Through the Looking Glass: Chapter 2-B
Second Dream
Banjo found himself in a dream again, this time in a small room that for some reason had walls consisting entirely of silver metal. It was much less familiar territory than even the colorful void he had stepped in last time, and the only reason he was not actually uncomfortable was because he noticed Rouge laying down in a bed in the corner. The bear was confused by the flourescent lightbulb that was fixed in the ceiling, the bright light illuminating his chocolate-covered fur as his sky blue eyes looked around, seeing the place devoid of decoration.
Suddenly, he heard a slight shifting, and that was when the bear noticed Rouge sitting up in bed, looking at Banjo with shining topaz eyes.
"You remembered everything that occurred in our last dream, didn't you?" asked the bat quickly, standing up and acknowledging the bear.
"Yes!" replied Banjo, raising his hands in the air. "There's something else going on!"
Rouge nodded. "That much is for sure," she said, looking to the door. "And there's no way in hell I'm telling Eggman over on the other side of that door what's going on."
Banjo's eyebrow rose in curiosity. "Eggman?" he asked. "That's the name of the doctor?"
"Well, technically, his real name is Dr. Ivo Robotnik," replied Rouge, gesturing with her hand as she grimaced in distaste. "But since he's such a fatass his greatest rival has gone to the liberty of calling him 'Dr. Eggman'. I wonder if that evil witch that fought you had a stupid name..."
The honey bear shrugged at this. "If Gruntilda Winkybunion is stupid, then yes."
Rouge looked at Banjo briefly, and all too suddenly her eyes shone in merriment. In an instant, the bat had doubled over, laughing hysterically, her eyes shut tight as she let loose her loud laughter. Eventually, her laughing was so hard that she was writhing on the ground, tears coming out from her eyes at how funny she thought the name was.
"Oh, God!" she managed to get in the middle of her laughing. "Winkybunion! Ha ha ha ha ha! Wait until Sonic and friends hear about that! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Oh, my god! Ha ha! Winkybunion! Haaaa...!"
"I'll take that as a yes then," replied Banjo, a slight blush creeping under his cheeks that his fur was thankfully doing a good job of hiding.
Eventually, the bat's laughter died down, and then she stood back up, wiping a tear from her eye as she realized something.
"Although, how would you make fun of that, anyway?" she asked.
The bear shrugged, taking the time to sit on Rouge's bed. "I dunno," he said, settling into the surprisingly soft mattress beneath him. "But Kazooie keeps calling her things like 'onion breath' and all that..."
The bat's eyebrows rose slightly as she heard this. "Kazooie?" she asked. "Who's that?"
"Oh, Kazooie?" asked the honey bear, only then noticing the absence of his rucksack on his back. "She's my best friend. We've lived in the same house for around twelve or so years. Well, no, actually, she's lived in my rucksack for that long. Or... I don't know how long anymore. It's hard to count. I've lost track after all the adventuring I've done with her. But anyways, she's always gone on every adventure I've been involved with, and every time she's been useful. She's also come up more insults than I can shake a finger at..."
"Really?" asked the bat, shrugging. "You don't have any secret feelings for her, do you?"
Surprised, Banjo rose up from where he sat on the bed abruptly. "W-what?" he asked. "Of course not! We've been the best of friends, but it's only been that!"
"Are you sure about that?" suggested the bat, placing her hands on her hips.
"Of course!" replied Banjo. "Kazooie's often way too loud and mean for me to actually feel for her in that sense..."
"I see..." said Rouge, one of her fingertips tracing her lips. "What is she, anyway?"
"Oh, she's a bird," said the honey bear, shrugging as he began to move around the metallic room. "I found her in the blue rucksack I was talking about earlier. I don't wear it in bed, though..."
"Hm..." Rouge tried to imagine Banjo wearing a blue backpack on his back, and when she found herself seeing a snarky bird sitting in a blue backpack she nodded.
The bear, meanwhile, had another question forming in his head. "And who's Sonic?"
"Oh, him?" asked Rouge, leaning against the desk. "He's Dr. Eggman's greatest rival. Always has been, and probably always will be. Anyways, he's a blue hedgehog..."
Banjo's eyes flashed briefly at this revelation, his mind going back to the L.O.G.'s comment to Kazooie he had made earlier that day. Thinking of this, the bear scratched his chin. "And he keeps emeralds away from this 'Eggman' person, am I right?"
The bat gasped in surprise as she heard this sentence. "H-how did you know?" she asked.
Banjo smiled brightly, crossing his arms in front of his chest and nodding.
"You know that friend that made people lose weight by wishing it?" began Banjo. "He knew something. In fact, he was able to tell me that I actually have a Chaos Emerald with me right now that was left by one Shadow the Hedgehog."
The treasure hunter's ears were pointed high in surprise at this, her mouth just slightly agape. She did not say anything as her mind tried to process how a simple and seemingly unassuming bear had found out about those two things. The silence was so long, Banjo's face eventually fell, his smile forming into lips that were curved downward as his eyes percieved her deep state of thought.
"H-how?" she finally asked. "How did you find out?"
"Well, given that this friend of mine is omnipotent..." replied Banjo with a shrug. "Why? What's the matter?"
"Shadow's one of my best friends!" exclaimed the bat perturbedly. This comment greatly surprised the honey bear, and he abruptly brought his arms behind him to brace himself against the wall. "Well... he was... I guess..." she added uncertainly.
Suddenly, Banjo's eyes took on a tone of concern for the bat, and then he came forward, standing in front of the bat. "What happened?" he asked.
"Well, I betrayed his trust..." she said uncertainly. "I... You know this doctor and his rival Sonic, right?"
"Yeah," replied the bear. "What happened.
"Well, this time the doctor managed to capture Sonic..." replied the bat. "And he would've captured me if I hadn't joined him voluntarily..."
"And that meant betraying your friends?" asked Banjo, anger flashing ever so briefly in his sky blue eyes as he asked his.
Rouge nodded uncertainly, laying a foot to rest on her desk. "But already I'm having doubts about it," she said. "First of all, he's doing something that I find fairly disturbing to one of Sonic's best friends. Second, I don't know if the rest of them can look me in the eyes without hating me anymore..."
"And is there something else?" asked the bear.
"Oh, just that I was going to steal the emeralds from under the doctor's nose once he had them all," replied Rouge with a bitter, mirthless chuckle. "But now... I don't know if it's such a good idea anymore..."
Confused, Banjo tilted his head to the side. "And why?" he asked.
Rouge pulled both of her legs in, hugging them slightly as she smiled bitterly. "Well, you know, at first I figured 'hey, I'll steal those jewels from Eggman when he has them all'. You know, it works for me because I get all of the Chaos Emeralds to myself, and it works for everybody else because it means Eggman gets defeated once again, and right when victory is right in front of him. But lately... after seeing Eggman do that to Tails, I just don't know anymore..."
"And is there something else?" asked Banjo, trying to see if Rouge really could be moved by one incident.
The bat laughed briefly at this, surprising the honey bear greatly as he stared at her.
"What?" asked Banjo swiftly, leaning in towards Rouge.
"It's gonna sound like something from a crummy romance flick..." she replied, shaking her head rapidly. "You're gonna laugh, I know it."
"Well, try me," he said, folding his hands together as Rouge released her legs and sat with her back against the wall, her legs stretched out on the desk.
"Well, I guess it's when I met you..." she replied.
At this, Banjo's fur stood on end from surprise, and he felt a strange sensation wash over his being as Rouge looked at him, her topaz eyes shining in expectation. The startled bear was too surprised to do anything other than to just stare, and when he finally felt his fur go at ease again, he shook his head in disbelief.
"W-what do you mean?" he asked, his voice sounding slightly flustered.
"Well, to put it simply, you're the most optimistic, unassuming person I've ever met in my life," she replied, voice soft and endearing. "And from what I can see about you right now, I guess you're also the kindest person I've ever met. And I don't know anymore... You've got a Chaos Emerald, so I guess I'm just afraid to involve you in all of this..."
Banjo was not entirely sure what to say to Rouge after she said this. The two of them were simmered in relative silence for quite some time, Banjo scratching his chin as he pondered what to tell Rouge. Finally, however, he placed a hand on the bat's shoulder, surprising her a little by the contact.
"If he comes for me, I'll be ready for it, and I'm sure Kazooie will be too," he said, smiling. "I've battled an evil witch four times in my life; what could make some mad scientist any worse?"
The bat shrugged lightly. "Well, the fact that his machines are tailored to fight a guy who can run faster than the speed of sound..."
Banjo gawked at this, his jaw hanging agape as he took in this minor detail. However, when Banjo felt Rouge's hand patting his own, his jaw closed rather quickly.
"But I appreciate your optimism," she added with a smile. "People like you are really hard to come by these days. So, thanks."
Banjo blushed slightly, and this time his fur was not enough to obscure it. With his free hand, he rubbed the back of his neck nervously, closing his eyes as he did.
"Uh, you're welcome, Ms. Rouge..." he replied sheepishly.
Suddenly, his eyes snapped open, realizing what he had done. Both of them were stock still, although Banjo was more petrified by the look in Rouge's eyes as she glared at him. Finally, Banjo removed his hand and blushed even more intensely while looking away, and his gaze suddenly found itself to be very interested in the wall.
However, instead of being reprimanded by the bat, Banjo only heard a slight giggle from her direction. He turned his head quickly to see that the hand that had been on the desk was against her mouth, which was curved in the most genuinely cute smile Banjo had ever seen in his life.
"You know what?" she asked. "You actually sound rather cute when you say it like that."
In reply, Banjo blushed so hard that even with his brown fur the tint of red on his cheeks was strong enough to make Kazooie's feathers jealous. To this, Rouge only giggled harder, a small blush forming on her own cheeks.
"I think we're both getting flustered here..." said the bat, looking at the wall.
"That's what it seems like..." said Banjo, the blush on both of their faces intensifying as he said this.
There was a rather awkward silence for some time, both Rouge and Banjo turning away from each other to gaze at the wall. Their blushes eventually did die down, and even though Banjo was the first to blush he turned rather quickly to the bat.
"Rouge?" he asked.
"What is it?" asked the bat.
"You're going to try to beat this Dr. Eggman person, right?" he asked uncertainly, Rouge turning to gaze into his eyes.
Rouge took a rather long time to look at the corner uncertainly before turning to the honey bear.
"Well, you know I can't just waltz in there and steal all the emeralds from under his nose like that right now," she replied with a shrug. "That would be stupid. But if there's something more subtle that I can do to fight against him, I'll do it. And if he ever gets all of the emeralds, you know what I'm going to do."
Banjo smiled, nodding his head simply at this as he took Rouge's hand and shook it ardently.
"Then I'm on your side," he said.
Rouge blushed slightly, an embarrassed smile creeping on her lips.
Banjo woke up the next morning rather slowly. The sun was only just rising, meaning he thankfully had not overslept as he was often wont to do after a day of hard work moving things in Showdown town. Kazooie still slept in the blue rucksack that hung on the coatrack.
Seeing Kazooie's red feathers brought back the dream he had just woken up from. A slight blush crept over his cheeks as he thought about the sexy bat and their interaction last night. As he thought of this, he pulled the covers over his person, and hoping to surprise Kazooie that morning by having the birdseed out extra early, he snuck into th kitchen while avoiding some of the floorboards that he knew would creak under his weight.