,” they gently massaged the back of Gangle’s ‘hands’ with their own.
“And because I care about you, I will not let you attempt to harm yourself on my watch,” they squeezed onto her hands in another attempt to ground her.
Gangle looked extremely torn, “S-Shouldn’t you hate me,” she struggled out, “I clearly made you uncomfortable with my drawing, If I were you…”
“But you're not Me, and you never will be,” she rose their hands still holding hers just under eye level, “And I am, well more than anything I’m just a bit confused to be honest,” they paused for a moment, “Confused, and surprised, and more than a little conflicted right now, but none of what I feel right now I’d describe as angry,” they closed their eyes, “Never angry, not at you Gangle.”
Gangle looked taken aback, “R-Really?” the mask muttered.
Zooble nodded, “Really.”
After kneeling next to each other for a little while longer, they slowly decided to get up, Zooble walked over and closed the door, which had just so happened to be open during that entire exchange.
Before closing it the mismatch peered out of it, ensuring that no one had overheard their conversation just now. Having found no one lurking about, they shut the door.
Zooble turned back to face the still tense looking woman, “Buuuut,” they started cautiously, causing the mask to crane her neck back in anticipation, clearly expecting to be chastised.
Zooble needed to handle this as delicately as possible, they decided.
“But, we still have to talk about what this is all about, alright,” they offered evenly, “I’m not here to judge you, or criticize you, I just want to try and understand where this is coming from exactly is all,” they averted their gaze for a brief moment before their eyes met Gangles yet again.
“Does that sound okay with you Gangle?” Zooble was far too curious to let any of this go, yet knew they had to navigate it as precisely as possible.
The mask’s eyes flicked about the room, as if searching for any sort of sign of deception or dishonesty.
Having found none, she nods, “Alright, I guess that’s fine with me,” Zooble noticed she was still standing around rather uncomfortably.
Zooble chuckled to themselves, “Come on, sit with me for a bit,” they sat down onto their bed, patting the mattress right next to them.
She slowly took the spot next to the amalgam, she ensured that there was a bit of distance between the two of them, not wishing to make this situation any more awkward than it needed to be.
“So about that picture of us,” Zooble started, “Care to explain?”
Gangle fiddled with her ribbons nervously, “W-what is there to explain, isn’t it obvious?” she cast her gaze back down, focusing on wringing her ribbons together.
Zooble answered, “Well maybe, but I don’t really want to assume anything, so,” they paused, “Care to try?”
Gangle took another deep breath, in and out.
In and out.
“Well I guess I just feel really lonely is all, and you’ve been very kind and patient with me, so yeah,” that seemed to be as much as she was willing to give for now.
And Zooble was okay with that, slow and steady and all that.
“Gangle if you're ever feeling alone in this place, I’d be…” they let their arm drift towards the shy woman, before thinking better of it, “You can always just come to me you know, I wouldn’t mind.”
Gangle chuckled slightly, “Well, honestly you've made that much clear before, but I wasn’t sure if I could… Well not weird you out or anything, especially considering my…” she chose not to say it, not yet, “I just didn’t want to freak you out or anything,” she decided to say instead.
Zooble shook their head, “Freak me out with what exactly, because it’ll take a lot more than a bit of pervy fanart to get rid of me,” they chuckled, attempting to lighten the mood a bit.
Gangle immediately blushed at that, “EEEEP,” the poor girl yelped.
Zooble scoot a bit closer to her on the bed, deciding to tease her a bit more, “Yeah, especially with those sultry pics you got of Pomni and Ragatha in there,” Gangle was about to start freaking out again before she saw the soft look in the tinker toys eyes.
She began to giggle, albeit a bit nervously, “W-well about that, you s-see,” Zooble nudged her with their elbow, “I’m just messing with you Gangle, I’m just glad you spared me from having such an exaggerated design.”
Gangle blushed even deeper, “W-well about that, I… that isn’t exactly true, you’d have known that if you were to look in the book for a bit longer,” Gangle admitted bashfully.
Zooble blinked a couple of times, their eyes readjusting to this new information, “Nevermind then,” they grumbled.
“Oh sorry, I didn’t mean to, I was only trying to be honest with…” Gangle apologized, desperately trying to come up with a satisfying explanation.
“Hey, enough with the sorry’s alright, you don’t have anything to apologize for,” Zooble scratched at their cheek, or where their cheek would be at the very least.
Gangle perked up a bit at that, “Well in that case would you like to see…”
Zooble interrupted her, “NO, ABSOLUTELY NOT,” Gangle flinched back a bit at that. Zooble course corrected, “Well, not yet at least,” they put that topic on the backburner, “Not until we can sort out whatever this is,” Zooble gestured between the two of them.
Gangle looked at them, before nodding in understanding.
Zooble decided to just rip the bandaid off at this point, “So, I guess you like me or something,” they said while laying down, folding their arms around their head.
Zooble gazed up at her expectantly, giving Gangle another chance to explain herself.
Gangle rubbed her ribbon arm, “Yes, I mean yeah,” she admitted, yet seemingly wasn’t ready to delve too much into the meat of it.
Zooble rolled their hand in a ‘go on’ motion.
“Y-You don’t seem to be very surprised by any of this,” Gangle spoke, not quite getting how Zooble could be so calm about such a thing.
Zooble shrugged, “Oh believe me, I was, but the initial shock of it had already worn off I guess,” they laid a claw against their chest.
The ball was back in Gangle’s proverbial court now, Zooble not offering much wiggle room for that to not be the case.
Gangle still couldn't believe that it was this easy, “That was fast.”
“Yup,” was all Zooble offered this time.
Gangle poked her ribbons together in front of her face, “W-well now what?” the mask looked off to the side once again.
Zooble just folded one of their legs over the other, looking more and more comfortable by the second, “Well, that’s up to you I suppose. Is there anything else that you want to ask me?”
Gangle was nearly shocked at how aloof Zooble was being about this whole situation. The tinker toy was often the most calm and collected of the group, but this just didn’t seem like a natural response to something so deep and personal to Gangle.
But Zooble already offered her the floor, so Gangle supposed she should just ask them about some things she was dying to know.
“I guess, would you mind telling me about what kind of people you like,” Zooble raised a brow at that, “Your sexuality I mean, do you even like girls in the first place?” Gangle was hoping that being that direct wasn’t a mistake.
And it seemingly wasn’t, “I guess I don’t have any particular preference, Pansexual I think…” Zooble hung on that for a few seconds, before nodding, “Yeah, that sounds about right.”
The mismatch spoke as if never having given it much thought before.
That only further proved to perplex Gangle. But she quickly shook it off before moving onto her next question, “And is there, would there be anyone in the circus that you're interested in,” Gangle ventured further, she was in this deep now, so she might as well just take the plunge into the deep end.
Zooble thought on that for a moment, “Not really, or that goes for the rest of them at least,” they then searched Gangle up and down, “And as for you, and I assume that this is what you really wanted to know when asking this question,” they mulled that over for a second before shrugging, “I wouldn’t mind giving it a shot, never thought much about romance in this place considering,” they gestured to everything around them.
“But yeah, you're pretty cool so sure,” they slumped back down into their original relaxed position.
Gangle stared at Zooble, not quite believing what she had been told yet. She blinked multiple times in pure disbelief, before she could slowly but surely start accepting that that is in fact what they had just told her.
Gangle could not even attempt to hide the smile she was currently sporting, and decided just to go for it, “So does that mean that you wouldn’t mind going out with me,” Gangle finally asked the question that she’d been thinking ever since they had given her that pep talk after their fast food evaluations.
Zooble finally crawled up from their slouching position to look Gangle right in her eyes, “Yeah, I think I’d like that.”
Gangle swept them into a shockingly tight embrace, shocking considering she’s just a walking mesh of ribbons, “YES, YES, YES, I…” she caught herself, “Yes I, yeah,” her sentence drifted off dreamily.
Zooble chuckled at that, patting her on the back, “Been waiting a while to ask that or something?” Zooble teased.
The mask chuckled, “You have no idea,” she was still smiling like a smitten school girl.
Gangle suddenly withdrew her hands, “D-Does that mean I can, can I?” Zooble knew where she was going with this, “Yeah, you can say it.”
“I HAVE A PARTNER NOW,” she giggles to herself again, “That felt so so good to finally say, like you have no idea how long I’ve been wanting to be able to utter those words.”
“Yeah no $#@%,” they both laughed in the other's embrace for a bit before Zooble had something to add, “And I suppose I have a girlfriend now.”
Gangle squeaks at hearing those words out loud, being absolutely unprepared for how they would affect her.
“You're really happy to hear that aren't you?” Gangle just nodded into their chest, her mask having taken on a cat-like expression.
They laid like that for a while longer, being truly comfortable in that moment.
But Gangle just needed one more thing before she could call this moment perfect.
She placed her ribbon on her partner’s cheek, rubbing at it softly.
She slowly drew them in and…
CLINK
Gangle had kissed them on their… face, Zooble didn’t have lips but she would make do alright, don’t ruin this for her, she’d been waiting for this moment her entire life.
Zooble raised a hand to the back of her mask to deepen the ‘kiss’.
They slowly pulled apart from each other to gaze into each other's eyes lovingly. They laughed together at not only their giddiness over the kiss, but also at how absurd this place really is, not really giving them the equipment to share a proper kiss, but this’ll have to do for now.
Now Gangle can curl into her partner’s side, utterly satisfied.
They laid like that for a while longer before hearing a knock at the door, before either could answer it that stupid purple rabbit with his damn stupid smirk popped into the room.
SNAP
Jax pulled the newly printed photograph from the camera, shaking it to more quickly dry the ink.
Zooble immediately surged up from the bed, “JAX GET BACK HERE WITH THAT YOU @#$%?&.”
They bolted out of the room, Gangle just giggled to herself before trailing behind to catch up with them.
Gangle knew that this circus was a truly horrifying place, but now with having someone to help her tackle the horrors head on, couldn’t help but think that things were going to be different from here on out.
As long as her and Zooble were together, they’d be alright.
She hopes.