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ramshacklerumble · 3 months

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?ylsuoires esnesnon koot ew fi ffo retteb eb dlrow eht t’ndluow

twst fic | 2.1k words

With the moon the biggest Ace had ever seen and in such crisp alabaster, it struck him with its true presence as a celestial body rather than an afterthought of a pale disk in the sky. The sand along the island glowed under its light.

He didn’t bother with his flashlight, he immediately spotted the figure sitting on a rock jutting out a few meters below the lodge’s landing, beyond the railing.

“Psst!”

Gia jumped and turned to look up where the voice came from. They gave him a small wave when they saw him.

Ace turned his palms up. What are you doing?

Gia held something in their mouth. Ace thought they were sucking on a stone before they reached into the fanny pack on their side and pulled out a mango. Gia seriously loved mangoes. Gia loved mangoes so much, they’d been tearing through the group’s supply and eventually earned themself a two-mango-per-day limit. One they were currently on their way tripling over alongside the other two he’d helped them smuggle earlier that night.

Ace shook his head as Gia motioned him to come down and instead motioned for them to come up. He didn’t hear it, but he could plainly imagine the huff coming out of them when they waved him off and turned back towards the beach.

“Oh, c’mon.” Ace muttered. He glanced over his shoulder, half-expecting Riddle to be standing there in all his pipin’ teapot tyrant glory.

They were supposed to be in bed, safe in their little pseudo-getaway spot. While it didn’t make a lot of sense to Ace given it was the only man-made structure on the island and might as well be a flashing neon ‘ATTACK US’ sign for Gantu— Gantu never tried. It should have been a riskier move than just roughing it out in the open, but with how things had been turning out so far, Ace was on the same page in regards to it being better inside.

Also, the mosquitoes were driving him nuts.

He looked back out at Gia, still staring off into the ocean. Alright. Fine. If they wanted to get eaten alive out there, then that was their business. Ace wasn’t in love with the idea of having to scavenge tomorrow with a collar around his neck for being caught past curfew. If he slipped back inside now, he could just say he’d gone to the outhou—

“Hey!” The word left his mouth before he had the chance to choke it down. Ace clamped his hand over his mouth and spun into a crouch, trying to discern any sound of movement above his heartbeat. He waited. Ace took a glance at where Gia had stepped off the rock they’d been sitting on.

Now standing on the sand, Gia was looking back up at him. They’d started towards the beach.

Frantically, Ace motioned for them to come back, his other hand still fixed onto his mouth.

Gia only shook their head, pointed at him, then at the lodge. They continued on their way towards the beach just as the mango pit they’d been holding hit the sand.

Ace suppressed a groan.

With not even Grim at their side, there was no way Ace would be able to just crawl back into bed now. He ducked under the railing, climbed off the landing and onto the sand.

It didn’t take him long to catch up to Gia. Unlike their usual speed walk against the imaginary timer they took everywhere and anywhere, they strolled down the beach at their leisure. When he reached them, they greeted him like they’d just happened to cross each other at a mall, “Hey.”

“Don’t ‘Hey’ me.” Ace reached out to block their path, “Where are you going?”

“Beach.” Gia said. They placed their hand on his arm, but didn’t force it down. They simply held it. “Let’s go.”

Ace faltered, “What?”

“For a little bit.” Gia gave their hand a brief squeeze. They had this strange…non-smile. The corners of their lips didn’t curve upward, but Ace instinctively knew they were smiling at him. Something about how their expression seemed so light.

Refocusing, Ace said, “Are you kidding? If Riddle and the others find out we’re not there, we won’t hear the end of it.”

“I told you to stay,” Gia reminded him. It almost sounded coy. Tone variation? From Gia?

“Yeah? What about you?” Ace said, “You can’t be out here alone, Gantu or his bots could be anywhere.”

“Fine.” They shrugged, “Come with me.”

A sigh, born as much out of frustration as it was amazement, left Ace. He scanned the shoreline trying to figure out what about it called to Gia. It was a lost cause. Ace liked to think he was pretty quick on the uptake, but when it came to Gia sometimes he couldn’t begin to guess what went on inside that head of theirs.

“Okay, but only for a few minutes.” Ace said, “And we are not going into the water.”

Gia had the gall to look disappointed.

—

To be fair, it was really nice out.

Even in this late— possibly early— hour, it was still warm enough to justify their light clothing. The breeze was sea-salted, though not briny, and while Ace wasn’t much for stargazing— stars blanketed the island in an otherworldly surreal technicolor that made them hard to ignore.

Gia produced two more mangoes out of their fanny pack, which at this point Ace was sure had to be enchanted, and gave one to him as they walked along the shore.

They were sweet and refreshingly chilled. He couldn’t blame Gia for wanting to eat them by the ton. They told him about their craving for a sour syrup they called ‘chamoy’ and how just thinking about it made their mouth water. They laughed as they said so.

It didn’t surprise people to find out Gia didn’t laugh often, even when it was just them, Ace, Deuce and Grim— and when they did laugh, it was less a sound and more a subtle shaking of their shoulders. They always hid it behind a fist or turned away.

Maybe they thought Ace wouldn’t hear it over the roar of the waves, because tonight they didn’t bother to.

Much of their walk was silent, though.

Under most circumstances, Ace found silence unbearable. This time his usual urge to break the quiet was nowhere to be found. Even as Gia shot him a side-long glance before stomping into the edges of the waves.

He just rolled his eyes and followed them into ankle deep water. He expected it to be freezing, but found the water pleasantly cool.

“I love it here,” said Gia, throwing their mango pit far into the water.

Something about that came off as strange to Ace. When he thought about it, it was because he was sure he’d never heard them use that word before.

Love.

He was especially sure he’d never heard them use it in reference to themself. That was a whole personal preference they’d willingly voiced.

“I can make it work,” they said.

Ace had followed suit and thrown his own mango pit into the waves. It didn’t splash nearly as far as Gia’s. “You mean staying?”

“Yeah.”

“No way.” Ace said, “It’s nice here for a vacation or something, ignoring the whole ‘being hunted by robots’ thing. But there’s no way I’d stay just to live here.”

“I know.” They said, “You guys would be back in Night Raven.”

Ace studied them for a few seconds, “…And what? Leave you here?”

“Yeah.”

Though he smiled, Ace shook his head in disbelief.

Gia pointed down the path they’d been walking, at the lodge, “That’s built.” They pointed to the fire pit, “I cook. I can build my own fire and I can fish.”

Their hand gestured at the jungle, “There’s water. There’s fruit everywhere. Plus, I finished building a garden around back today.”

Ace remembered the square plot of land behind the lodge sectioned off by a log fence.

“Woah, wait.” he said. “You’re serious?”

Gia continued walking along the water’s edge.

Ace stayed behind, trying to puzzle out what the interaction meant— if it meant anything at all. Laughs were unsurprisingly rare from Gia, but what people often failed to predict was that it didn’t stop them from having a sense of humor.

That’s what Ace assumed it was at this point, anyway. He didn’t know what else to call it. Gia’s idea of comedy was throwing someone a curveball and seeing if they caught it or let it hit them in the face.

He jogged to join them again and said, “Okay, well. What about Gantu?”

“What about Gantu?” Gia notched back, “He won’t have a reason to be here once Stitch leaves the island. Then it’s all mine.”

“You’re just gonna sit here on your pile of mango seeds all alone on your island in the middle of nowhere.”

“I’ll name it: Ogy-Gia.”

Ace settled on his trump card, “And Grim? You know he can’t go back to Night Raven without you. You know Headmage will kick him out the second he knows you’re gone.”

Gia didn’t reply immediately. Their toes brushed over the sand, leaving overturned trails stretching out from their footprints as they walked. Finally, they looked at him with their weird little non-smile, “You do care about him.”

They spun around, walking backwards to face Ace as they spoke, “Grim can stay here with me. He won’t have to do anything. He’ll love that.”

Ace snorted.

“And since it’s just the two of us—” Gia continued, “—that automatically makes him the Greatest Mage.”

“Alright, fine. But then…” Ace trailed off, his hand circling as though he could magically conjure up a reason. A different one he could actually say.

The topic of Gia’s family always made them clam up and Ace learned not to broach the subject. It nipped at him sometimes, though. Even before coming onto the island where the occasional downer thought of never getting off it led to thinking of his own family. He hated the idea of his family worrying about him and he hated the idea of never seeing them again.

But there’d been one time Ace asked Gia about it directly back at Night Raven, when Gia told him outright they decided they weren’t going back home. Don’t you wanna see your family again?

Not as much as I should, Gia replied. He didn’t see them for the rest of the day.

It hit Ace that if they were capable of making a decision like that once, could they do it again? Was it really that easy for them? If family wasn’t enough for them to reconsider, then…

“Then what?” Gia prompted.

Ace shoved his hands in his pockets, “Then I’ll just never see you again, I guess.”

In a single quick step, Gia blocked his path, stopping him short. They nearly bumped into each other. Leaning in with a tilt of their head, trying to get a good look at his face, they asked, “That bothers you?”

Ace blinked at them, then with a dawning understanding he said, “You want me to say I’d miss you.”

Gia had a lopsided sort of grin. It made them look like a whole new person— but Ace knew better now. This Gia was always there. Looking for the next adventure, the next spark of excitement. The one who made things worth the trouble.

“And if I say I won’t?” Ace said.

“Try.”

Ace met their eye, “...You're just playing with me. You're not actually staying.”

Gia glanced at the sky– sharing a knowing look with the stars. This moron. But when they looked back at him, they said, “I'd miss you.” There, see? It’s not so hard.

That was the thing about Gia. When you were someone who didn’t speak more than a handful of sentences at a time, you knew how to make them count.

Gathering all the pride and puff in his chest as he could muster, Ace said, “You wouldn’t have to.”

It wasn’t a real silence that stretched between them. Waves continued crashing against the shore. Ace found himself wanting for something else to break it.

Gia dropped their gaze and huffed. Not a laugh. Not a grin. Not even their little non-smile.

When they lifted their face again, they motioned Ace back to the lodge with a subtle jut of their head.

Ace scanned the sand as they walked back together. Nothing popped out at him. Maybe for the best.

Better for it to stay there than risk him crushing it, too.

tag list:

@cyanide-latte @inmateofthemind @simons-twsted-children @tixdixl @blithesharem @thehollowwriter

@jovieinramshackle @theleechyskrunkly @skriblee-ksk @boopshoops @the-trinket-witch @twistedwonderlandshenanigans

@kimikitti @felix-cant-ski (dm to be added)

#twisted wonderland #twst #yuusona #ace trappola x oc #ace trappola #twst oc #twisted wonderland oc #disney twst #this is the best i could come up with before the stitch event comes to a close #i actually have gia’s tropical wear ssr as a wip #gia yugo #gar’s art #gar’s writing #oathofoaks #the title and the opening line is from the tally hall song #which lyric-wise besides the title and the outro really only the music itself really set the vibe for me

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