I'll Be Your Auntie

Theo was blissfully, embarrassingly unaware of Mercury's presence as he went along on his rather distant journey.

Since disembarking from the train ride jokes and singing, the man had farted and giggled about it no less than twice, went digging for gold in his nose, and had several spirited conversations with himself complete with voice acting for the different parts. You know, just Theo things, especially when he thought he was alone.

In fact, he was even more manic when running solo because of the lack of distractions. The small periods of silence that crept in revealed a much more somber, damaged man who, upon arriving at the mysterious canyon, just sat on a rock at its mouth and stared at the dirt until he could psyche himself up to continue on. Theo Silversong was gaslighting himself into being/seeming okay. Just as he incessantly tried to keep his friends happy and laughing, he also attempted to do it to himself. If he didn't, he'd simply go back to the guild and crawl back into his sweaty cocoon of blankets for days, so he rose, put on a smile, and bebopped his way into the weird crack in the earth.

Today's excursion, as he monologued so well in a boisterous narrator's voice, was to get back into the swing of treasure hunting by finding an artifact. "With rumors fresh in his mind, the flashy and handsome treasure hunter of legend uses his expert senses to sniff out the shinies and valuables. A magical artifact of untold power rest somewhere in the dangerous tunnels! What challenges will these rocky walls hold for him? Find out next time, on Silversong Saga!" What was the artifact? No idea, he'd just heard some chatter when he started skulking around in his old circles again for intel. Should he have looked more into it? Of course, but that wasn't his style. He also kept forgetting his body and magic weren't what he was used to. While he was truly gifted at finding what he wanted with very little information, he was also woefully unprepared for the danger. But hey, he always made it out! It was just chaos for a while. No pain, no gain!

"OooOOoOooo~ I'm gonna find treeeeeasure that'll make the draAaaAaaagons jealous~" he sang, wiggling his butt back and forth to some music only he could hear and proceeded to use the same movement as he wriggled himself through a tight crack in the rock wall he felt particularly good about. It was squeezes like these that made the slick tracksuits he loved shine. Fashion and function! "WeeeEEeEEeee don't want no easy tunnel openiiiings because my cooompetition, wHo aRe pOo pOo, has already piiiiilfered theeeemmm~~ hnngh, rrrgh aaaAAaaand the harder ughnph plaaaaces are for eeeeexperts...like MOI~  ACK-"

He popped through the tightest part at the end with some effort and then fell on his face... into a spider web. "IIIIEEEEEEEEEE!!!!" he screeched, thrashing wildly as if being actively face-molested by spirits. Theo did eventually free himself, but he was left panting wildly and extremely freaked out. A hand gripped his chest as he attempted to calm down. "Oh no..." he warbled sadly, moving to rub his sticky web hands on the rock wall. "Spiders... why did it have to be spiders...?"

For a long moment, he stood there, debating whether to turn back. "I should try another tunnel... but what if they're all like this? No, I have a really good feeling about this one... but... the spiders... aw, man... but what if this is the artifact I need?"

The debate went silent and he stared into space. Then suddenly, as if reanimating, his flared nostrils sucked in a breath and he charged deeper into the tunnel. A very slow charge, because there were so many webs.

"They're touching meee-heee-heeee...!!"

[wc: 637 || total: 1137]

By the time she spoke, he was already covered head to toe in spiderwebs to the point that he was starting to look like some sort of crying mummy in a tomb, but that didn't keep his whining self from losing his absolute crap right there in a spider-infested tunnel.

"AAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEE!!!!!"

Well, if anything had missed all the noise he'd been making already, they were definitely aware of the treasure-hunting interloper now! Perhaps if he hadn't been screaming and convulsing into the wall, he'd had heard the distant chattering of insect legs.

"SCARING THE GUY WITH THE BAD HEART?!" he screeched, the intensity of his fear causing loose lips syndrome. So much for that secret, but he wasn't even aware that he'd spilled it yet as he coughed and sputtered like an old man with a bum ticker. "CRUEL! I-I HOPE YOUR SOCKS ARE ALWAYS MOIST FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!" He stared between whoever the heck had snuck up on him and the pole, the cogs in his brain slowly ticking away. A rival hunter? A thief? Something worse... both?

"Oh, it's you, Mercury!" Theo suddenly grinned, his whole attitude abruptly swinging to the other end of the spectrum once he recognized her. Nearly scaring him back into the hospital was forgiven and forgotten in an instant. He took the pole from her with interest, as if it was some genius idea to clear the webs to prevent getting caught in them, though it did little for the ones coating his front. Now that he thought about it, he totally could have used the knife he packed! But this was longer and better though late.

"She didn't send you?" he asked, both hopeful and sheepish. The silly jello man huffed a relieved sigh, switching from rubbing his chest to the back of his head. "No, I didn't tell her. She was busy and I... uh... didn't want her to know. Y'know, so she wouldn't feel like she had to come with me."

It was a half-truth. The only reason he didn't want her to come with him was that he was keeping the severity of his issues as secret as possible. Theo didn't want anyone to worry, especially not Aspen (she had enough to worry about). She knew he'd been in the hospital and that it was something to do with his heart, but other than being notably weaker than before, Theo was doing a decent job at masking how dire his situation was. The days when Big D was a full power were easy, but it fluctuated often enough and without warning that he knew two things; he was a potential burden to everyone and eventually the demonic magic keeping him alive would fail altogether. He was dying. Again.

Theo Silversong needed a magical miracle.

"Soooo...." the shiny enthusiast started, a little confused and awkward. If Aspen didn't send her, why was his aunt-who-didn't-know-she-was-his-aunt here? While his brain was a little damaged and very derpy, sometimes it connected dots presented in surprising but plausible ways. At least for the moment, Theo was starting to wonder if she was here to hit on him. Alone in a tight cave together? What other reason could it be? This was the worst reason!

"Did someone else send you to... help me, then?"

[wc: 552 || total: 2135]

"Awwww... how sweeeeet!" Theo cooed, rubbing his own cheeks and wiggling around. She came just because she was concerned? How nice of her! "You're so nice Au-- Mercury! But I'm fine, I promise-"

The warm and fuzzy moment was ruined by what plagued every nook and cranny of this strange planet called Earthland. Monsters. In this case, some of the worst ones. "Spiders?! Already?!?!" Theo barked, genuinely shocked as if his unfettered screams hadn't been what lured them.

If Mercury had expected him to be helpful with those spiders, she would be super surprised. He was utterly horrified by her announcement of their arrival, even more horrified when they drew near, and super grossed out as they exploded into squidgy goo. Out of the ten, he had encased one in jello and batted it deeper into the tunnel with the pole she'd given him.

"Yeesh..." he grimaced once the fighting was done, poking an arachnid carcass with the staff and yelping when it rocked a little due to its roundness. Part of this was due to his overwhelming Theoness, but the other was a bit of a show to hopefully distract her from his labored breathing and underwhelming display of strength. The Theo she'd known-- the one who was quirky and accident-prone but always knew when to get serious to save himself and others-- appeared to be gone. The power level she'd sensed from him prior to his disappearance had waned to half of what it was, if not even less. He'd fallen far in the aftermath of his lengthy hospitalization.

It didn't work.

Ah, rats. Caught by her expert detective skills! As if he hadn't just blurted it out earlier.

"I-" he started, the first impulse being to lie. "Haha! It's no big deal!" But he was bad at it... and it made him feel bad. He chewed on his words. "Er, that's not... It wasn't... I didn't..."

Theo heaved a big sigh. He was really going to have to bribe her after this, wasn't he?

"Okay, yeah... kinda..." he finally fessed up, seeming none-too-happy about it. He forced a sheepish smile, then heaved another heavy sigh. "Sometimes the magic putters out for some reason and there's... well, there's nothing to keep pumping my blood."

Conveniently, he left out exactly what kind of magic was at work holding his battered body together. Not only because he was still ashamed, but because speaking of Big D seemed to sorta... summon him. A 'speak of the devil and he'll appear' kind of deal. And Big D was a Big Jerk.

Since the cat was out of the bag, he slowly slid down the tunnel wall to sit on the sticky floor for a rest. Theo got tired so quickly in this condition. Dropping some of the mask, the man truly looked weary. It was like a glass being held together by duct tape personified. "Please don't tell her," he begged, very serious and quiet. He meant Aspen, though it applied to Leona as well. Really, it applied to everyone. If he disappeared one day, he wanted them to assume he was fine and living the exciting life of a treasure hunter, not laying dead in a ravine somewhere.

[wc: 537 || twc: 3229]

"I know, but she's got enough to worry about..." the treasure hunter sighed. Merc's words were true enough. Theo telling Aspen that he was freshly released from the hospital and leaving it at that was a band-aid sticking to ointment. It was just another reason why he was in a rush to find something, anything that would work. Even if it was temporary, it'd give him some more time to find the real solution.

Before he could tell her his plan, she lightened the mood with a tease. Number one, that was his job. Number two, now he was uncomfortable. Not just because he didn't like parting with money or valuables he accumulated, but as always, he got mega weirded out by her even mentioning sexual things. Theo cringed and offered the same awkward laugh he always did. "U-Uhm, I'm sure I can find a treasure to give you.. heh heh..." he mumbled, rubbing the back of his head and looking away. This was never gonna get easier, was it? If only he could tell her how icky it was when his aunt, who obviously had no idea she was his aunt, hit on him.

Moving along quickly, he revealed his grand plan. What little there was of it. Theo wasn't really the planner kind of guy...

"So, here's my plan!" Theo embellished, twinkling his fingers and getting a bit of life back into him. He always had a flare for the dramatic. "I need to find the lacrima I buried in Desierto a long time ago to see if it'll help. The problem is... I don't remember where I buried it because Desierto has changed a lot and also it might have been dug up and moved or lost. Also, I need Krystal Jr., which I can't find," he ticked off in his narrator's voice, the tip of one finger tapping on each of the fingers on his other hand as he recited his 'plan'. Krystal Jr. was his flying ship, by the way. "Until I can get it together and travel there, I need something in the meantime. I asked Bobert at the guild if we had or knew of anything that helped bodily functions, but he said there were no records other than a magic toilet brush that enchanted you with regular poops for life, which is super nice but not helpful right now, and several standard but unproven tales of doodads that give immortality that people have died trying to find for ages," he continued, getting a little winded from talking so fast. Who knew if 'Bobert' was really that guy's name. "SOOooo... I went back through my old connections, sniffing for rumors, maps, whatever of artifacts waiting to be found like the legendary treasure hunter I am. One such rumor led me here, so something deep in this tunnel has mysterious powers that might help!"

He turned to Mercury, huffing but grinning. "This might be it!" he chirped, but the optimism didn't reach his pale blue, desperate eyes. At one point, Theo had been this chronic, unshakable optimist to the point that it sometimes blinded him to the truth, but that wasn't the case anymore. He wanted to believe it, but very much didn't. Depression, especially the kind hidden behind a comedic mask, was a horrible thing. It was a very deep and dark hole he was in now, to the point that most days he felt all of this wasn't even worth doing.

"Will you... help me get it?" the inky-haired man asked next, slowly getting back to his feet and futilely dusting off his clothes. He didn't ask for help often, only usually when he was being chased by something that could kill him and he panicked. But really, wasn't that always the case now? It wasn't the sudden appearance of a giant sand worm trying to eat him, but death had been chasing him for over a year now.

Theo sheepishly grinned. "I promise I'll be more help if there are more spiders..."

[wc: 671 || total: 3881]