tear in my heart

ten|| too good to be true.

the monarch team was pretty dumbfounded when they had heard about what happened between prince and goggles. emperor almost laughed but realized it was rather cruel of him to do so (n-pacer actually shut him up real quick but he refused to admit that). eging jr saw it coming but didn't rub it in. he knew what it was like to be dumped but still be on good terms; hell, that's what happened between him and emperor after all. n-pacer was infuriated but refused to do anything rash. not only for prince's sake, but if she did something to harm goggles, headphones wouldn't forgive her. prince wasn't exactly sure how to react, he wanted so badly for goggles to say he was kidding or something, but that never came.

the most prince could do was sit in his room, eat chocolate ice cream, and listen to his teammates try to cheer him up.

"i guess that's just what happens when you fall for a moron," eging said with a small shrug, rubbing prince's back comfortingly. "this is why you must aim for someone less high maintenance, brother. gloves exceeds those standards just fine," emperor said with a cocky smile. "i thought you guys were trying to cheer me up," the youngest houzuki muttered, taking a bite of his ice cream. "want me to beat him up?" eging offered. emperor shook his head in disapproval. "eging jr, that's absolutely unacceptable. prince, will you please give me the honour of beating the shit out of your whore of an ex-boyfriend?" n-pacer groaned. "you two are impossible. this obviously isn't helping him at all, so stop suggesting such childish alternatives," she scolded, glaring at the two boys. "sorry, ma'am," eging said quickly, gulping at the sight of her glare. emperor stared down at his feet, avoiding eye contact with n-pacer. "eging, a word," the older houzuki brother said, causing the said inkling to raise an eyebrow. "excuse us."

while n-pacer reassuringly rubbed prince's back, eging and emperor went into the monarch's bedroom. "eging jr, your mention of challenging goggles seemed to upset n-pacer and prince," emperor said thoughtfully. "pfft! c'mon, man. you also suggested—"
"let me finish," he muttered, rubbing his chin. eging waited anxiously to hear what he had to say. "say, we do it without them knowing," he said with a mischievous smile. "yo, i was only kidding," the darker inkling said with a nervous chuckle. "does it sound like i am?" eging let out a small scoff. "c'mon, goggles is cool," he said. "but this is for prince," emperor insisted. a small and guilty groan escaped eging's lips before he said, "fine, let's do it."

the two discussed a plan and how they were going to execute it. eging knew how to kick ass, he was quite the troublemaker growing up (he actually dropped out of private school for causing a little too much trouble) but emperor had never done anything like this before. the older houzuki never found any reason to waste his time on some low level weakling but now that his little brother was sad and slowly breaking into little pieces, he decided he couldn't just stand around and watch.

emperor came to the conclusion that what goggles did was definitely not cool. and he realized the fact that what he did to eging wasn't any better.

🦑💙🦑💚

the feeling of his shorts being slipped down to his ankles was a feeling rider almost forgot due to the tension between he and goggles. but ever since their meeting at inkblot, everything seemed fine again. the yellow green inkling pulled up his shorts and turned to see the shorter boy giving a cheeky smile. "hi!" rider couldn't help but let out a small chuckle. "hi."

goggles stared at the direction rider was heading. "you gonna turf?" rider shook his head. "nah, i'm gonna do a few ranked battles," he said. "oh. well, find me when you're done. i'm gonna be hangin' around the square all day," goggles said with a warm smile. rider blushed. that smile was just so mesmerizing. the taller boy just couldn't take his eyes off of the small idiot. he was just... too good to be true.

"inkopolis to rider?" rider was pulled out of his thoughts when he saw goggles waving a hand in front of his eyes. "oh, sorry. i zoned out," he mumbled. "it's okay. have fun though, it's tower control right now. i'll see you after!" goggles bashfully pranced towards the squid beatz 2 machine outside the arcade and started scrolling through the many songs to dance to. rider felt a blush fall onto his cheeks as goggles hesitantly chose bomb rush blush. the yellow green inkling made his way into the deca tower.