#my brain is pickles and I am Nathan explosion

[xsister-serpent]

Brain: Lets make a vampire Kylo story

Me: No WIP needs some love

Brain: *SLAMS TABLE* NO VAMPIRE KYLO NOW!!

[skrunksthatwunk]

skwisgaar punished arc

[official-darkforest]

brutal

[polyklok]

Movies I think Dethklok members would really like

No this is not based on anything I’m just in a mood™ rn

Nathan Explosion

Mad God

So, no, I did not have any ounce of an idea of what this movie was about when I originally watched it, and I’m still not 100% sure tbh but an hour and a half of these pure vibes would totally be up Nathan’s alley. The post-apocalyptic setting, all the gore, the details of the various monsters, and I think he would just really appreciate it from an artist’s standpoint as well. This movie would just resonate with him, even if he wouldn’t have a fucking clue what was going on the whole time.

Mary and Max

I’m, personally, a bit on-the-fence about this movie, but it is undeniably sweet and I headcanon Nate to be on the spectrum so 🤷

This would be, like, his guilty pleasure film. The movie he knows is for kids and is totally not brutal but he loves it anyway. The, “I do not feel disabled, defective, or a need to be cured” really hits for him every single time. He rewatches it at least once every few months, especially when he’s in some sort of emotional slump.

Mandy

Another one that just like, like, big Nathan energy, you know? He just seems like a guy to really love loose plots with trippy visuals and strong emotions attached to them. Also, this movie is so completely badass, it is certified metal in his book. He also finds the story incredibly tragic; having the love of your life stripped away from you in such circumstances really tugs at his heartstrings, but in a way that gets him pumped up rather than sad. This is probably his go-to when people ask, “what’s your favorite movie?”

Pickles the Drummer

Son in Law

Okay this is my guilty pleasure movie. I usually don’t like stoner-comedy from the 90s, but this movie hits different. Maybe I just find Crawl hot. Anyway, I’m projecting that onto Pickles. He honestly probably finds a lot of crappy comedies to be peak film, and this is no exception. Pauly Shore pretending to be a country boy for a whole movie? Hells yeah. Pickles would watch while high off his mind, laughing his butt off and going to town on some cheez-its or something. And you know what? He deserves it.

Opal

I’m counting short films because I feel like Opal is the movie for Pickles. He’d watch it on a whim, because these are not usually the types of things he enjoys, and then he’d in tears over the emotional rollercoaster he did not agree to go on. Like, he grew up in a neglective household with authority figures that were overly-selfish and projected their own problems onto the youngest one in the house, to which he had to hide within his own brain more often than not just to properly function. And then he just…watched it happen all again in the hypnotic style of Jack Stauber. The Mom’s song had him in gasping tears for a while, the way you get when a movie somehow perfectly captures your own trauma right in front of you. And the ending??? Ugh. Go watch Opal, guys, it’s on YouTube.

Nathan and Pickles both get very emotional about certain stop-motion films, isn’t that crazy?

House

Thank you to Lucy for this Letterbox review that I think he would write

Anyway-

This movie is actually so insane. It’s not scary in a horror-movie way, like it meant to be, it’s scary as in ‘What the hell is happening and why do I understand it?’ Pickles doesn’t like most traditional horror films, as the long, quiet suspense bores him and the sudden jumpscares freak him the hell out way more than they should. But he loves the campy-wacko-type horror that they were apparently making in 70s Japan. It’s just scary enough to get his heart pumping, but the pure silliness of it all overrides that, getting him in a giddy mood and excited to see what happens next.

(No I am not done but tumblr won’t let me add more pictures)

[mtltranscripts]

Season 1: Episode 1-The Curse of Dethklok

Summary: The band is sponsored by coffee and also accidentally maim their chef.

Characters: Dethklok, Jean Pierre,

Special Thanks: @offdensmith​ for helping out! <3

Pastebin  

JEAN PIERRE: I am a gear in the hands of the clock. I fear not my mortality.

NATHAN: Approach us. 

JEAN PIERRE: Everything to your liking, my lords?

PICKLES: Are you aware of the fate of our last restaurant helicopter chef?

JEAN PIERRE: His face was-

MURDERFACE: His face was smashed!

JEAN PIERRE: Yes, I know.

TOKI: He slipped his hand and face on the slohovercroft.

SKWISGAAR: Holbercraft...

TOKI: Hov…

SKWISGAAR: Homo...

PICKLES: Hovercraft.

TOKI: Hold me...

SKWISGAAR: [unintelligible attempt at saying hovercraft]

TOKI: [unintelligible attempt at saying hovercraft]

PICKLES: Hovercraft.

SKWISGAAR: [unintelligible attempt at saying hovercraft]

TOKI: [unintelligible attempt at saying hovercraft]

PICKLES: Hovercraft. They’re trying to tell you that a guy got his face smashed in with a hovercraft. That’s what they’re trying to tell you.

JEAN PIERRE: Yes, I know.

TOKI: And then, from the sorrow...fatoo! He blow he brain in.

SKWISGAAR: He blow he brain out.

TOKI: Whatever.

SKWISGAAR: Out.

TOKI: It make a great album cover.

SKWISGAAR: Yeah that-yeah all of our chefs they has died a horrible death. What of that’s do you think?

JEAN PIERRE: I would rather have my brains scooped out with a melon baller, than to miss the opportunity to deliver the various cheese snacks to my beloved Dethklok.

PILOT: Sorry, my lords, we’re chewing through a few thousand doves up here! Don’t worry, these rotors will grind them into paste in no time!

JEAN PIERRE: From the prime minister of Norway. There are several cases. The finest wine-

NATHAN: No! We never drink before a show! Never!

MURDERFACE: Well, I’ll just have a little drink!

TOKI: Me too!

SKWISGAAR: Me too!

PICKLES: Me too!

NATHAN: Me too.

 ♪ Do anything for Dethklok ♪

 ♪ Do anything for Dethklok ♪

 ♪ Do anything for Dethklok ♪

 ♪ Do anything for Dethklok ♪

 ♪ Do anything for Dethklok ♪

♪ Dethklok' Dethklok Dethklok Dethklok ♪

♪ Skwisgaar Skwigelf, taller than a tree ♪

♪ Toki Wartooth, not a bumble bee ♪

♪ William Murderface, Murderface, Murderface ♪

♪ Pickles the Drummer, doodily doo ding dong doodily doodily doo ♪

♪ Nathan Explosion ♪

REPORTER ONE: Live from Batsfjord, Norway, where over 300,000 fans have traveled to the Arctic Circle to see the legendary metal band Dethklok perform just one song.

REPORTER TWO: Surprisingly the song itself is a jingle, a coffee jingle. Never before have so many people travelled so far for such a short song. 

REPORTER THREE: A jingle for international coffee moguls, the Duncan Hills Coffee Corporation. Is Dethklok selling out? “No!” says band frontman, Nathan Explosion.

NATHAN: We’re here to make coffee metal. We will make everything metal. Blacker than the blackest black, times infinity.

REPORTER TWO: They’re called pain waivers. Fans are literally signing their life away, releasing Dethklok from any and all liability.

FAN ONE: My eye got tore out and force fed to me at a show. Dethklok rules!

FAN TWO: In London some dude chopped off my fingers and threw ‘em up onstage. Murderface rolled them up and smoked them! Murderface! 

REPORTER ONE: Dark clouds have rolled in. Static electricity’s in the air. Wait! Wait! Wait a minute! It's Dethklok! It's Dethklok!

 PILOT: Dethklok rolling.

♪ Do you folks like coffee? ♪

♪ Real coffee ♪

♪ From the hills of Colombia? ♪

♪ The Duncan Hills will wake you ♪

♪ From a thousand deaths ♪

♪ A cup of blackened blood ♪

♪ Dying, dying ♪

♪ You’re dying for a cup ♪

♪ Guatemala blend ♪

♪ Ethiopian ♪

♪ French vanilla roast ♪

♪ Dying, dying ♪

♪ You’re dying for a cup ♪

♪ Prepare for the ultimate flavor ♪

♪ You're gonna get some now ♪

♪ And scream for your cream ♪

♪ Duncan Hills, Duncan Hills, Duncan Hills coffee ♪

SENATOR STAMPINGSTON: As you can see, Dethklok is no laughing matter. They’re the world’s greatest cultural force. The short time since the Duncan Hill Coffee Batsfjord Massacrefest, every other coffee company has been obliterated. Completely blown out of the water.

GENERAL CROZIER: Freaks.

SENATOR STAMPINGSTON: These freaks as you call them are currently worth billions. Gentlemen: Skwisgaar Skwigelf, taller than a tree. Toki Wartooth, not a bumblebee. William Murderface, Murderface, Murderface. Pickles the Drummer, doodily doo ding dong doodily doodily doo. Nathan Explosion. I’m afraid that’s all we know, gentlemen.

CARDINAL RAVENWOOD: I will remind you again of the Sumerian artifacts. The resemblance is indisputable.

GENERAL CROZIER: If they’re the ones that we think they are, we should exterminate them immediately.

MISTER SALACIA: No. We wait.

NATHAN: Well, I don’t think all of our employees are cursed!

PICKLES: The chefs. The chefs.

NATHAN: Oh the chefs are cursed, yeah! Yeah.

PICKLES: Yeah.

TOKI: Actually, he’s stills alives. Yeah.

NATHAN: Well I mean he’ll be dead soon. That’s what I meant-that’s what I meant to say.

SKWISGAAR: Oh, come on. He could probably hear that. Oh wait no he can’t ‘cause he ain’t got no ears.

PICKLES: Hold on. It says here that keeping this guy alive is costing us $10,000 a day?

DETHKLOK: [overlapping exclamations]

MURDERFACE: Well here’s an idea. Why don’t we Yankee-doodle-dandy, you know, pull the plug? Kill ‘em!

PICKLES: Let’s just fire him. Look at him. He ain’t cooked a damn thing all day long. Let’s face it, he’s bringing me down.

SKWISGAAR: What is wrong with this dumb dildo, they give all all the free coffee in the world but no instruction on how to cook it!

TOKI: Whew, I might need to take five, six, personal days for all this griefs gonna have to do.

MURDERFACE: Aw, here we go again! You took two personal grieving days last week!

TOKI: Yeah, well, I was depressed about color. Don’t hassle me about thats, deals with thats-

MURDERFACE: You’re depressed?! You’re depressed! I’m fat! I’m the fat one!

TOKI: Come on-

MURDERFACE: Yeah, I’m fat!

SKWISGAAR: Aw, come on, you’re like a male model-

MURDERFACE: We know that! The one good thing about Jean Pierre being dead is that maybe I won’t eat so much, and lose these flabby deth-handles!

TOKI: No!

MURDERFACE: No, I’m fat!

TOKI: Welp, I’m starting to get a hungries, but it looks like we starves.

PICKLES: Well, great. What are we supposed to do now?

TOKI: What’s this place called?

SKWISGAAR: This is I believes called food libraries.

TOKI AND SKWISGAAR: [overlapping saying “Food library”]

PICKLES: It’s called a grocery store, ya douchebags! I’m sorry about “douchebags” I got-I got low blood sugar. 

NATHAN: Alright, here’s the deal. We have to do our own shopping so we can make our own dinner like regular jack-offs do. Now you’re all in charge of putting together one dish, and don’t just buy booze! That ain’t food!

MURDERFACE: What do you mean “booze ain’t food?” I’d rather chop off my ding-dong than admit that!

TOKI: You’d rather chop off your ding-dong than not drink?

MURDERFACE: Yeah!

TOKI: Wowee!

MURDERFACE: Hey grandma, is there olives in it?

OLD LADY ONE: In what?

MURDERFACE: Lemon tart wrinkled tits! Geeze!

OLD LADY ONE: Oh!

MURDERFACE: Good! Then it’s pee-pee time!

PICKLES: Hey, chief, this stuff good for soup?

WORKER ONE: No-

PICKLES: Ahh! That’s a yes!

TOKI: Who is walnuts?

SKWISGAAR: Ah, Toki, look inside of your basket. Guess whats you’re in such a crappy mood you have lady’s tampons inside of it and you buy them for yourself! Go have a conversation with all the ladies and tell them your problem!

TOKI: You lady, Skwisgaar!

SKWISGAAR: No I’m not!

NATHAN: Two cups of rice. Brutal.

PICKLES: Okay, hold on now, so you’re telling me that you put these little guys in boiling water and they shriek and they turn red and they die?

WORKER TWO: Yes, sir.

PICKLES: That is the most metal thing I ever heard in my whole life. High five!

NATHAN: Price check! Clean up aisle six! Rotted body landslide!

SWKSIGAAR: Oh that’s greats!

NATHAN: And don’t forget our special sale on every bone broken chicken! Hurry!

SKWISGAAR: Go get ‘em, Nathan!

NATHAN: Enjoy our tasty Hammer Smashed Face! Uh, aisle three!

SKWISGAAR: I loves to laugh. Hi.

OLD LADY TWO: Hi.

SKWISGAAR: Guess what? You are a GMILF. That is a grandmother that I would like to-

PICKLES: See, I told you guys we don’t need no chef!

NATHAN: Put in the ingredients into that thing there.

TOKI: Oh no, we leaves all the food at the food place!

NATHAN: What?!

MURDERFACE: Jean PIerre! Jean Pierre, cook something! Come on don’t be a dick, be a dude!

NATHAN: Yeah, come on!

SKWISGAAR: Yeah be a dude, don’t be a dick!

NATHAN: Make us some food!

DETHKLOK: [overlapping]

PICKLES: He can’t hear you, he can’t hear you! It’s over! By the power of all that is evil, I command you to awaken, and make me a sandwich!

MURDERFACE: There’s only one thing left to do...kill ourselves!

SKWISGAAR: Dudes, we would, like, have to sew him back together to get him to cook for us!

TOKI: Yeah, but we such screw ups that he would be sewn back together wrong.

 NATHAN: Whoa! That's a good song title.

♪ Sewn back together wrong ♪

♪ Back together Sewn back together wrong ♪

♪ Back together Sewn back together wrong ♪

♪ Back together sewn ♪

[atmilliways]

Stuck on the Outside Failing to Look In (Just Like in Real Life)

This @mtl-trick-or-treat fic is for @tanyonlee, who asked for either a treat of “Very cute Skwistok!!” or a trick of “Skwisgaar and his gmiltf girlfriend XDDD.” 

It was while writing this bit that I realized, hey, I’m writing this for a Halloween event, maybe it should have some actual Halloween in it. Thank you to @little-murmaider for the costume suggestion. All the other suggestions were close seconds, you are all superstars. 🎃 

Here’s part three! (1562 words)

(part 1) (part 2)

~

Halloween day dawned cold and crisp over Mordhaus — but the five members of Dethklok all slept through that part. It wasn’t until a much more reasonable eleven am that three hunched figures sat around the sawblade kitchen table, piled high with breakfast pastries, clutching steaming cups of black, black coffee in their hands.

“Fuck, okay,” Nathan rumbled after a few mouthfuls of blessed caffeine. “I call this what-the-fuck-do-we-do-about-our-guitarists meeting to order.”

“Uh, exchusche me, I’m a guitarischt?”

Pickles rolled his eyes. “Yeah, bass guitarist. That’s barely an instrument.”

Murderface glared at the drummer, but chose not to dignify it with a response. Not an audible response, anyway — he may or may not have mumbled something containing the word Thunderbottom into his coffee.

“Stop bitching and pay attention,” snapped Nathan, who was absolutely not a morning person. “Look. Toki keeps going off and costing us money in damages and lawsuits, and Skwisgaar’s being even more of a moody asshole than usual. We’ve gotta do something about it.”

There was a drowsy silence while the three men tried to think while still in the process of waking up.

“Does anyone else get the feelin’ that they’re, like... eggin’ each other on or someshit?” Pickles asked finally.

“Let’sch juscht put ‘em in a room together and lock the door,” Murderface grumbled, still smarting from the jab at his instrument.

“That’s...” Nathan paused, mulling the suggestion over for a minute. “... Not the shittiest idea I’ve ever heard. Good job, Murderface.”

The bassist replied by flipping him off with his still-bandaged band, his other busy grabbing for a powdered donut.

“What if they kill each other?” Pickles asked.

“We’ll stay nearby,” Nathan said firmly. “I’m pretty sure if any of us get seriously hurt, that... thing would happen again.”

They all shifted a little uncertainty at that — except for Murderface, who inhaled at the wrong moment and started coughing and hacking on powdered sugar, which diffused the feeling somewhat. Because sure, That Thing had been brutal and badass and a rush, but the idea of it was still unsettling. It was the kind of experience that you half hoped, half worried would happen again someday.

Nathan reached over and gave Murderface a helpful couple of thumps on the back, which helpfully knocked over his coffee into the bassist’s crotch.

~

SEVERAL HOURS LATER.

A klokateer had just finished bringing three fresh drinks to the hot tub when Pickles suddenly sat up from his relaxed slouch and asked, “Wait, don’t we gotta figure out how to get both’a them in the same room in the first place?”

“Uh.” Nathan’s brow furrowed. “Yeah... I guess we do.” He took a long pull from his beer. “So, uh... if anyone has any ideas, that’d be great.”

“Schuper leaderschip right there,” Murderface deadpanned.

“Shut up! I had the idea to come up with an idea, I’m fucking worn out.”

“It is Halloween,” Pickles said slowly, ignoring the bickering with the ease many years’ practice and more substances than just alcohol in his system. “Meybe we could tell Toki some story about trick or treatin’?”

“But what about Schkwischgaar? He doeschn’t even want to go out for schweet poontang anymore now that he’sch deschided to schack up with that fat grandma.”

“Yeah, what’s up with that?” Nathan grunted. “Skwisgaar doesn’t even know the word monog... mogon... m... hrnnnnn... He doesn’t know what settling down even means.”

Pickles shrugged. “Feck If I know. Meybe we can grab ‘em while he’s still sleepin’, throw him in wherever, boom, lock the door, done.”

“But that only worksch if he’sch aschleep... What if we juscht tell him the fat grandma isch waiting for him schomewhere, and when he goesch in that’sch when we lock the door.” Murderface sipped thoughtfully on his Bloody Mary, then made a face. “Ugh, thisch thing isch dischguschting!”

“Dood, then why’d you ask for one? Give it here, I’ll drink it.”

“No, it’sch mine,” Murderface whined, holding the glass as far away from Pickles as he could and thus giving Nathan a good look at the cocktail onions decorated to look like eyeballs and a set of plastic vampire fangs floating in the thick cocktail. “It’sch feschtive!”

“What’s you guys all doin’s up so earlies? Trick or treats hasn’t even starts yet!”

The three men in the hot tub turned in unison to look at Toki. Somehow he’d managed to sneak up on them despite his costume, which requires a moment of blank staring to fully take in — from the ridiculous umbrella hat on his head to the ludicrous arrangement of base drum, cymbals, and various horns slung on his back like a backpack, completed by an array of mouthpieces clustered around his face like an addition to his already weird facial hair and his Flying V strapped to his front.

Plus, there were coins dangling from the umbrella, clinking against each other every time he moved. Nathan and Pickles exchanged one of those what just happened here and could it have anything to do with…? looks, because he shouldn’t have been able to sneak up on them with all those noisemakers on. They weren’t that drunk yet.

“What the fuck?” Nathan asked finally, speaking for everyone as per his job description.

Toki grinned proudly. “I ams a one man band!” He punctuated the statement with a cymbal crash, operated by some sort of hand lever. “Where’s Skwisgaar? I bets he ams too lazies to even does a costumes...”

“He’s prahbly still sleepin or something. What’s... with all the coins, dood?” Pickles asked.

The flicker of disappointment in Toki’s eyes was so brief that his band mates didn’t even notice, quickly replaced by exaggerated childlike glee. “They ams my tips what’s I get for playing goods!”

“That’s, uh...” Nathan glanced around, searching his brain or possibly the room for something to say that wasn’t too jackassy but not an outright lie either. It was hard to tell sometimes what might set off one of the rhythm guitarist’s violent tantrums, and Toki’s bubbly mood could just be the manic before the storm. “...Uh... sugar-free?”

Murderface, still staring, spoke up in lukewarm agreement. “Healthier than playing for candy, that’sch for schure.”

“You got your insulin, right?” Pickles asked reflexively.

Toki nodded and beamed and played a riff on his guitar, accompanying it with various clashes, bashes, and honks.

In the midst of the cacophony, Pickles turned to the other two and said in a low voice, “This is a tickin’ time bomb. You guys wanna get this over with now?”

“...Yeah.”

“Schoundsch good. I’ve got my tascher in with my clothesch over there.”

“Okey.” Pickles leaned back and raised his voice again. “Hey, that’s real good, Toki! You wanna start trick or treatin’ early this year?”

Toki stopped the assault on their ears and clapped his hands together in excitement. “Oh boys, does I!” He paused. “But… it doesn’ts starts until suns-set, I thoughts?”

Murderface, ever a champion of messing with people, literally leapt up in his eagerness to cover this plot hole in their story. “Nope! I know a neighborhood that schtartsch early, scho letsch get thisch schow on the road!”

As one, everyone in the room groaned and shielded his eyes in dismay.

“Goddammit Murderface,” Nathan bellowed, “stop freeballing in the hot tub!”

~

ABOUT HALF AN HOUR LATER.

Nathan pulled his dethphone out of his back pocket. “Okay, I’m going to text Skwisgaar now. Everybody ready?”

Pickles nudged at Toki with a sneakered foot to make sure he was still down for the count, getting the hoped-for lack of response. He nodded and flashed a double thumbs up.

From his position by the door, Murderface held up his taser in wordless salute.

They’d decided that the one man band getup presented too many improvised weapon possibilities, so they’d tasered him into unconsciousness, removed everything but his clothes, and made a couple klokateers carry him down to the studio. To make the whole thing more fair, they’d also decided to do more or less the same to Skwisgaar as soon as he stormed in.

“... Wait, how come I gotta do all the taschering? My hand schtill hurtsch, schomeone elsche do it thisch time.”

“This isn’t the time for whining, Murderface,” Nathan called as he and Pickles hid behind the couch, just in case. “This is your time to shine!”

~

Text log between Skwisgaar Skwigelf and Nathan Explosion:

NE (5:29:27pm) — Hey, come to the studio.

NE (5:41:02pm) — GET YOUR ASS DOWN TO THE STUDIO RIGHT NOW.

NE (5:43:26pm) — Some of your pickups in the new track need some work.

SS (5:43:56pm) — WHAT

SS (5:43:57pm) — BOLLSHIT

SS (5:43:59pm) — THEMS WAS PERFECTION

NE (5:45:37pm) — Prove it. Just get in here.

SS (5:45:44pm) — THIS AMS SLANDER ON MY NAMES I WILLS PROVE IT ALL OVER YOURS DUM BITCHTITS

~

ONE AMBUSH LATER.

Pickles was helping Nathan drag an unconscious Skwisgaar into the booth with the equally unconscious Toki, when the drummer suddenly dropped the pair of booted ankles he’d been lugging and asked, “Wait, don’t I have some sorta dentist appointment to go to later today?” 

He glared at his band mates. 

“How come neither’a you dooshbeags reminded me? Now I don’t got time to pour bleach on my teeth first!”

[atmilliways]

1!

“Toki trying to convince Nathan to do something lame.” It’s lame in the sense that I couldn’t come up with anything particularly lame. I sort of had an idea when I started, but it took a weird hop a little while in and ended unexpectedly. I’m not sure if I want to continue it or rework it to fit into the chaptered fic I’m still toiling away at. 

(mtl prompts list)

—

It started off totally wholesome and innocent. 

Okay, no it didn’t. It started out with Toki walking in on Nathan fucking the manager over his desk, and the little shit ran screaming from the room like he’d just seen his parents doing it and needed to wash the dirty scene from his eyeballs with boiling acid. 

Then the texts started. As a rule, Nathan didn’t bother to read any texts from the Scandinavian guitarists because they were always a horrible mishmash of misspelled words, typos, autocorrects, and non-English words — in other words, completely incomprehensible. Toki, being generally more talkative, was the worst about this. Nathan solved the problem of the Norwegian relentlessly blowing up his phone  first by ignoring it, then eventually by leaving it in his jeans pocket to get taken out with the wash. He was issued a new one, with a new number, the next day. 

Since avoidance seemed to be working pretty well, Nathan continued the trend until it snowballed into the entire band just sort of forgetting to include Toki in things. That worked pretty well for a while too, until the whole Special Persons Invites Club mess. By then Toki seemed to have given up on trying to talk to him about what he’d seen, but Nathan was still vaguely on alert for the idiot to blurt it out right there in front of Pickles and Skwisgaar during a club meeting. Why else would he exclude Murderface, the band member most likely to shit his pants at the news and have a screeching gay crisis that could go on for weeks?

Well, aside from the fact that it was Murderface, that guy was pretty rank. But yeah, so totally incapable of coming out of the closet himself that he’d just ruin it for as many other people as possible. 

When nothing happened, Nathan just sort of figured Toki had forgotten about it. And then he’d started having those weird dreams about whales, and that thing with the liquid master had happened, and Pickles was so mad at him and pissing him off so much it was starting to border on cold war feud territory… and he kinda forgot too. 

Fast forward about a year and Nathan was still reeling from all the shit that had gone down. They all were, really. Everything from Roy’s death to Charles’ sudden resignation to Toki and Abigail’s rescue, it was too much to take in and make sense of. Had they become better people or something? Were they expected to save the world now, all by their dumbass selves? 

It was Nathan’s turn to sit in the box-like hospital room with Toki and keep an eye on him, make sure he didn’t wake up from his frequent drugged naps and go totally postal on the doctors and nurses or whatever, so he was crammed into the unfairly narrow visitor’s chair and trying to think. Not just about all the weird shit that had gone down, either… Ever since that, hrm hrm HRMMM, thing with Abigail on the Dethsub, Charles hadn’t been anything more than politely civil towards him. It had fucked up the whole boss-and-employee-with-benefits thing all to hell, and Nathan couldn’t help wondering guiltily if that was part of why the guy had left. They’d heard through the grapevine that Charles had taken over for that old priest who’d died, but none of Nathan’s calls or texts to the man seemed to go through anymore. 

“Nathans?” croaked a raspy voice. The frontman looked up to meet Toki’s bleary gaze. “Are you here’s to helps me goes to the b-a-s-t-h-r-o-h-m-n-s-e?” 

“Uhhhh…” It took his fumbling brain a moment to figure that one out, but when he got it, he grimaced. “No. They gave you a catheter after you pissed on Skwisgaar and he fell and broke his ass for a couple days. Just… go ahead and pee where you are.”

“Oh.” Toki giggled, either about the Skwisgaar thing or at the privilege of peeing without wetting the bed. “Okays.”

There was a deeply uncomfortable silence, during which Nathan pretended he didn’t know exactly what his band mate was doing over there. 

“Nathans?” Toki asked again. 

Fully expecting to be asked for ice water and a crazy straw, Nathan sighed and levered himself out of the uncomfortable chair. They all took Toki duty every few days, partly to protect the hospital staff but partly to reassure themselves that the kid — even though Nathan was technically younger, it was hard not to think of Toki as the baby of their fucked up little family — really was alive and well. Or at least, healing. Not dead, anyway, and definitely no longer a missing-in-action Schrödinger’s guitarist. After all that time they’d spent dicking around when they could’ve just fucking manned up and helped with the search, getting him water or his deddybear seemed fair enough penance. It beat having to say sorry, anyway. 

“Yeah, what?”

“You remembers… that time what’s I saw you and Charleses doings it up the butts?” 

Nathan froze, all the blood slamming out of his face in shock. “Uhhhhhhhhhh…” 

“Is he mads at you ‘cause of Abigails?” Toki continued weakly but earnestly. “I talks to her yesterdays and she saids maybe that ams what happens why he goes to that church place.” 

The creepy thing about that was, Abigail had opted to be moved to another hospital so she could be closer to her family. Several weeks ago. 

“So maybes whats you should does is… apoljisecks to hims in person, likes you did with Pickle.” 

“Toki, that’s…” Nathan scowled, trying to find the right words to convey how he felt about that suggestion. “Apologizing is really fucking lame and not metal. And you know how I feel about that.” 

Toki just looked at him with a grimace that said, Reallies? Okays, we does it this ways then. He groped around for the bed controls and hit the button that elevated his pillows slightly, so he was practically sitting up. 

“Nathans,” he slurred, “I talks to all the guys, and they says you should does it. Espescially Pickle, he said he was ams very moved whens you did it to hims. And Skwisgaar says you ams really bumming everyones out because you needs to get laid. Even Morderface agrees you beens in a real weirds mood since the submarines… I think that says a lots.” 

“What… does that say?” Nathan asked with menacing slowness, his scowl deepening stubbornly, but on the inside he was totally freaking out. Toki had talked to the guys about this? All of them? 

And those assholes actually backed him up on this apologizing thing? 

Toki gave him a wavery smile. “That you misses and cares about hims.” 

“I don’t— God, you’re making it sound gayer than it actually is.”

“Whats am gayer than sex in the butts with two guys?” Toki asked, puzzled.

There wasn’t really any good answer for that, so Nathan just stomped over to the window and glared out through it at nothing, his arms crossed sullenly over his chest. Yeah, he was pissed at Toki, but dammit if the kid hadn’t hit a nerve about his conflicted feelings over their former manager.

He thought about the long string of texts on his phone — all sent to Charles, with no reply for months. At some point the stupid knock knock jokes and links to cat memes had given way to things like Did you get my text and Just fucking talk to me you dick.

He thought about how he really had been in a piss-poor mood ever since being stuck on that sub for three months, and how it no longer felt quite adequate to simply blame his own actions on Charles holding out on him so they could all focus on the new album. After all, it was the album that was somehow supposed to save the fucking world, right? And sure, Charles could’ve explained that at the time, but Nathan had to admit it wouldn’t have had the same convincing affect as a giant flying dude coming out of nowhere and murdering the head of their record label with scary-ass mind powers. 

He thought about fooling around with Charles, getting the guy to loosen up a little for a change, and how afterwards Charles would be all relaxed and pliant and actually laugh at shit like a normal person… 

“Nathans?” 

“WHAT?” 

“Can I haves a cups of ice waters whats got a real cool straw?” Toki asked petulantly. His pout at being snapped at was practically audible. 

When Nathan stomped out of the room to get the requested drink, he stopped a passing doctor by grabbing onto one lab-coated arm and swinging her around. 

“Hey,” he demanded gruffly, jabbing a thumb back over his shoulder towards Toki’s room, “is that dildo okay to be moved?” 

The doctor blinked. “Um, yes, Mr. Explosion. He still needs to be on medication, but he’s healing up more quickly than expected.” 

“Good,” Nathan growled, “because were going on a trip. Get him ready to go by… uh, just as soon as possible. Got it?” He’d been about to say tomorrow, but now that he’d decided on his next course of action he wanted to get it over with as soon as possible. Releasing the bewildered physician, he rounded on the klokateers standing guard outside Toki’s door. “You guys, you call… someone, and make sure the submarine is ready to go. And tell all the guys, too.” 

He straightened up to his full imposing height — not that anyone around him needed to be more intimidated, it just felt cool and important to do every once in a while. Without realizing it, his growl was starting to take on some of the ominous rumble of prophecy. 

“We’re going back into the ocean.”