TW: Angst, Seperation, Loss, Yoglabs

*The Video: Never by Andrew Huang.. TW for fire and destruction and angst*

"Now, are you sure about this?" Honeydew asked, eyeing the doorway to Deep Search III with considerable suspicion. "Nothing good has ever come out of this place."

"Of course I'm sure," Xephos said, nudging his friend forward into the large warehouse. "When have I ever misled you?"

"Um, yesterday, so..."

"Anyway," Xephos continued, apparently having not heard the dwarf's reply, "this is different. We're just going in here to fetch a few things and come right back. No dimensional travelling, no giant bugs, nothing crazy." He placed a hand on Honeydew's shoulder and smiled down at him. "You can trust me."

Honeydew smiled back and turned his head to kiss Xephos's fingers. "I know I can," he said, and walked into Deep Search III with renewed confidence. "So, what are we looking for here?"

"Well, according to Professor Bixby, there's some sort of device in here that used to have some pretty impressive abilities." Xephos pulled Bixby's note out of his pocket. "Let's see... 'eternal youth, resurrection, turns sheep into squids'..."

"Hang on, what?!" Honeydew paused his rummaging through a chest. "Sheep into squids?"

"I might have made up that last one."

"Idiot," Honeydew said, in a tone which belied his affection for the spaceman. "So what does Bixby want with it?"

"Paperweight."

"... You're serious."

"Yeah! Apparently it's completely powerless now. Been powerless for ages. Bixby's been using it as a paperweight and it went missing somewhere in here. So come on, let's get looking."

"Unbelievable." Honeydew shook his head and turned back to the chest. Xephos didn't head into the depths of the storage containers just yet, though. Instead, he watched Honeydew. The two had shared so much over the years, and Xephos couldn't remember ever having been this happy. He thought back to the many times the two had shared a home and a bed, the times in battle when one had taken a blow for the other – it was as natural as breathing to him, as constant as the stars. The world turned, the grass grew, and the spaceman loved his dwarf.

"Are you even looking, you lazy git?" Honeydew's voice cut through Xephos's daydreams.

"Oh!" Xephos shook himself out of his reverie. "Oh, right. Yes. Sorry."

"Leaving all the heavy lifting to me, are we? As per usual."

"Ah, pipe down. You're not exactly a delicate blossom, I'm sure you can take it."

"I'm a sensitive soul!"

"Sure you are." Xephos grinned and turned towards the boxes.

He'd only been searching for a few moments when there was a loud sound behind him. "Um, Xeph?" he heard Honeydew calling. "What've you done?"

"I didn't do anything, what do you mean?" Xephos asked, turning back around.

In lieu of a response, Honeydew pointed at the Stargate, which stood imposingly in the centre of the room.

"Oh, shit," Xephos breathed.

The Stargate had come to life somehow. Neither of them had touched it, they were certain, but still it whirred and howled, in a way Xephos had never heard before. And it didn't look right to him, even overlooking the fact that it was apparently behaving on its own.

"It's possessed," Honeydew said with a nervous laugh. Xephos nodded and took a few steps towards it, only to be wrenched backward. "Are you fucking mental?!" Honeydew asked in horror, clenching Xephos's arm. "Xephos, if anything says 'Do not touch', it is that fucking thing!"

"Relax, I'm sure it's fine. It hasn't got a destination programmed into it, what could it possibly do?" Despite Xephos's reassurances, Honeydew still held his friend in place. Xephos gently pushed Honeydew's hand away. "Honeydew. Listen. It's fine. I'm just going to go check it out. Nothing will happen, I promise." Honeydew's eyes stayed on Xephos's, even as he allowed his grip to be broken, and he watched as Xephos slowly approached the wailing Stargate. "Now then, what exactly is wrong with you?" Xephos said, turning his gaze to the control panel. "I wish I knew what any of this meant..."

"Look out!" screamed a testificate from somewhere in the room, and Xephos jerked his head upward to see the Stargate roaring into life as though coordinates had been entered, even though Xephos could've sworn he hadn't touched the keypad. Over the deafening sound of the Stargate, Xephos could vaguely hear Honeydew shouting his name. Seconds later, something small and solid slammed into him, knocking him to one side and out of the Stargate's range.

"I fucking told you!" Honeydew yelled. "I fucking said, didn't I!"

"Honeydew, get out of the—" Xephos began, intending to warn the dwarf away, but even before he began speaking he could see it was too late. The Stargate gave off a blinding light as it ejected a swirling vortex, just as it had done on every startup. This time, though, it was different, and Xephos watched in horror as the wormhole seized his beloved friend. "Honeydew!" he screamed, reaching out and grasping the dwarf's hands.

"Xephos!" Honeydew screamed back. "What—"

He was cut off, though, as the wormhole retracted, pulling the dwarf into its depths. Within seconds, the dwarf vanished. The Stargate kept up its furious howling, glowing brighter and brighter until Xephos was forced to turn away, tears streaming from his burning eyes.

And then, as suddenly as it had begun, everything stopped. Xephos looked back, stars dancing in front of his dazzled vision, and saw that the Stargate stood silent as ever. Slowly, he approached the lifeless machine, gazing up at it. Its frame was cracked and red-hot to the touch, and smoke seeped from each fissure.

"It must have been a malfunction," Xephos could dimly hear a testificate scientist saying. "It appears to have have burnt itself out, this must have been a sort of... swan song. What I can't understand is how it managed to seize Mr Honeydew, it's absolutely—"

"Fix it."

The testificate ceased his chattering and looked over at Xephos's hunched figure. "... I beg your pardon, sir?"

"Fix. It." Xephos's voice was low and sinister, and he turned slowly to the testificate with eyes that blazed with fury and anguish. "Fix it, and get him back."

The testificate spoke carefully. "Sir, I... None of us have any idea how this thing works, and even if we did, it would take years to repair such extensive damage. Look, this part is still on fire, I just don't see how—"

Xephos turned his back on him and spoke loudly, his voice carrying throughout the entirety of Deep Search III. "Computer, execute lockdown order alpha, confirmation code Yankee-Oscar-Golf-Xray."

"Lockdown in progress," a calm voice said, echoing throughout the entirety of the compound. The doors and windows slammed shut in unison, and soon a cry rose from the upper levels of testificates who found themselves trapped in whatever room they'd happened to be in at the time.

Xephos turned on the testificates, his blue eyes seeming to glow with rage. "There. This facility is now officially in lockdown, and none of you – none of you – is going to leave until you fucking fix this machine and get. Him. Back."

"Sir, please!" cried one of the crowd. "You can't do this! We have families, children, loved ones who need us, you can't just—"

"I can't what?" Xephos demanded, whirling around and brandishing his trusty diamond sword in the face of the naysayer. "I can't separate you from them? I can't keep them from you, trapped? I can't snatch them away from you without giving you so much as a chance of saying goodbye?" Faced with silence, he turned back to the head scientist. "Fucking fix this monstrosity. Get him back. I don't care how much time it takes, or how many men, none of you leaves until he's home."

*

Hours passed. Days. Years. Xephos threw man after man at the Stargate, working each one to death. He stopped sleeping, barely ate. He became deaf to the cries of the imprisoned so many floors above him, which soon became a deathly silence. Yoglabs fell into disrepair, chests rotting away, their contents nothing more than dust and sand. Bodies lay piled at the door, little more than skeletons, starved to death and clamoring to escape even in their final moments. Day after day, month after month, year after year, Xephos sat before the tomblike Stargate, whispering to it. His voice gave out long ago, but still his mouth moved tirelessly, producing little more than a hoarse gurgle.

"Please come home. Please come home. Please come home."

Please come home.

Please come home.

Please come home.

please come home

please come home

please

please

please

Credit to BecNo1r on Ao3