TW: Body Dysphoria, Trans Male Character, casual transphobia, unintentional misgendering, dysphoria, and obv lots of frustrated and upset feelings

For the fourth time that day, Will turned off his welder's torch and lifted his goggles in order to deal with an interruption. He ignored the sweat that beaded off the edges of the goggles in favor of using his teeth to pull off his left glove while his right hand pulled his cell phone out of his pocket. He sighed and squinted at the name on the screen.

**DO NOT ANSWER #3 is calling**

He narrowed his eyes but swiped the answer button and held it up to his ear, shaking off the right glove and kicking the pair under his workbench as he spoke. "What do you want, Parv?" he sighed.

"Oh, Strife, don't act like you weren't happy to see my pretty face show up on your caller ID!"

Strife snorted, biting the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. He didn't bother telling Parv he had long ago changed the photo to a stop sign. "You didn't answer my question." He looked around his workshop, trying to spot something he could do while talking.

He could practically hear the pout in Parv's voice. "Am I not allowed to call my Strifey-wifey?"

Strife scowled and didn't reply, instead walking over to stand on his charging station, simply holding the phone to his ear as he let his jetpack charge.

Parv was silent as well, expecting a reply before finally realizing his mistake (to Strife's relief, though he wouldn't admit it.) "Oh, god, sorry. I didn't mean–"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Strife kept his tone light. He didn't need Parv tripping over apologies when he already was avoiding just outright stating the reason he called in the first place.

Speaking of. "I'm busy repairing my armor, Parv. I'm a very busy man and have very important business things I need to do. Say what you want before I start charging you for my time."

"Welllll," Parv drew out, his tone taking a sharp turn into a devious sing-song. "You're big on providing solutions and whatnot, riiiight?"

Will tapped his foot impatiently. He was getting very sick of this nonsense argument where Parv declared his blood magic was good for Will's business. The argument had come up so many times, it was safe to assume Parv was about to bring it up again. "Wasting my time stalling isn't doing you any favors," he warned.

He really wasn't in the mood for dealing with this. First, Hat Corp had dropped by early in the morning, hassling Will to loan them a disassembler (he told them no); then, Will discovered his farming system had somehow gotten damaged; and then only an hour ago, his good binder lost a few hooks (and Will knew exactly which two things to blame.) He was stuck with one he had outgrown, and it was already digging into his skin.

He absentmindedly reached up as Parv spoke, and rubbed at his shoulder where, underneath his button-up and vest, the straps were leaving angry red marks into his shoulder. He'd have to find a way to repair the good one, aysap.

"–so we'd probably need your atomic hammer thingy, and–"

"What?" Will asked.

"Were you not listening?" Parv gasped, as if the concept of such a thing was utterly outrageous.

"Don't get your boxers in a bunch, I just couldn't hear you over my machinery." A blatant lie, but Parv would never shut up if Will had told him he had spaced out thinking about his growing to-do list.

Parv sighed. "I swear, Strife, if I weren't around to pull you out of your base every once in a while, you'd go deaf from all your technology things and forget to feed yourself."

Strife's cheeks heated up as he realized he hadn't eaten today. He was suddenly very thankful Parv was too lazy to make the trip to visit him for this conversation. "Yeah, yeah, whatever you tell yourself so you can sleep at night," he said, running his fingers through his hair. His hand caught on his goggles, and he pulled them off his head.

"So, anyway, as I was saying , I found a new one of those fish people villages and since it didn't go very well for me the last two times I tried to raid them alone, I thought maybe you could provide a solution by going along with me to help."

Strife sighed before setting the goggles down and stepping off the charging station. He looked around the room; he'd need one of his back-up sets of armored pants. "And why on Earth would I do that?" he asked, as he walked over to his sorting system and began clearing his inventory of anything unnecessary.

"Because I am your boyfriend and you love me," Parv cheered.

"Nah, not worth it." Will pulled out a pair of chainmail leggings from a chest. Did these still fit?

He cringed and nearly dropped them on the floor as his ear was filled with the loud whining noise Parv made when Strife didn't let him have his way.

"Jesus christ!" Strife nearly shouted. "Alright, alright, I'll help you if you stop making that infernal noise."

"Yay! I knew you loved me!" Parv crowed, completely ignoring Will's words. Will rolled his eyes and pressed the phone to his ear using his shoulder, freeing his hands to start strapping on the chainmail over his pants.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever."

Parv ignored him. "So, I'm thinking we'll need lots of torches, and you'll want to bring your atomic assembler–"

"Disassembler."

"–and I'll be pretty OP with my blood magic, but you'll probably want armor."

"If you're so 'OP,' why do you need my help?" Will grumbled under his breath, tugging on his boots over the chainmail strapped around his ankles

"What was that, Strife?"

"I said I'm putting on armor now." He jangled his leg pointedly, the interlocking rings of the chainmail clattering audibly.

"Good! I'll hang up then and prepare while you head over here. Bye, Will!"

"See ya, Parv," he mumbled, the sound of the dial tone cutting off his sentence.

If Parv was that eager to hang up, he probably wasn't prepared at all.

Strife decided to give him a head start by putting away his soldering equipment and eating before heading out.

***

When Strife arrived at the base an hour later, he was surprised that he didn't find Parv digging through his chests. A glance around the main portion of the castle showed he wasn't in the bedroom or crafting area either, and the underside of his blood alter only had the usual gathering of witches.

Strife left again and jetpacked up to view the whole area. He spotted Parv by the ritual circle, and as he neared, he realized the blood mage was tossing things onto the stone.

"Oh! Hi Strife!" Parv greeted when he noticed the blond descending.

"What are you doing?" Strife asked curiously as he switched his jetpack off. Parv must've forgotten to get ready, and then they'd have to set out tomorrow instead.

"Oh, got bored waiting on you, so I was just tossing things down to see what would happen."

"'Waiting' on me?" Strife scoffed.

"Well, you certainly took your time," Parv pouted. Strife rolled his eyes and moved to stand next to Parv, looking at the book that had been thrown on the ground. He didn't shake Parv off when when the blood mage slipped his hand into Will's.

"Maybe next time you decide to dabble in potty-mouth wizardry, you'll build your base closer."

Parv scoffed. "Or maybe you could move your base closer."

"Look, are we going to raid a water village or not?" Strife asked, though it was obvious he was biting back a smile.

Parv grinned. "Someone's eager!"

Strife let go of Parv's hand and began to pretend to set up his jetpack. "Okay, fine then, I'll just head back home then."

"Noo! Strife, I'm sorry, let me go get Picky and then we can go."

Strife wrinkled his nose, dropping the joking act in favor of distaste. "No, I have an atomic disassembler you can borrow." He didn't hide in his tone how he thought the tool was far superior to the destructive pickaxe.

Parv stared at Will, surprised, his eyebrows raised. "You almost never let me use your gadgets."

Will rolled his eyes. "Yeah, because you always lose them. But your pickaxe is a menace and will cause me more trouble than the resources I'll need to build another disassembler," he grumbled.

Parv opened his mouth to disagree but instead closed it in favor of grinning at Will. They would argue in circles otherwise, until Will really did decide to return home. "I'll lead the way, then."

Parv watched as, sure enough, Will reached towards the soft red grid overlay projected across his left thigh, coming from a tiny black box clipped to his belt. Really, Parv couldn't understand how on earth Will could see his inventory with the overlay in red, the brightness turned down low. It made only a faintly shimmering square of red across his boyfriend's thigh, like opaque glass.

A second after Will tapped a seemingly arbitrary space in the grid, the disassembler shot out of the inventory into Will's open palm, and he caught it with practiced ease before manually tossing it in Parv's direction. Parvis caught it easily enough, careful for now not to drop it.

Parvis glanced down at his own legs before pressing the handle of the disassembler to an empty space in the black grid displayed across the top of his thigh, barely visible against the dark fabric of his skinny jeans. With just a tap, it was pulled into his inventory. As Strife began setting up his jetpack, Parvis popped his unbound crystal out of his inventory. He did a mental pat down: boots of the traveller, sigil of elemental affinity, healing spells, bound sword.

He began to bounce in place impatiently as he watched Strife double-check his equipment. "It was fine two minutes ago when you flew here; it'll be fine now, Strife."

Will looked pointedly at him as he adjusted the jetpack's straps. "And exactly how long was I flying before that?"

Parv scowled before jumping up, letting the magic infused in his boots push him upwards. He jumped a few more times before grinning as he finally heard the quiet thrum of the jetpack's engines.

Will sighed under his breath as Parv soared ahead immediately, not even bothering to look back as he called, "This way, Will!"

"Don't race ahead like that!" Will shouted as he watched Parv leap forward towards the ocean, looking both like a feather caught in the wind, and like a meteor crashing towards the earth. Will dug his nails into his palms as he watched his boyfriend hurtle around at breakneck speed. He had to remind himself that Parv could fall off a mountain with his magic and not get hurt; it was so easy to forget, watching him leap through the sky like that.

Strife distracted himself with his wounded pride, knowing full well his jetpack was no match for Parvis' travel spell. Parv had looped back twice now, and he was still an easy few hundred feet away from Will.

He bit back the words he wanted to shout at Parv about the blood mage's carelessness and impatience, and instead tried to relieve some of the ache of his binder digging into his shoulders. Parv wouldn't hear Will's complaints about racing ahead from this distance anyway.

***

When Strife finally reached the water village, Parv was boredly tiptoeing his way along the iron railings, his arms spread on either side of him for balance. Strife was irritable; the ten minute flight had been lonely with Parv zipping off ahead of him. Will had spent most of the time in silence, becoming increasingly aware of the tightness in his chest and the welts that were welling up along the edges of his binder. He just wanted to go home and take it off, or at least find a private corner to take a break and breathe.

"Finally!" Parv called, jumping off the railing to the roof of the building.

"C'mon," Strife sighed, "let's get this done with." He rubbed at the bridge of his nose underneath his sunglasses before slipping them back atop his forehead.

Parv pouted. "Why are you in a sour mood all of a sudden?"

Strife simply shook his head. "Tired," he said, and he decided it wasn't a lie. Parv frowned but nodded nonetheless.

"Okay, soon as we finish looting this place, we can go to the castle and take a nap together in one of the cult beds."

Strife just nodded before pulling out his disassembler. Parv took that as his cue to trade his unbound crystal for his bound sword.

"Ready?" Strife asked.

Parv grinned and rocked on the heels of his feet. "Yes!"

For Parv, the village was easy enough. He barely took any damage. When a creeper exploded and brought water cascading around them, he didn't have to drag himself back up to the air like Will did. Parv could easily and readily jumped down holes to the next floor rather than hunting for the stairs in the quickly forming labyrinth.

They had split apart five minutes ago, and Will was starting to strongly consider going AWOL. He hurt, he was tired, and each breath felt like they were wrenching his ribs apart. And Parv could obviously handle the village dungeon on his own.

Parv sweeped into the room Will was sorting through then, as if Will hadn't fought tooth and nail to clear it of mobs.

"Will! Any good loot?"

Will shrugged, trying to decide what to leave behind in his inventory to make space for a diamond chest. "Yeah, but I don't have room for any of it."

"Oh, I've just been using the knapsack that–"

"Yeah, I know, Parv," Will snapped, trading out a few enderpearls for the chest. He glanced at Parv, but looked away when he saw the way his boyfriend's forehead furrowed in worry.

"Are you okay, Will?" Parv asked, stepping closer and stretching out a hand towards Will's shoulder. Will immediately evaded the movement, carefully ducking out of reach, masking the sidestep as a stretch.

"I'm tired, Parv," Will enunciated carefully.

"Please don't lie to me."

Parv reached out again. Will flinched back this time, causing his binder to dig in worse as he recoiled. He hissed, and in his scramble to alleviate the binder, he bumped his inventory, knocking a stack of torches onto the ground.

"Shit," he groaned, rubbing at his shoulder and glaring at the torches.

"Is your binder bothering you?" Parv asked.

Will didn't answer and instead glanced at Parv warily as Will attempted the impossible feat of making the fabric straps sit comfortably against his skin.

"You can take it off. I don't understand at all why you even have to wear it around me."

It was immediately obvious to both of them that that was the wrong thing to say. With a furious growl and a glare, Will scooped up the torches and stormed out. He ignored Parv's shouts calling after him, and didn't even bother attempting to cut down the monsters that crossed his path. He stayed out of their way, the businessman just wanting to get as far away from everything as possible.

As he stormed through the dungeon, turning corners at random, he unbuttoned his shirt, fumbling with the hooks on the binder. When the hooks didn't immediately come undone in Will's shaking fingers, he angrily grabbed on it and pulled, tearing out well over half of the hooks in the process. He pulled undone the rest before tugging the now useless fabric off of him and tossing it onto the floor.

His furious, thudding footsteps began to quiet as his anger dissipated into a more muted distress, his frustrated mumbling turning to quiet, choking sobs, and warm, fat tears began to roll down his face.

He wasn't even sure why he was so upset. The statement hadn't been particularly terrible. Instead, everything that day had just snowballed until it overwhelmed him. He found himself in a corner room of the dungeon, and he sat down on the floor, his back to the wall. Everything that had happened during the day crashed into the forefront of his mind, and his quiet crying roared into full-frontal sobbing. He shakily pulled his knees to his chest and lay his forehead atop them, only muffling his crying slightly.

When Parv finally found Strife, the blood mage's worry was put at ease, but he was still tense. He was very aware of the effects his actions had on Will recently. He was slightly paranoid, uncertain of what he could and couldn't do.

Will didn't hear Parv approaching until he felt the ground in front of him shake just slightly as Parv set the disassembler down beside them. Will lifted his head, slightly startled when Parv's dark jeans were the only things that filled his vision. Though he could barely see through his tears, Will looked up at Parv's face.

"Oh, Will," Parv breathed, his heart thudding in his chest at the sight of the state his boyfriend was in. Will's shirt was still unbuttoned, the tawny blond hair leading down from his navel contrasting against the pale skin of Will's stomach. And it broke Parv's heart to look at Will's face. His eyes were puffy and red, the blue bags under his eyes even more prominent, and snot dripped out of his nose. Will's lips quivered as he stared up at his boyfriend. Parv kneeled down and reached forward with trembling fingers. He just barely refrained from sighing in relief when Will let him hold his face in his hands.

"I'm sorry," he said purposefully.

Will closed his eyes and shook his head slightly, whimpering and reaching up to swipe at his eye, but Parv was a step ahead of him, carefully brushing Will's tears away with his thumbs.

"It's not you," Will spoke hoarsely. "So much has gone wrong today."

Parv paused and took that into consideration before defiantly saying, "I'm still sorry. I should've thought before I spoke."

Will half-heartedly shrugged and leaned into Parv's touch, reaching up to wrap his fingers around Parv's wrists. "I'm sorry for being a prick."

Parv gasped as if the statement deeply offended him. "Will Strife, you go through so much stress and responsibility, if I were you, I'd probably piss my pants like a whiny little bitch."

Will's lips twitched up into a small smile. "Good to know you finally acknowledge how you wouldn't be able to get anything done without me to clean up your messes."

"Fuck you!" Parv roared before ducking his head forward to press against Will's lips. Will smiled and kissed back before pulling away enough to lean their foreheads together.

Parv grinned before glancing down and immediately redirecting his eyes up towards the ceiling, pressing his lips into a thin line. "You probably don't want me looking down right now."

Will scoffed, but self consciously tugged the fronts of his button-up together. "Way to ruin the moment, dick."

Parv giggled before leaning back to rest on his heels, staring down at his thigh in concentration, squinting in the dim light at his inventory. "I have a diamond chestplate, if you want to wear that 'til you get home."

Strife sighed as Parv started to lean down to get a closer look at his overlay. "I know you have the punk theme going on and all, but making your inventory black is taking it too far."

"Your face is taking it too far."

"That's it, I'm never going dungeon raiding with you again," Will declared, crossing his arms.

"Willlll," Parv whined, looking him in the eye and
puppy-dog pouting. "Please just get me some torches so I can give you your present."

Will sighed dramatically and reached for his own inventory. "Don't say I never do anything for yo–OH, FUCK."

"Why did you pull out lava?!"

"I didn't mean to! Fuck, did the bucket melt?"

"Oh my god, Strife, pick it up already!!"

"You're immune to it, Parvis!"

Credit to panicatthesipsco on Ao3