Chapter Text
So fixing his sleep schedule this time around was proving to be rough . That nap Boombox took right when he got back to his apartment after the gig was the final nail in the coffin. Lately, he’d been going to sleep right in the early morning and waking up in the late afternoon, no matter how hard he tried to not do that. Every night that passed following that routine was another step back, and made it more of a pain to fix. The gig was almost a week ago at this point, and he was still fighting to get it normal again.
He’d at least try and drag himself out of bed before he’d wake up with the sun already going down so he’d be tired enough that night to get some sleep at a reasonable hour, but that only tended to work when there was something to do. Otherwise, he’d just shut off the alarm and go back to sleep.
But maybe going to McDonald’s with Skateboard and Slingshot for lunch was not the brightest idea, especially because he’d gotten about four, maybe five hours of sleep based on when he went to sleep and when he pulled himself from the comfort of his nice, cozy bed. Boombox was fighting to keep his eyes open as he listened to them have a small debate over if hot dogs counted as sandwiches or not. He honestly wasn’t sure what sparked the debate, but it might’ve been Skateboard asking Slingshot if he’d consider adding hot dogs as a menu item to the cafe.
He shut his eyes for a brief moment, letting the conversation go in and out of his ears. Maybe the fact that the time he spent trying to fall asleep at night was instead filled with constant thinking about how Medkit would react if he did recognize Boombox at that gig wasn’t helping, with wondering how things would go and constantly thinking about the worst case scenarios. He’d have to get up and pace around some to try and get it to quell, lay back down, and then it’d happen again.
It was… not fun, to say the least. But hopefully he’d be able to get it fixed soon and prevent anyone else from suspecting anything was up because if not, then he could find himself facing too many questions that he wouldn’t be able to skillfully steer away from.
Boombox’s eyes shot open as he heard his name, unsure who said it, but determined to prove he wasn’t starting to doze off, he gave a very thought out and graceful “ whuh?” in reply to Skateboard or Slingshot, whoever it was that said his name.
Nailed it.
Skateboard snickered, elbowing Boombox’s side to fill him in on the reason why he heard his name, “Sling’s asking if you think a hot dog is a sandwich, or are you too far off in snooze land to give your opinion?”
Boombox rolled his eyes and ignored Slingshot’s accompanying laughter to Skateboard’s jab as he stole a fry from Skateboard, leaning back into his seat after pointing the fry in Slingshot’s direction. “What if it’s a taco? What then?”
Slingshot blinked before bringing his hand up to his mouth into a thoughtful gesture, clearly considering the possibility and thinking it over like Boombox had just asked him a trolley problem question. “...You’re right, actually, it might be a taco.”
“Are you kidding?!” Skateboard swiped a fry from Slingshot, popping it into his mouth before continuing his argument, “So then that means those sandwiches that are split down the middle are tacos!”
“Nuh uh! Those are still sandwiches!” Slingshot countered, stealing a fry from Skateboard in retaliation, “They’re horizontal! A taco is vertical! Like a hot dog!”
“Hot dogs can be horizontal!”
“Where in the Inphinity are hot dogs horizontal?!”
“I’m with Sling on that one-” Boombox interjected, taking another fry, “Where are you getting horizontal hot dogs Skate?!”
“You come into McDonald’s with me, you argue about the validity of a hot dog as a sandwich with me, you discredit my horizontal hot dogs, and you’re stealing my fries…” Skateboard lamented, taking one of Boombox’s fries now, “It’s a cruel world out there!”
Slingshot stuck his tongue out in concentration as he stole another fry from Skateboard, since the other was more occupied with his lamenting to notice. “Okay drama king-”
“Okay catboy.”
That was a poor time to be taking a sip of soda because Boombox almost spit it out as he watched the conversation derail and become less focused on the validity of a hot dog as a sandwich and more of Slingshot and Skateboard trying to have the last word in their faux heated argument. The eyelights of his visor darted between the two as they went back and forth, and he took the chance to steal a few more fries from both Skateboard and Slingshot. It was a win for him, honestly because neither of them noticed.
Eventually, each of them had finished their lunch and left the McDonalds’s, still holding conversation until Slingshot had to head out to get back to the cafe. Then it just left Skateboard and Boombox in the parking lot, with the DJ getting ready to head to the bus stop to get back to Playground. As he was getting ready to walk off, he felt a hand on his shoulder and turned around to see the other phighter, his gear tucked under his other arm.
“Boom are you sure you’re like, good?” Skateboard asked, a look of genuine concern on his face, “You literally almost fell asleep earlier while Sling and I were yapping, and then you’ve been answering texts a lot later than you normally do.”
So his eye resting earlier wasn’t as subtle as he thought it was if Skateboard noticed it, which meant Slingshot probably did too. Then there was the matter of his text replies which… yeah. There was no way of hiding that without raising some brows and suspicions. Boombox would always wake up to a number of texts that had been earlier in the day, and surely a pattern had to have been noticed by now, there was no way it wouldn’t have been noticed.
“I’m all good Skate,” Boombox gave him a small grin, watching as the other raised a brow in doubt and very clearly did not believe him. He could’ve just chosen to brush Skateboard off and keep things simple, but then that meant he could get grilled again in the future, possibly with Slingshot there too if they held a makeshift intervention.
Yeah, he’d take telling just Skateboard over getting Slingshot wrapped up in this mess too. With a sigh, he dropped the grin and looked the other right in the eyes, “Okay, okay. But you need to keep it Playground confidential, promise?”
‘Playground confidential’ was their unofficial code for when something was supposed to just stay between them two. Slingshot was great, really! But he came from Thieves’ Den and didn’t quite get how Playground worked, especially with the less, uh, public parts of it. The moment either of them said something was meant to be Playground confidential, they locked in, which is exactly what Skateboard did the moment the words left Boombox’s mouth. With a nod, he took his hand off of Boombox’s shoulder and put his gear down on the asphalt. “Hop on- I know there’s an empty skate park nearby we can talk at.”
With a nod from the DJ, he hopped onto Skateboard’s gear with the other phighter and then the two were off. It was unusually quiet, but it didn’t feel strange or anything, just felt like the general quiet that came before they had a talk like this. It didn’t take them long to get to the skate park Skateboard was talking about, and they found a good spot to sit, right on top of a ramp. Gave them a good look over the park, and let them keep an eye out for anyone else rocking up.
There were a few more beats of silence between them before Boombox finally broke it, exhaling before he laid out as much of the situation as he could. Yes he trusted Skateboard, but the less he knew about it, the better it was because then it meant he had a lower chance of getting involved somehow.
“So, long story short: I’ve been doing some alias gigs at one of the party venues in the you-know-what part of Playground,” He paused for a moment, making sure Skateboard got the memo of where these gigs were happening and hoping he got the message that he was being vague for his own good (based on the firm nod he got from the other, he knew it was received). “It gets most of my rent sorted out, which is why I stick around and have stuck around. It phucks my sleep schedule over when it happens though, and it’s especially phucked now because Med might have figured it out and he hasn’t said anything to me to prove my guess right or wrong.”
It seemed like a good enough explanation, and as a bonus it didn’t give away the fact that Medkit was showing up at a place Skateboard knew was shady to be at in the first place, especially if he was there for a meeting. That could potentially make Skateboard do a complete 180 on how he felt about Medkit, honestly.
Speaking of which, Skateboard sucked in a breath through his teeth after Boombox finished his explanation, “Yikes… yeah. Ok yeah that would explain it- phucked up sleep schedule on top of worrying about Medkit possibly finding that out. Ooooh that’s not good-”
Boombox simply gave a nod, a silence falling over them as they stared up at the clouds together. Thankfully, Skateboard wasn’t saying anything about the gigs, but then again, they both just knew how Playground worked, especially in the parts that existed only at night or just generally were shielded from inphernals that weren’t involved in it. Boombox knew about some of what Skateboard got up to, and Skateboard knew some of what Boombox got up to. No judgement from either of them, just knowing that they had their own things and did what they had to.
“So uh,” Skateboard broke the silence, idly rolling his gear back and forth with his hand, “How are you gonna deal with it? Get things solved?”
The DJ thought about it for a moment, tapping his fingers against the concrete. How was he going to get this dealt with and solved? He already had an idea, had it since the morning he woke up after taking that unintentional nap. “I mean, just gonna keep trying to brute force my sleep schedule back into place, and then wait until Med says something about it to me. No point in bringing it up if there’s the chance he doesn’t know, you know?”
“Will that work?” Skateboard wrinkled his nose up slightly, like he was thinking really hard, “What if he’s waiting for you to say something?”
Boombox shrugged, “Then it’ll just have to stay unspoken, I guess. Until something happens or whatever.”
Skateboard gave him a look that read something along the lines of ‘I don’t think that’ll work but okay’ before turning his head back up to look at the clouds, and they stayed like that. Just sitting on the ramp, listening to the sounds around them as they hung out in comfortable silence. Out of everyone, Skateboard was probably the only other phighter Boombox would be this quiet around. Even then, it would only be during these Playground confidential moments, when things weren’t quite ready to get back to how they normally work.
Maybe he did have a point about the possibility of Medkit waiting for Boombox to say something. It was something that could happen after all, but if it got to the point where the DJ had to ask Medkit directly if he was in a meeting with his pseudo boss, he was picking any of SFOTH and praying that he would tell the truth. Boombox didn’t think Medkit would lie about it, but he had to prepare for it, just in case.
His phone buzzed with a notification and interrupted his current line of thinking, and Boombox pulled it from his pocket to see a message from Vine Staff. The healer was asking if he could take her place at this weekend’s phight since something came up to keep her from attending, and they’d be down a support without her. He internally cringed at the fact he would have only a few mere days to fix his sleep schedule, but maybe this was what he needed to force himself to get things into shape before his awful sleep schedule decided to stick around for longer than it needed to.
Despite all the searching Medkit had done, he hadn’t been able to find anything about shadier places in Playground, or anything about DJs or performers putting on an alias of sorts when going to gigs. All he got was stuff about typical stage personas, nothing about anyone doing anything to hide their identity for reasons that weren’t really legal. Everyone in Playground seemed to be tight lipped about it, which was incredibly inconvenient for him.
He was running into nothing but dead ends, even as he sat in Pink Parlor with Sword and mulled over his lack of discoveries with a cup of coffee. The other had managed to clock that something was up, and Medkit knew that being asked about it was inevitable. Maybe he could hold it off until they’d parted ways and Sword would just text him and ask to come over, but based on the looks he’d been getting, it definitely didn’t seem like that was happening.
The healer was proven right with his assumption moments later when Sword put his own cup of coffee down and turned his phone off, “So what are you looking into this time around?”
Medkit took a sip of his coffee, eyeing his own phone and considering the possibility of just not answering and changing the subject. However, he was very bad at that, he didn’t even understand how Boombox could switch topics like it was nothing. So instead he opted to sigh and ask a question of his own, “How do you know I’m looking into something?”
“You get like,” Sword paused, taking a moment to make sure what he was going to say would make sense, “I don’t know but it’s like, an air of focus around you. Or something like that. You get a certain way when you’ve been really looking into something, you know?”
Medkit sighed again, putting his coffee down, “Alright, alright. I’ve simply been trying to learn more about Playground.” A simple answer, one that hopefully shouldn’t open more questions than necessary. However, with the fact that Sword made some sort of face, and the healer tried to stop the questions before they began. “There’s no actual reason behind it, if you’re wondering. There’s just not a lot I know about the faction.”
“Uh huh,” Sword took a long sip of his drink, squinting at Medkit slightly, “Conveniently the faction your boyfriend is from. There’s totally no reason.”
“Exactly.” Medkit gave Sword a glare that held no real heat behind it, “No reason.”
“Yep. No reason, no reason at all for researching Playground.”
“What about Playground?” Rocket’s voice suddenly cut in, and Medkit’s gaze quickly flicked over to see the other standing by their table. Sword reacted in the same way, and both of them had their attention on the other phighter, who stood at the end of their table with a disposable coffee cup in hand. “Sorry- I was just picking something up for my dad and overheard you guys and just came over to say hi.”
Medkit looked at Rocket for a moment, tuning out the greeting Sword gave his boyfriend as he thought. He did come from Playground, but was no longer a part of the faction. It had likely been years since Rocket had been in Playground, but given the fact that current Playgrounders were very protective of the nightlife scene, maybe a former Playgrounder would be more willing to share some information. It seemed like a long shot, but what other leads did he have?”
“Rocket,” Medkit started, ignoring the fact that both Rocket and Sword looked over at him and had their hands intertwined, “You came from Playground, correct?”
“I did, yeah,” Rocket gave a small nod, “Any reason for asking or..?”
“Is it common for people active in Playground nightlife to shield their identities?”
That question got a confused look from Rocket and Sword, but before they could say anything, Medkit quickly followed it up with something that would hopefully prevent them from asking more questions. “Work related matters, there was someone from Playground that I highly doubt went about their day-to-day activities like that.”
Thankfully, this didn’t bring up any other questions as Rocket began to think, putting the coffee cup in his free hand down to tap a finger against his chin. “I mean… it depends on the part of Playground they come from. In some parts it's just relatively innocent, like putting on a costume or stage persona when going out. But then in the riskier parts, it can be prime blackmail material if you get caught there. Especially if you’ve got like, a really good image built up. I mean, even the performers and party hosts there shield their identities, those are known alias gigs and parties. Everyone there knows you steer clear of those.”
Rocket started talking about something else Playground related, more about the fun part of party aliases, but Medkit got everything he needed to know from that first bit. The confirmation that it was common for performers to put on aliases for gigs in places that would wreck their career if it was ever found out. Burst was clearly an alias, and so was Toxin. He wasn’t a fan of the way this was turning out. It was common, but that meant the chance for it being an unrelated DJ was just as great as Boombox being involved.
Speaking of which, Sword seemed to fall down that train of thought after Rocket said his goodbyes and left. “Med, you don’t think that Boombox is like…” He trailed off, looking at the healer over his cup of coffee.”
“No.” Medkit was quick to answer, “It was work related.” It in fact, was not, but he would rather not have the chance of this spreading further than it needed to, especially if it was a blackmail hotspot and Boombox was involved. He wasn’t going to risk giving anyone any sort of leverage over the DJ. There were plenty of listening ears here, and while he was sure they wouldn’t catch on unless they were specifically listening for him, he didn’t want to risk it.
The conversation lulled after that, Medkit taking a sip of his coffee as Sword talked about the most recent update to the neighbor drama he always talked about when there was nothing else to talk about. It served as pleasant background noise, and sometimes there was something interesting about it. He honestly wasn’t sure how Sword managed to end up neighboring such a variety of inphernals that didn’t seem to click all that well, but it happened, and now Medkit had a weekly recap.
The healer opened his phone to check the phighting schedule, to confirm that he was still scheduled for the phight happening this weekend and to check if there were any new changes to the team to account for. There were no changes on his own, but Boombox’s name in place of Vine Staff’s on the opposing team caught his eye. He wasn’t sure why his boyfriend would be taking part in the phight, especially since it was one of the earlier ones and he was sure Boombox was still having trouble with fixing his sleep schedule. It wasn’t hard to figure that out based on the times he texted and replied to messages.
He could feel a small frown tugging down at the corners of his mouth, knowing that this meant that they could very well end up talking about their run-in that fateful night if Toxin was Boombox. Then that meant Boombox would have the opportunity to lie and brush it off, and despite the fact he didn’t want to think about the DJ doing that, he had to be prepared. If working at that party was blackmail worthy, then he’d likely want as few ties connecting himself to that alias as possible, which meant he’d have to lie.
The coffee tasted even more bitter on his tongue the more he thought about it, and he opted to listen to Sword’s weekly soap opera update instead of thinking more about Boombox lying to him.
This phight definitely wasn’t one of Boombox’s proudest moments. He’d completely fumbled so many chances so many times, finding himself unable to focus properly because of how exhausted he felt. He wanted to punch his past self for thinking he’d be able to pull his sleep schedule together in time, because he didn’t do that. Boombox didn’t even know how many hours of sleep he ended up with, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.
At least he wasn’t completely at the bottom of the scoreboard, he had enough assist points to keep him from that embarrassing fate. He honestly could just pass off his performance today as not being ready, due to being asked to fill in on such a short notice. Not the fact that he was starting to crash and fall asleep right on his feet as he stared up at the numbers and points-
“Boombox.”
Medkit’s voice coming from behind him shot Boombox awake completely as he whirled around to face his boyfriend, trying to act like he wasn’t just about to take a quick standing up nap, totally not. He smiled brightly at the other, swinging his gear back up to its usual place on his shoulder. “Med! You did great today!”
“Thank you,” Medkit’s gaze flicked over to the scoreboard behind the DJ, and the awkward silence that followed spoke volumes. Boombox knew he was trying to figure out something to say regarding his score that didn’t come out sounding wrong, but it wasn’t really coming to him easily.
Not that he blamed the other for it, he wasn’t on par with his usual performance, and it really wasn’t worth complimenting or commenting over. Boombox gave a hum, looking over his shoulder to take another glance at the scores again. Everyone else had already departed to their typical post-phight routines, and since Skateboard and Slingshot weren’t here for this phight, that meant Boombox would be going right home. He just needed to head to the bus stop and wait for it to get there, simple enough because then he’d get home, crash on his couch, and take a well-deserved nap.
“I was wondering if you wanted a ride home.”
“Huh?” Boombox whirled around again to look at Medkit, whose attention was now wholly on him instead of the scoreboard. It still gave him butterflies, even though they’d been dating for a couple of months at this point.
“You take the bus home after phights,” Medkit continued bluntly, “I can drive you back, because you seem like you’ll fall asleep at the bus stop, or on the bus and miss your stop.”
See, now Boombox couldn’t even counter that, because he knew that was a very real possibility with how tired he was now and the fact he almost fell asleep standing up. His face flushed in embarrassment, and he couldn’t even think of a good reason to decline it. That car ride meant it could very well lead to a conversation about the gig, and it still felt too soon to have that talk.
Unfortunately, he was out of options that wouldn’t look suspicious.
“Yeah- yeah! A ride home would be good!” Boombox grinned, praying that Medkit wouldn’t take note of how tense he felt. He knew he was good at disguising it, but for some reason it never seemed to fool Medkit, no matter how hard he tried. “Let’s go-”
The DJ tried to fill the silence with idle chatter, but he felt like it got to a point of nervous rambling as he got into Medkit’s car. Eventually, that died down too, and they were left to sit in silence together as the healer began the drive to Playground. Like always, there was no music, and without Boombox’s typical chatter to fill the air, it was unusually quiet. The air felt thick, like there was tension and too many unspoken words in the air from both of them, and that had to mean that he knew.
He knew that it was Boombox at the party, and this was going to be it. They were going to talk in Medkit’s car, and then Boombox would get dropped off at his apartment and that would be it. Maybe he was catastrophizing again, but how else could it go? What else could happen?
Boombox chose to stare out the window, watching the buildings fly by as his eyes started to grow heavy. Medkit wasn’t far off when guessing that Boombox would fall asleep on the bus. Despite how tense the air in the car felt, he could feel himself starting to drift off. He shut his eyes for what felt like a moment, and then when he opened them again, he felt groggier, rubbing his eyes under the visor as he stared at the sun setting behind his apartment building-
Oh
phuck
the sun was setting. He fell
asleep
on the drive home.
Boombox shot up straight in Medkit’s car seat, the other’s jacket falling from its place on him (wait when the hell did Medkit’s jacket end up on him?) as he started rambling out apologies, “Phuck- oh phuck- sorry Med! Genuinely did not mean to fall asleep in your car for this long-”
“Your sleep schedule.” Medkit cut in, his body turned to face Boombox from his seat, “What happened to mess it up?”
This was it. Boombox was going to dig his grave and lie in it, and pray that someone would come fill it in because there was no running from this one. He could always try to stall, but he wasn’t sure how much Medkit knew. He needed to gauge how bad this could be, he needed to know.
“I had a gig that ran really late last weekend,” That wasn’t a lie, it did run late, it just generally tended to always run late, “It messed up my schedule big time and I haven’t been able to fix it-”
Medkit sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose before he spoke again, “Boombox. I’m not going to beat around the bush. I had a meeting in Playground last weekend, and there was a brief interruption from the DJ that was performing that night. So, I need you to tell me if it was you or not that I saw, because it would really grant me some peace of mind to know.”
What was he even supposed to say to that? Even if Boombox wanted to say anything, it felt like the words died on his tongue. He shrank back into the seat, praying that Medkit would just drop it, would see that this was too soon to talk about and that they could pick this conversation up any other time just not now . Anything he could say to dispute it wouldn’t leave him, like his own brain didn’t want him to admit it or lie about it. So he sat there, silent, unable to pick something to say.
“Because if it was you,” Medkit continued, “Then you could be in trouble because from what I’ve heard: that’s not a good place to be, it’s dangerous. What if someone else found out it was you? What if it was someone that wanted to use that against you? What if they already know it’s you?”
The same song and dance, the same thing he’d heard people say before about alias gigs in hushed whispers, the warnings he’d been given three years ago when it was already too late and he was already solidified as a partial team member at the warehouse. Medkit clearly saw him, heard him, knew that it was him but didn’t want to believe it until he heard it from Boombox himself. He just wanted to say that yes, it was him there, but Medkit kept talking about the dangers of it, the things Boombox already knew , and he couldn’t stop the words from leaving his mouth.
“I’m not stupid Med! I know!” Boombox interrupted as he threw his hands up and shut his eyes, effectively making Medkit go completely quiet as the words continued to spill out of the DJ like an open faucet, “I know it’s dangerous! I know I’m not safe! There’s a reason why I only go to gigs when I have to!”
There was a beat of quiet, and Boombox felt his blood run cold as he cracked open his eyes and realized what he’d just said, what he’d just done. That wasn’t what he meant to do, that wasn’t what he meant to say- there had to be a way to salvage this before it was too late and everything was ruined. “Med?” He started, ignoring the way his heart pounded with anxiety as he rambled apologies all over again, “Med I’m sorry-”
Silence. Boombox was met with complete silence. His gaze quickly darted over to look at Medkit’s face, seeing the healer looking at him with a look nothing short of shocked and a hand over his mouth.
This was it for them. This had to be it. He’d just completely phucked it up, just with one outburst.