Work Text:
Ramón opened his eyes, the ground feeling hard and the sounds of birds and cicadas fill his ears. He rubbed the back of his head when he sat up, seeing greenery flood his vision, nothing but a variety of trees and grass surrounding him with a thick fog around the forest he was in. He doesn't remember falling asleep in a forest... Why was he here? Did someone put him there? Where was everyone anyways? He remembers something about... Wanting to do something? Maybe? He doesn't know, he can't remember. He just knows that he wanted to do something and then someone told him no. Everything was a bit more confusing with all this fog, he couldn't get his mind right. He almost couldn't even remember his own name, but it's um... Well, his name is... Wait, what? Something wasn't right here. He needed to leave and possibly quickly. But where's the way out? He can barely see anything. It's like his memories are just getting picked from his brain until he's just nothing. He started walking in one direction, not knowing where it would lead him, ultimately finding more trees. He tried to look at his map but he soon found out there was no map, he didn't even have his inventory of weapons, armor, or snacks. There were no blocks to build up and whenever he tried to collect wood or dirt it just wouldn't budge and his hands would hurt.
Where was everything? Where was everyone? This is wrong, everything is wrong. Where are his parents? Where are his siblings, where is his home? He can't remember. He frantically runs through the forest in search for something, anything. He can't remember his name, he can't remember his parent's name, not even his siblings or his teacher or his pets. Who did this? Why is he here? Why is he all alone? He can see glimpses of red wings and flutes and masks and a party and pictures and a hand around his shoulder but something is very wrong. He's on the verge of crying, looking for someone, any... Wait, he remembers something. A name maybe, someone close to him. Dad, Dab, Dap, Bad. Wait, yes! Bad! That's one of his parents, right?
"Bad!" Ramón shouted, tears streaming down his cheeks, "Bad help!" He screamed. "I'm all alone, I..." He sniffled, "I don't know what to do," He put his head in his hands, shaking. He walked around the forest, not paying mind to his surroundings anymore, "Dad!" He choked out, wiping his tears away. He heaved in breaths, "Leo!!!" He wept, falling to his knees, "Chayanne help," He sobbed quietly. He just sat there, crying for anyone, anything to pop up and get him out of this hellscape. But then—
"Wahh!!!" Someone cried, and Ramón froze. He looked up, "Wah wah wah!!" A man mocked, sitting up on a tree, "Y'know that really gets annoying, right? You woke me up," He glared down at him and Ramón's nervousness started to show.
"Leave him alone, Trump," Someone else piped in nearby.
"He woke me up!" Trump pouted, jumping down the tree to the ground near the new guy, "And I told you to stay out of my space Tilín, I think a bit of privacy is due—"
"Kinda hard to do that when the forest not only repeats but I also have no sense of direction with the whole place being covered by fucking trees," Tilín argued.
Ramón was confused about what to do. Should he run? Should he hide? These were strangers but also not really? He knew them, or at least he's heard of them sometime before in his life. And then a woman shoves past the two who are arguing and scolds both of them. She catches sight of him and immediately his breath hitches. Her eyes soften, "Hey, are you okay?" She asks, stepping closer to him slowly. She's the first person to ask that.
"I... I don't know where I am I-I think I'm lost," He said, the rest of the older kids looking at each other.
"Oh god, I'm... I'm so sorry," She frowned with guilt like she was mourning something.
"Do you remember anything that happened before you got here?" Tilín asked. Ramón shook his head. "Oh no..." He sighed. walking up to him too. "Juana I'm pretty sure I know this kid," She stated.
"What's his name then? Do you remember his parents?" Juana questioned, Tilín nodding.
"His name I'm pretty sure was Raymond. No, that's not it... Oh! Right, his name is Ramón, I'm pretty sure, I remember my dad and his dads having an argument when we first left the daycare. Spreen and... Fit, If I'm not mistaken," They explained, Ramón surprised by her knowledge about him. But that did put a lot of things into place, he does remember his dads! Or at least one, but he probably got his dads wrong then.
"I don't know Spreen, my other dad is Bad, not him," Ramón corrected.
Juana and Tilín looked at each other. "Did they get divorced?" Juana asked.
"N-No, Bad and Fit are my dads,"
"O-Ok, maybe I got the memory wrong I just thought that Bad was a single father,"
"Maybe things just... Escalated? After we died?"
"What?" Ramón's eyes widened.
Juana covered her mouth immediately at her own words. Everyone was silent.
"What do you mean, died?" Ramón asked with more authority in his tone despite how little he was.
Trump sighed, getting closer than the others and putting a hand on his shoulder, "This place is an inescapable limbo of repeating corners and vast fields of tall grass. It makes people seemingly grow and remember everything they've experienced in their life. For me, it was 9 days of loneliness and absolutely nobody there to care for me. For these two? It ranged from 10 or 12 days close to mine, but they actually had parents that came over and looked over them despite them being either toxic or abusive! You, however, had two loving parents and lived in a world of sunshine and rainbows. Except you're still dead," Trump told him, cold-hearted. Ramón could tell that Juana and Tilín wanted to fire back at him but he could tell there was pain in their hearts as well.
This wasn't right. It couldn't be. He remembers now, he was celebrating his graduation with Leonarda and Dapper and Chayanne with the rest of the others. He'd just been having fun not even an hour ago. He couldn't be dead, he can't be dead, it didn't make sense it wasn't right, none of this was right, no no no no no no—
"What's happening to him!" Tilín shouted with panic in her voice.
Everything was on fire and alight in his body, things too bright, too loud, too much everything, it needed to stop he needed it all to stop. "It's happening again..." Trump said in disbelief, Juana staring in shock too. "Flippa, do something!" He urged her and upon hearing her own name, she blinked out of her trans and ran over to Ramón. She got on her knees in front of him, holding both his hands into hers.
"Hey, okay listen to me, it's okay Ramón, you're okay, relax," She told him, voice in a soft and low tone enough for it not to be too much for his ears at the moment. "I know you're feeling a lot and it may just be too much for you but It's gonna be okay... you're gonna be okay," She squeezed his hand, "You just have to breathe and smooth into the process, okay?" She instructed, and he did whatever would make it stop faster, "If you need to hold onto something for grounding then you ca—" He grabbed onto the front of her shirt immediately, Flippa hugging him. "You're gonna go back, okay? You're not dead, you're family is bringing you back and you'll be alive again," She told him.
"B-But what's gonna happen to you?! You'll still be here all alone and no one will know what happened to you!" He cries, JuanaFlippa smiling sadly at him.
"But you'll remember, I feel like that's enough for me. We're doing okay here, even if there's nothing out there for us you've still got so much potential Ramón, you're still a kid,"
"But you were too, you still are,"
"And I've had a lot of retries," She huffs, "Maybe life wasn't it for me,"
"I've barely known any of you, how will I know this was real," Ramón asked, tears in his eyes. Flippa backed up, still holding onto him.
"I'll show you, but I need to ask a favor of you,"
"Anything,"
"Tell everyone that we said... 'Hi', and look after our siblings for me, okay? But don't overexert yourself, you're still the youngest," She said, Ramón nodding in agreement. "I'll miss you, okay, little brother? Don't miss this second chance of life you've been given," She hugs him, shoulders shaking, "I love you, so much," She sniffles, Bobby shaking with her. And he was gonna say it back, he would've said it back but, everything was starting to blank and Flippa pulled away and tilted his forehead down to give him a kiss, and then he burst into a cascade of white orchid petals, the trees' green leaves turning to orchid petals.
— —
Ramón blinked his eyes open, vision a blur as he sat up, in a daze. "Flippa? T... Tilín? Trump?" He looked around the cabin room, hearing people in another room shuffling before the door swung open, making him jump. There stood two kids much taller than him, one with a red cap on, and the other behind him, a black hat on his head. Ramón rubbed his forehead, still feeling the contact JuanaFlippa left, and smiled at them, "Hey," His voiced croaked and they both immediately sped towards him and pummeled him into a hug. "Hey, I'm oka—"
"Don't do that to us ever again!" Leonarda sobbed, Both of them shaking and Ramón sat surprised at their affection. He looked at the open door where Foolish and Bad stood, tears starting to then form in his eyes.
"Dad..?" He said, and Bad came over to hug him as well, Foolish on the other side looking relieved.
He'd make sure to protect this, he swears.