Archive of Our Own ^beta

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Things Idia didn’t get: social cues (overrated, anyway), the limited-edition Cyrene skin in HSR (lowk mid since it was just a cosmetic change for her bow), and how NRC was supposed to be the GOAT of arcane academies if they shut down all of campus ‘cause of one lousy snowstorm. Thaaaaat somehow affected not just all of Sage’s Island, but every dorm dimension as well.

Chapter Text

Idia wasn’t entirely sure how Cater managed to convince him that baking gingerbread cookies was a good way to spend a Saturday afternoon. “It’ll be fun! And ‘cammable!” was usually, like, the Least Convincing Dialogue Option of All Time, but Idia was never gonna lose the CSAs (Cater Simp Awards), so he’d allowed himself to be swept along in what would defo be a S-rank difficulty sidequest. 

And now here he was: in Heartslabyul’s kitchen, sleeves rolled up like he’d been yeeted back into the Culinary Crucible.

Cater was already humming some winter bubblegum pop remix and was scrolling a recipe on his phone. “Okay, so,” he announced, reading dramatically, “Step one: get flour, spices, baking soda, etc. Step two: mix it? I think that’s what Trey does. Step three: cut out the cookies, bake, and then decorate cute ginger-versions of ourselves—well, mostly you, IG, since I’m already cute and ginger. Step four: take pics!”

“You forgot ‘pretend like we didn’t set off the fire alarm,’” Idia muttered. ‘Cause they would. It was written in the stars, ATP. [Cue Star Rogue OST, plz and thx.]

Cater laughed and tossed him an apron. “Not with our powers combined, we won’t! We can totes handle baking a few cookies without needing to bust out any water magic. I mean—look at this domestic vibe! We’re, like, ten seconds away from becoming a viral Magicam couple.”

Idia flushed instantly. The pink hue curling through his flames caused Cater to grin, which only made him glow hotter.

After that humiliating display, they mixed, measured, and made a spectacular mess. This was expected and actually apart of Idia’s dev notes for this particular matchup. But he could deal ‘cause the kitchen smelled warm, like ginger, cloves, and mischief, since apparently, Cater had been given express orders not to go through the spice cabinet, after the mess he’d made last time trying to “flavorize” his hot cocoa.

Once the dough mixture, AKA, a thick brown mound that looked only vaguely edible, sat in front of them, Cater poked it.

“… So, like,” he said lightly, “dare me to eat some.”

Idia froze. “Excuse me?”

“Dare me,” Cater insisted, eyes bright. “C’mon. Tell me to eat the cookie dough.”

“That’s—” Idia’s brain lagged worse than his PC did whenever he opened his super secret folder that did not contain 2.3 TB of BL manga screencaps. “That’s literally just you asking me to dare you to get salmonella. Are you trying to speedrun the infirmary or something?!”

Cater made an exaggerated pout, lower lip wobbling. “Aw, you’re worse than Trey. But also: even if I did get salmonella—hypothetically!—would you still kiss me?”

Idia sputtered so violently that he inhaled something that seemed mildly un-air-like. “Grk! W—why—what—t—that’s a trick question!” It was giving “would you still love me if I was a worm?” and everyone knew that there was no right answer to that!

Cater beamed. “Aww, you’re blushing! That’s so cute!”

Idia wished he had more control of certain bodily functions.

They returned to working and rolling out the dough, though Cater kept glancing at Idia with that suspiciously scheming glimmer. Idia pretended not to notice. He focused on trying to roll evenly with Cooking Mama-level determination, even when Cater’s fingers brushed his every time they adjusted their rolling pins, causing the tips of his hair to go Zero-Two-pink.

As they procured various cookie cutters and began to cut out the little men, Cater leaned in with that too-casual cheeriness. “JTLYK, if flour gets on your cheek,” he said, “I reserve the right to wipe it off. With my thumb. Or my lips. Dealer’s choice.”

Thankfully, the oven’s preheat alarm dinged right then, saving Idia from what would be an obviously embarrassing response that would be less response and more incoherent stuttering.

They scrambled to transfer each little gingerbread onto a baking sheet and slid them into the oven. Then, they used the baking time to clear the counter of flour explosions and stray utensils; ninety-percent were neither of their faults, obviously. The second the real timer chimed, though, both of them hurried back to the oven like anxious parents checking on their firstborn batch of cookies.

When the cookies miraculously weren’t burnt, Idia stared down at them in awe. “Mission actually success,” he whispered. “We didn’t fail.”

Cater grinned. “Of course we didn’t! Cay-Cay always slays, duh.” He took one gingerbread figure and examined it as if it were some rare magical artifact that Trein had asked them to pass around and not, like, a mixture of flour and sugar and eggs and stuff.

“KK, now lemme find those icing tubes that Trey promised he’d leave out,” Cater said, after he was satisfied with their work. He spent way too long clattering around the kitchen, which was dumb, since this was literally his dorm and he should probs know where more things were.

After he finally found them (two inches from where they’d been standing), they both pretended that that hadn’t taken ten full minutes and grabbed the icing and got to decorating.

“Who’s that?” Idia asked as Cater piped blue icing onto one cookie. He knew Cater had wanted to decorate a cookie to look like him, but, c’mon? Did he look that wet-paper-bag-adjacent? Er, actually, don’t answer that.

“You,” Cater said instantly, dotting little blue icing flames for hair. “Ginger-Idia needs to look extra snackable.”

Idia’s cheeks went pink again. “Y—you mean, aesthetically accurate?”

“Um, sure! That.”

Trying to retaliate, Idia attempted to decorate a Cater cookie—adding green eyes, a little smile, an icing pompadour, and a tiny frosting phone in one hand.

Cater peeked over. “Sevens, I look totes adorbs!” He immediately struck a pose next to the cookie as if comparing accuracy, then returned to decorating with laser focus. Twenty minutes later, when the icing had set, Cater quietly scooted the Ginger-Idia and Ginger-Cater cookies close.

Idia watched with mounting dread.

Cater pressed them together so their frosting mouths met. Then, with great gravitas, he made a soft mwah noise.

“… Cater,” Idia whispered, mortified. “They’re cookies.” Not 1/7-scale PVC figures, which would have been totally acceptable.

Cater held them mid-kiss and said, “Look, Ids! They’re us! Finally kissing! Can you believe it? Took forever to get here.”

Idia covered his face. “Y—you—today—have made an obscene number of references to kissing me. Or, um, the other way around.”

Cater threw his arms up. “Sigh, yes, Ids. That’s maybe BECAUSE I’VE BEEN TRYING TO DROP HINTS THAT I WANT YOU TO KISS ME.”

Idia blinked. “Oh.”

“YES. OH.”

“So …” Idia swallowed. He and Cater had reached the kiss ending before, but he’d never been so, er, direct. It was … kinda hot, TBH. “You … actually … want me to?”

Cater softened instantly. “Um, yeah, always, actually.”

Idia short-circuited entirely, heart and hair sparking in equal measure. But then he leaned in, Cater met him, and everything else melted away.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

“Wanna know what’s sad?” Cater wondered as he and Idia crossed the Ignihyde lounge one day after class en route to his room.

Idia rolled his eyes good-naturedly. OK, not good-naturedly. Agathokakological-naturedly (that was a thirty-two base point word, BTW), maybe. “Um, and spare you the joy of telling me? LOL, no THX.”

Cater poked him in the nose. “You’re giving Grinch, but fineeee, I won’t keep you in suspense.” He stopped short and gestured toward the ill-used lounge space—ill-used only ‘cause there was a net zero number of Ignihyde students who left their rooms long enough to wanna slum it in their state-of-the-art lounge that was tailored to every one of their interests. Gods, who’d want that when they could hunch over their PC setups in the quiet of their room?! 

“This,” Cater declared, “is the saddest, bleakest, most Christmas-less place in the entire school.”

Idia blinked, then frowned. “That’s … the point? Ambience: death. Mood: despair. Color palette: blue and suffering. That’s literally the Ignihyde brand, courtesy of the GOAT: the King of the Underworld.”

“Yeah, well, it’s December,” Cater said, hands on his hips. “And even your brand deserves a little joy. You gotta keep up, or else you’ll never be #trending!”

Idia winced. Joy. A terrifying word. Like “group project” or “flight lesson”.

Cater grinned mischievously. “So we’re putting up a Christmas tree!”

The flames at the tips of Idia’s hair sputtered. “WE’RE what—?! SINCE WHEN?! R U SRS?! No one here will even look at it!” The Ignihyde lounge was a ghost town on a good day!

“OK, slay,” Cater replied. “Then no one will complain.”

Before Idia could protest further, Cater dragged him to a large cardboard box sitting ominously by the wall. Glitter leaked from its seams.

“Where did that come from?” Idia asked. Unauthorized stuff in the lounge was s’posed to be reported to him ASAP! And then he’d delegate like a boss and ask Ortho to investigate!

Cater shrugged. “Found it in Heartslabyul’s storage. Consider it an inter-dorm gift.”

“Ohhh.” Idia nodded. He could swing that. As long as he didn’t have to put in a PO or log an invoice or anything. “Whee hee hee, so you stole it.”

“UM, not stole—‘rehome’ is the word most people use.” Cater corrected, already opening the box.

Fake pine branches puffed out. A cascade of red and gold ornaments clattered onto the floor. A coil of lights leached out down the side like smoke from some cursed loot box. That’s probs BC it is.

“Help me set it up?” Cater asked, bright and hopeful as he wrangled out pieces of a plastic pine tree. 

Idia’s fight-or-flight activated. “Hard pass. That’s, like, manual labor AND seasonal.”

But then Cater pouted and Idia was doomed. “Pleaseeeeeeeeeee?”

Which meant all he could do was let out a defeated sigh and sit beside him.

They assembled the tree slowly. It turned out to be significantly easier than expected, considering the whole thing came in three pieces that you just had to stack atop each other. Idia hadn’t even needed a tutorial, even though the weight of the unfluffed branches proved way too much for his toothpick arms.

When the top piece clicked on, Cater stepped back and beamed. “Phase one! Complete~”

“Grumble grumble, how many phases are there?” Idia muttered.

“Um, TBD?” said Cater. “Stay tuned, I guess!” 

Next came the lights. Untangling them was a mini-boss fight Idia barely survived. Cater cheered every time he freed another loop, like Idia was speedrunning a holiday puzzle game. At some point, Cater summoned his clones to take the remaining decorations and party cannon the rest of the lounge with idol-performance finale cheer.

Meanwhile, the two of them wrapped the lights around the tree together—Cater circling gracefully, Idia following behind and complaining like he secretly wasn’t digging the way the red and green colors were way evocative of Premo’s holiday costume lineup.

“Looking good. Supes Christmassy,” Cater said, nodding at his and Idia’s work and at the way his clones had ribboned and garlanded most every surface. The lounge felt different already—less sterile, less cold. The coziness touched every corner. Idia’s flames pinkened slightly without him realizing.

Helpfully, Idia noted, “‘Christmassy’ has ‘ass’ in it. Maybe that’s the word you’re looking for 4head?”

“Hm~ I spy with my little eye,” Cater began. Then, he and all his clones pointed an accusing finger at Idia. “A grinch!” As his clones went back to vomiting Christmas all over Ignihyde, Cater continued, “A grinch who’s one-hundo percent gonna lose his ornament-choosing privileges, bee-tee-dubs.”

Idia snorted. He was NGL, that was not something he was gonna weep over, but he figured he’d be nice-adjacent. Don’t wanna end up on Cater’s—er, what do they call it again? Naughty list? “Fine. My bad. It looks Christmassy.”

“OMG, you’re so right???” Cater cheered, as if he hadn’t just come to that same conclusion thirty seconds ago. Either way, he offered up a case of ornaments and nodded to Idia. “Pick one.” 

Inside were glitter baubles, round, sparkling hedgehogs (these were from Heartslabyul, after all) , a frankly-terrifying flamingo, and—Idia’s hand paused—fifty-two ornaments decorated to look like individual playing cards. He gingerly picked up the delicate four of diamonds one and wordlessly hung it on a middle branch.

Cater made a soft, pleased noise. “Cute.”

“The rest are trash-tier—that’s all,” Idia corrected, mortified by how warm his ears felt.

They continued decorating. Cater hummed. Idia’s movements slowly relaxed. When Cater placed a star on top—standing on a rolling chair and wobbling just enough to make Idia panic (like he’d be able to catch him if he fell)—they stepped back to admire their work.

The tree glowed red and gold and green and soft. The lounge no longer looked like a high-tech morgue, but was covered in felt snow that Cater’s clones would have to clean up in January, no ifs, ands, or buts; wreaths of various sizes; golden candlesticks; pots of poinsettias; and holly branches.

Cater bumped Idia’s shoulder. “See? Way less bleak.”

“…Yeah,” Idia admitted quietly. It did feel nicer—warmer. But something inside told him, as he glanced at the boy grinning by his side, that the tree and decorations only had a part in making it that way. Cater knocked his shoulder knowingly, and Idia smiled. A very small part.

Chapter Text

Idia would never admit it ‘cause that would mean lots of attention, perhaps an award or national day of honor of some kind, a slew of unlocked achievements that everyone’d force him to pin to his status page, and endless responsibility since people would always look to him in times of trouble: he was genuinely OP at wrapping presents. 

And not in a stupid way, even. He was methodical. Knew the exact length of wrapping paper to measure even when the gift was angular and weirdly-shaped (TBTW he’d gotten his parents that state-of-the-art milk frother and still managed to wrap it perfectly) like the very first prototype of Ortho’s head. His tape estimation and folding—gift wrap, not clothes—skills had been maxed out since birth, basically. Not that he’d done much wrapping back then, but yeah. 

Idia had every intention of taking this secret to the grave, ‘til GAME OVER flashed over his screen and the gods decided whether he reached the good ending or the bad one. 

Which was why, when Cater flopped onto the overly-decorated Ignihyde lounge chair with a cheerful,“KK, let’s wrap presents together! It'll be, like, a super wholesome couple activity!” Idia almost short-circuited on the spot. Er, if he went through with that, he’d be forced to do a challenge run where he equipped every debuff ever and pretended he was at Lv. 0 in the Gift Wrapping skill. 

But OFC he was gonna go through with it. He was a Cater Diamond glazer ‘til the end of time, after all.

Cater dumped a pile of presents and wrapping paper between them. “JTLYK,” he announced while selecting a roll printed with spades, hearts, clovers, and diamonds, “I’m kinda mid at this. But it’s all about aesthetics, right?” He winked and popped a peace sign for reasons Idia had yet to discern. “Even if they only look OK, they’ll photograph cute, and eat with a filter slapped on.”

Idia made a strangled noise. OFC Cater’s standards were “looks good on Magicam,” which unfortunately(!!) also meant Cater would be oblivious to any actual technique. Great. Perfect. SS-tier, even. Ideal parameters for deception.

He picked up a box of special edition playing cards—Ace’s gift, probs—and pretended to fumble the edges of a sheet of wrapping paper. “Oops. Uh. Guess I’m, like … bad at this too. LAWL. Tragic.”

Cater laughed, already battling a crooked seam of tape. “LMAO, same! It’s OK! I mean, it’s the thought that counts, right?”

The thought. Right. Idia swallowed hard.

For the next hour, Cater wrapped with an abnormal amount of focus and an even more abnormal amount of caffeinated black tea. Bows were everywhere, tape rolls stuck to themselves, and the clones he summoned did not help??? At all? (Idia almost considered dragging out his patented Idia Shroud’s Gift-o-Rama 5000 Technomantic Gift Wrapping Machine, but thought better of it.) Yet somehow—because he was Cater freaking Diamond—everything still looked kinda adorable. The gifts had moxie. Brains. Spunk. Or SMTH.

Meanwhile, Idia continued to perform the most gimped run of his stupid baka life.

He deliberately mismeasured paper. He folded corners wrong. He pulled tape too early, so it stuck in the absolute worst spots. He created a wrapping disaster so tragic it belonged in a highlight reel titled “Top 10 Christmas Fails—Number 6 Will Make You Cry.”

Cater, oblivious, patted his shoulder sympathetically. “Aww, DW, Ids. We can’t ALL be crafty kings.”

Idia’s internal stats screamed in anguish.

But then Cater leaned against him. “This is nice though,” he said quietly. “Our first Christmas together.”

If you expected Idia to not go pink at that, then you were wrong and probs needed your gray matter checked. “Y—yeah. Nice.”

They kept wrapping, and Cater hummed some winter remix under his breath while Idia pretended to fight the gift wrapping scissors as if he hadn’t already finessed them years ago. A comfortable silence settled, ‘cause even Cater liked the times when he could be “off”. 

As Cater scribbled on a spade-themed gift tag, Idia found himself staring at him. At the light catching in his hair. At the crinkle of concentration between his brows. At the faint smile he wore like he couldn’t quite hide how happy he was.

And Idia thought: what do you even give someone like that?

Sure, he still needed presents for Ortho. And he was almost considering getting Azul some crappy prize from an aquarium-themed claw game he’d seen a coupla days ago. But for Cater—his first Christmas with Cater—every idea felt wrong. Too impersonal. Too small. Too … not-enough.

He tried to picture Cater’s expression opening something he’d bought or created (Magicam algorithm haxx maybe?)—but nothing felt worthy of that warm, bright look Cater got whenever he glanced Idia’s way.

Idia wrapped another present badly, heart thudding. Nothing he could buy felt big enough, personal enough, right enough.

He needed the perfect gift.

Buuuuuut he had no idea what that was.

So he pressed another crooked piece of tape onto his fake-disaster wrap job and told himself: I’ll figure it out. I have to. I’ll keep thinking until I do.

After all … it was their first Christmas together.

And some gifts needed to be perfect.

Chapter Text

Idia had spent the last week pretending not to get sucked into the Christmas spirit, but the universe—no, Cater (but maybe that was the same thing?)—kinda speedran his defenses. First the hot chocolate. Then gingerbread cookie baking. And ice skating. The tree decorating. Followed by the whole “wrapping presents together” thing. Then Cater’s smile when he’d said the ridiculously shōjo-manga-LI-coded words: “our first Christmas together.”

Somehow, Idia’s holiday meter had ticked upward. Just a little. Maybe to, like … twelve percent. Or at least enough that he’d started actively wondering what other holiday excursions existed in the “normie romance DLC pack.” After hours of research, he came up with a buncha things, but one stood out above the rest: winter night festival markets. Couples at winter night festival markets. Kisses at winter night festival markets.

It was a whole genre, apparently. And—uh—not that he was thinking about the kiss part (obsessively, at least), but he’d noticed a banner on the Sage’s Island online bulletin board:

WINTER SOMETHINGFEST MARKET — ONE NIGHT ONLY. Lanterns, lights, food stalls, live music. Bring someone special!

“Someone special” was way too on the nose. It made his flames spark pink for several seconds before he could force himself to dim down to a cool blue.

Still … he bookmarked the page.

And somehow—somehow—he found himself outside Cater’s room the next evening, tugging at his scarf like it was choking him. When Cater opened the door, hair tousled and his makeup lived in, Idia forgot every line of the mental script he’d prepared.

“Grk, uh,” he croaked. “D—do you wanna go somewhere? With me? Like. Effective immediately?”

Cater blinked, then brightened instantly. “A date??” He took Idia’s flabbergasted sputtering as a “yes”, plucked his jacket off the rack, and grabbed Idia’s hand before he could flee gigachad-esquely. “Lead the way!”

They took the mirror out of Heartslabyul and slipped off campus to the town nearby, where lampposts lined the snow-dusted cobblestones. As they approached the main plaza, Cater slowed in awe.

The Winter Somethingfest Market shimmered across the night like someone had cracked open a storybook or looped a holiday anime episode. Ribbons of lights draped between rooftops like falling stars. Fat flurries drifted lazily, and pink-nosed people operated and clustered around stalls selling all manner of Christmas crap, not limited to: warm pastries, handmade ornaments, pre-lit garlands, and bundles of mistletoe attached to candy-cane-striped fishing poles. (Classy.)

Gasping, Cater’s mouth dropped open. “OMG, the way it’s giving winter wonderland? I’m obsessed.”

Idia flushed. “I—I saw online that couples go to these. In shows. Sometimes. I thought … IDK. Maybe you’d wanna try it IRL?”

“This is adorbs, so, um, yes! Let’s go!” Idia felt Cater’s gloved hands slip into his, and his insides warmed to a degree that usually promised combustion.

They stepped into the crowd—not too dense, thankfully—and began wandering between festival stalls. Cater steered them toward a booth selling snow globes. Each one held a miniature scene that came alive when shaken.

“Oooh, look!” Cater pointed at one featuring two tiny ice-skating figures. “Us!”

Idia squinted. “Ix-nay. They both look coordinated, so …”

“C’mon you weren’t thaaaaat bad … Y’know. Compared to, like, toddlers.”

Idia hmphed as they continued their trek. They passed a hot drink stand where flavors ranged from normal (literally regular cocoa) to questionable (Dubai-chocolate-matcha-ube-Buldak-sauce Supreme (free Labubu charm included!)). Cater immediately bought the latter. Idia ordered regular hot chocolate and decided that if he’d had a hot chocolate tier list, this version’d definitely be just below whatever variety Cater had produced when they’d been snowed in at Heartslabyul. Read: solidly a B. 

Somewhere near the center of the plaza, a small stage lit up as a quartet of musicians began playing twinkly winter music—the same kind Cater had been humming all. Damn. Week. 

They continued walking until they found a quieter corner near a fountain decorated with faux-magestones that sparkled atop the water using some kinda levitation magic. Cater leaned against the railing, breath puffing in the cold.

“NGL, this,” he murmured, his green eyes meeting Idia with more honesty than he showed most people, “is, like, my fave Christmas ever.”

Idia swallowed, flames glowing softly pink. “… Mine too.”

And beneath the swirling snow, with the music echoing gently through the plaza, they stayed like that, wondering how something as simple as a winter night could feel so much like magic.

Then Cater leaned in—barely—and murmured, “Hey, Ids?”

Idia squeaked, “Wh—what?”

“C’mere a sec.”

Before Idia could overthink, Cater pressed a quick, tiny kiss to the corner of his mouth. Soft. Warm. Gone in a heartbeat.

Idia’s flames went Kirby-pink.

Cater grinned. “Actually? Now it’s my fave Christmas ever.”

Idia made a noise that was more pathetic whimper than anything. Didn’t stop him from still agreeing, though.

Chapter Text

For someone with over six-thousand hours logged in various FPS titles—including the four-hundred hours he’d sunk into Some Game 5: FPS Edition alone—Idia SRSLY, really, objectively shoulda been cracked at snowball fights.

In theory.

In practice?

He was getting creamed.

It wasn’t fair. He knew every angle, every arc trajectory, every optimal cover position. His brain had the entire courtyard-slash-battlefield mapped from the moment they stepped outside. The problem was that his body—the noodle-armed version of him that’d been equipped since birth with the most dogwater stats ever—absolutely refused to translate that knowledge into physical output.

It felt kinda like being inside a mech suit where the controls all lit up beautifully, but the limbs didn’t move, or lagged, or wobbled in slow-motion even though the interface told him that he was executing a precision dodge. He’d slam the metaphorical button for evasive maneuver, but his spindly legs stayed planted. He calculated and visualized the throw … then his arm yeeted the snowball into a tree.

Cater, his boyfriend, meanwhile, was, apparently, built different.

Idia was p’ sure Cater had never held an FPS controller in his life and yet here he was, ducking and weaving and launching photo-perfect snowballs like he’d been born with auto-aim in his limbs. 

It was honestly insulting to watch—like the universe had handed him S-tier reflexes alongside a 5-star skin perk. (Funny how none of this assault-adjacent athleticism ever translated into Vargas’ P.E. lessons.)

It felt like a violation of several unspoken game balance rules. Sigh. TBF, this entire disaster had started as a non-PvP scenario.

It began innocently enough: Cater had begged Idia to come outside and help build snowmen because “It’s winter! And cute! And Magicam needs content!” Idia had planned to stay indoors, but Cater had already pulled him into the fresh powder so fast he might as well’ve been fast-traveled there.

They’d started by carving out space in the courtyard, which was covered in soft, sticky snow. Packing conditions? Optimal. 

Cater had immediately launched into building a snowman shaped like some no-name pop star. And he was only no-name BC he was entirely fictitious, born from the unholy union of Cater’s Twisterest boards, Magicam saves, and late-night MV binges, resulting in a snowman so aggressively stage-ready it practically demanded a comeback trailer.

“OK, Ids, I want you to meet Cinq Club!” Cater announced proudly. “A pop idol but make it Heartslabyulian.”

Idia raised an eyebrow ‘cause he swore he’d heard that name before. “Uh, why does that sound so familiar?”

“IDK!” Cater blushed so hard the red diamond on his cheek disappeared. "SRSLYhavenoideabutmaybestopaskingmaybealsoplease!"

Idia chose to drop it and focus on his own snowman. After circulating through several anime characters and the leads of Premo, he finally decided to build something more grounded. An Ortho snowman. Not a cartoonish, half-assed one, either—Idia went full engineer mode. It wasn’t his fault; once he started shaping the torso, he couldn’t not try to recreate Ortho’s proportions exactly. He had constructed Ortho’s body from scratch, after all. The schematics were etched into his brain.

He packed the snow carefully, carving subtle lines where plating would go, smoothing spots where metal joints should connect. Cater came over halfway through, squealed, and immediately took twenty pictures.

“OMG, it’s so realistic,” Cater gasped, his breath clouding the air. “Idia, he looks like he’s about to say, ‘Brother, if you don’t wear more layers, you’ll get hypothermia.’”

Idia snorted. “You’re not even wrong, though.”

Cater had proudly positioned his pop-star snowman next to Ortho-snowman and now snapped a selfie between them. Idia felt his hair flare a bashful pink at the proximity.

Everything was wholesome … until Cater flicked a tiny ball of snow at him.

It hit Idia square in the chest.

He froze. “Did … did you just—”

Cater’s grin sharpened, eyes narrowing with playful challenge. “Try to keep up, ‘kay?”

Idia sputtered indignantly. “Wha—like I’d ever lose to you!”

Then Cater threw another one.

And Idia—activated not by athleticism but by tripping straight into aggro-mode—scooped up snow so fast that not even an overclocked CPU could keep up with him. He calculated trajectory. Factored wind. Predicted Cater’s movement as if he had that busted anime ability where future hitboxes shimmered before the enemy even moved. He launched his snowball …

… and it veered five feet left and smacked the ground with an anticlimactic plop.

Cater blinked. “Uh. Um? Ids? Where were you aiming?”

Idia burned pink. “It was a … warning shot.” IT SO WAS NOT!

“Adorable,” Cater cooed. Then he hit Idia directly in the shoulder.

And so the Snowball War Arc began.

Cater darted around the courtyard with uncanny grace, practically dancing through the snow. Idia, meanwhile, occupied the tactical high ground (behind Ortho-snowman) and tried desperately to get his body to behave like a trained FPS avatar instead of a freaking rag doll.

“I know exactly what to do,” he muttered under his breath as he rolled another snowball. “But why won’t my motor functions GO THERE—” He yelped as another snowball grazed his ear, and retaliated. He wound up his aim; this time, RNGesus shone down on him, and he managed a decent throw. Cater screeched and dodged, but the snowball clipped his sleeve.

“Ohhhh, okay!” Cater laughed, brushing off the snow. “He’s powering up!”

“Grk, I—I’ve always been powered up!” Idia insisted, though his voice cracked in three places.

What followed was full-on winter carnage: Cater’s snowballs were annoyingly on point, while Idia’s alternated between elegant crescents and complete nonsense. He kept slipping, his legs refusing to mimic the anime-protag moves his brain queued up. Plus, he was sure the epic winter gear he’d slotted onto his person was causing major lag issues. Memo to memo, memo to me: study textiles to an annoying degree and make some OP, lightweight, but still durable coats to wear when the temps plummet again. 

But even as he got pelted, even as his precision aim betrayed him, even as his mech-suit metaphor became increasingly accurate … he wasn’t unhappy.

The courtyard glittered. Their snowmen watched like gleeful, lumpy spectators. And between volleys, Cater kept smiling at him—bright, joyful, fond in a way that made Idia’s chest heat up more than his flames ever could.

Eventually, Cater called a truce and flopped into the snow, panting. “GGWP. You almost had me.”

Idia dropped beside him, breathless. “Almost? I hit you … once.”

“That’s more than expected!” Cater nudged him with his boot. “And you looked supes cute being all gamer-intense.”

Idia hid his face in his hands. “Th—that wasn’t the goal.”

“Sure it was,” Cater teased. “It’s always the goal.”

Snow drifted quietly around them, softening the battlefield, covering their footprints. They trudged back toward their snowmen, dripping snow and, in Idia’s case, every iota of dignity he’d ever had ever. 

Cater bumped his shoulder. “Sooooo … same time next winter?”

Idia groaned. “Sure, IG, but I’m bringing my cannon.”