Chapter Text
Pure Vanilla opened the door to the wafflebot warehouses, not announcing his presence but immediately being heard due to the loud squeaking of the rusted old metal door. They really needed to replace that thing.
"Hm? Who is it?" Espresso asked in the direction of the door, not looking up from the scanner him and Strawberry Crepe had been bent over for the past hour. Whatever they were researching, they were enraptured in it.
"Oh, Espresso! I'm glad to see you're in, I wanted to talk to you." Pure Vanilla walked in, Black Raisin not far behind.
Espresso finally looked up from the scanner, eyes widening. He put a hand on Strawberry Crepe's head, and turned their head to face Pure Vanilla too. "Ah. You look... well." He finally said, a strange look on his face that held only the slightest excitement.
Strawberry Crepe, however...
"Woah... those are. SO. COOL!" Strawberry Crepe's eyes lit up, pulling their head from Espresso’s grip to dash closer to Pure Vanilla, admiring each wing. "Are they real? Did you make them yourself? Can I scan them?!"
Pure Vanilla looked flustered, wings twitching instinctively, looking unsure on what the appropriate reaction was to this. His face had gone red. He looked like a deer in headlights with how desperate Strawberry Crepe looked to get closer to him- and how he'd frozen at their sudden approach. "Ah, that's sort of what I came here to ask for." He moved his staff from one hand to the other nervously.
Strawberry Crepe quickly pulled the scanner from Espresso’s hands, pointing it at Pure Vanilla with a wide grin on their face.
“Ripping that out of my hands wasn’t necessary.” Espresso finally said, not matching their excitement, watching the numbers roll onto the projector screen, though leaned in closer the longer the scan went on.
“Hm… well, congrats. You aren’t going to die.” Espresso finally pointed to a number in the long list of data. 52%.
“Zoom in on the wings! I don’t care about him, look at the wings!” Strawberry Crepe pushed him aside, adjusting the projector screen with all the excitement of a small child that had just been handed a comically large lollipop. Their eyes narrowed, glancing back at him. “They’re completely created from magic- like an illusion. Are they an illusion?”
“How on Earthbread did you go about getting these?” Espresso extended out one of Pure Vanilla's wings, but he realised quickly that he completely couldn't- the wing was at least twice, maybe even three times as wide as Pure Vanilla was tall, and at least as tall as him, making it completely impossible to open his full wingspan without squashing each one against the wall.
“I don’t know. Like I said to Black Raisin- I woke up with them. I think it has something to do with the souljam, though, if they’re made purely of magic.” Pure Vanilla tugged his wing out of Espresso's hand- he really wished cookies would ask before touching, considering he'd now discovered just how sensitive they were- which was very. He pulled it back around his body, running his fingers through the feathers. He wasn't sure why he felt such a desire to stroke his own wing, but the feathers were soft and it felt nice so he was hardly complaining. “I do feel… stronger- stronger than I felt before, at least. No- not stronger, that’s not the right word. More like… rejuvenated. Like I’ve just had the best nights sleep of my entire life.”
Black Raisin watched him do this silently while Espresso and Crepe checked through the scanner readings, looking like she wanted to ask him something but didn't quite dare.
He finally noticed her trying to gather up the courage to ask... something. "Black Raisin? Are you alright?"
Her eyes widened a fraction, face going red. "Oh, yeah, I just... thought your wings looked really soft. I was debating whether or not it would be weird to ask to feel them."
Now he'd gone red- probably coming to the same conclusion she had, that being 'asking to pet someone is pretty strange'. He looked like he might actually be thinking about it for a minute before he shrugged, dragging his wings back and forth across the ground as he did. "I guess you can. I don't think I could ever possibly stop anyone from touching them anyway. And... you'd probably feel them while I'm asleep too if I don't."
"No I wouldn't- and you say that about everything I ask you to let me do." She crossed her arms indignantly, in disbelief that he was accusing her of... watching him sleep, presumably. Just because she sort of had once or twice didn't mean she made a habit of it- she'd only watched for his own good.
"That's because you do. I'm- well, I'm not a super light sleeper, but- my staff is a very light sleeper. You're quiet, not silent. You always wake my staff up, and then it shows me what you did in the night." He let a smile creep across his face at the look of complete embarrassment that had just overtaken her. "You let your sneaking skills get sloppy late at night. And yes, I did see you trip over the air that one time."
She looked like she might be about to defend herself before she frowned. "Wait, what? Your staff is actually alive? That thing sleeps? I thought it was just a fancy walking stick you had an unhealthy attachment to and the eye was just for decoration." She narrowed her eyes at the light in his staff, and for a moment she could've sworn it looked like it narrowed back at her.
"A walking stick!? I should feel insulted. Stop saying such things- you're making me feel old. You'll be putting me in a nursing home next." His words made it seem like he was mad at her, but he was laughing too, and his tone betrayed no hostility- maybe a little annoyance, but no full-on anger.
She gave him an incredulous look. "You are old. Like- a hundred thousand or something. You probably got to, like- ride a dinosaur or something.”
"That's just- no! I'm not in the millions, Raisin. Even if I was- that's still not long enough ago." He suddenly thought about that for a moment, then shook his head. "Actually... I'm getting close to the millions. That's... huh."
He'd zoned out again, seemingly trying to decide how to feel about being an ancient relic, before eventually deciding he didn't really care as long as he never had to look as old as he was.
Black Raisin took this opportunity to finally press a hand to his wing, running her fingers through his pristine-white feathers. She'd been right about them being soft- they resembled a swan's wings, though they also seemed to shimmer as each one moved, catching the sunlight and glittering like golden string was weaved between each feather. His wing pressed back against her hand, like how a dog might rub against your leg to get your attention. His entire body shivered ever-so-slightly as she moved her hand- he must not have been lying about them being sensitive. He looked like he felt every particle of dust that landed on them.
He started making a low purring sound, something like the sound a cat might make if you scratched in the sweet spot behind its ears, until he caught himself- covering his mouth and going redder. "Ouh... I didn't hate that but I don't think I loved it either. That felt weird."
Espresso, spurred from his research at the sound of purring, gave the both of them a strange look. "Okay, which one of you was purring? And why?" His eyes narrowed at Pure Vanilla specifically, noticing how he seemed much more embarrassed than Black Raisin did.
"That was me. That was just because Black Raisin touched my wings!" Pure Vanilla crossed his arms around his chest, turning away from Black Raisin, but hadn't pulled his wings close enough to his body yet and knocked at least three books off the nearest shelf. "Ah, crumbs. I'll just..."
He twisted back around to the wall, looking worried as he picked the books up, though in doing so he nearly took Black Raisin out with a wing directly to the face.
Black Raisin stumbled back, looking a little shocked as she did. "Ow, Pure Vanilla, careful!"
He turned back to her, only knocking more things off the wall before finally taking a hint and pulling his wings around his body like a straitjacket. "Sorry, sorry. Didn't mean to!" He finally placed everything back on the wall, realising he actually felt quite nice wrapped up in his own wings- it was like being hugged tightly while also being wrapped in a warm, weighted blanket, which was definitely going to be his favourite aspect of these new wings.
Strawberry Crepe, who had finally finished doing their calculations, gave Pure Vanilla a thoughtful look. "You think you could fly with those things?" They held up a small piece of paper scribbled with equations that he wasn't willing to even begin to try to read, let alone understand. "If I've done these right, they should be about the right size to be able to fly."
"You know what, I didn't think about that. It would be kind of strange to get wings from my souljam but have them be nothing but decoration- they must have a purpose, I’m sure." Pure Vanilla admired one giant wing, then shrugged, though he didn’t seem to able to shrug properly anymore, shoulders too weighed down to. "Maybe I'll try that out later."
"Oh, come on, you can’t drop this on us and then leave it to later! Try it now! I need to see this!" Strawberry Crepe pleaded, and he finally gave in.
He laughed at their excitement, raising his hands like they’d accused him of purposely not trying his new wings out to specifically irritate them. "Oh, alright then. But I should probably do that outside."
Black Raisin groaned, having a bad feeling. "This is one-hundred-percent going to go wrong."