This time for another chapter~ might try and go for back-to-back chapters this week u let's see what I can do.
Song Suggestion: Change by The Revivalists
Disclaimer: I own nothing~ Resident Evil belongs to CapCom. Tis is fanfiction and a glorified spoopy romcom at best X'D
Time passed slowly after Duke's arrival and rather stunning revelation. To be honest, Charlotte wasn't sure how to go about telling Heisenberg. Instead, she remained quiet on the subject. days would pass and he'd continue to practice and train as he was left at home. Predictably he made no further progress from what he was already able to do. Day in and day out it was the same routine. Go to the mini-factory, work on thinking with random parts, use his powers to try and hold things in the air for as long as possible, get frustrated then eat from a styrofoam box for dinner, and as decent as the food was, it was getting old eating food that had been sitting in a box for close to an hour getting soggy in its own steam.
Thinking this over with a frown he continued the routine and worked on a new project that involved making that dumb Alexa AI mobile. It only worked with other electric devices so giving it arms and legs would potentially increase its functionality, Or, Well at least give him a punching bag. "All right you stupid hunk of metal let's see if you work." He says then puts his Cigar back in his mouth so he could use both hands to click away at a laptop hooked up to the maybe 2-foot tall robot sitting on his workbench.
A small booting up chime could be heard. Heisenberg smiles as he watches a few lights power up. That smile slowly fades as smoke starts leaking from the mechanical interior of the body.
"oh n-"BOOM
He coughs as he quickly opens the door to the mini-factory and tries to air out the place, ditching what was left of the Cigar in a bucket outside before going back in to throw a flame suppressant blanket over the robot. "Buncha God damn cheap ass bullshit parts gonna get me fucking killed stupid ass shit," the profanity poured out between coughing and hacking from the foul-smelling pitch-black smoke.
"So I take it you're having a good day?" Says Charlotte who was a safe distance away from the Mini factory as it leaked smoke. Heisenberg eventually got the mess under control and walked out covered in soot. "You look like an ashtray," She says while trying not to laugh.
Heisenberg continues to grumble under his breath as he walks over and gives Charlotte a peck on the forehead which leaves a slight smudge thanks to the soot.
"Okay grouch, let's get you washed up and fed, I have dinner," Charlotte says as she holds up the usual plastic bag. He winces slightly upon seeing the bag, it wasn't bad food it was just, Well, it would have been better fresh. "Try not to act too excited," Charlotte says shaking her head as she leads the way back to the house. "How was your day?"
"Think you saw the jest of it. It blew up in my face," Heisenberg replies as he follows Charlotte into the house while taking off his shirt to use that as a rag to wipe off his face. "Training doesn't seem to be getting anywhere, I'm not getting stronger..." He says as he heads over to his loft to wash up and change while Charlotte sets the table.
Charlotte grimaces as he mentions his lack of progress. she knew why. "Well... maybe that can be a different project," She says speaking louder so he can hear her from the loft. eventually, he walks down with a haphazardly washed face and arms while wearing a clean shirt.
"What do you mean different project?" He asks as he walks over and continues the conversation.
"Well. What if you made something that amplified the abilities you already have?" Charlotte suggests as she opens her own box and takes some plastic silverware from the pile to start eating.
"Well that's some vote of confidence sweetheart," He says with a sneer. "Look I'll figure this out myself."
This was not going great... "I know you're trying it's just." she bobs her head. "There's.. reason to believe that training isn't the problem."
"The hell is that supposed to mean?" Heisenberg asks with an unamused stare that said 'tread lightly'.
"Duke showed up again..." Charlotte admits while avoiding eye contact and digs out the card from her purse to place on the table between them.
"What did that fat bastard want this time?" Karl asks as he picks up the small rectangular cardstock and looks it over, finding the instructions a bit odd. just ripe the card?
"He says he kept a piece of your remai-" Charlotte started but that was more than enough to set off Heisenberg.
"I'm going to fucking kill him," He says openly upset.
"I'm not thrilled about this either okay," Charlotte says as she takes the card back before he 'accidentally' ripes it so he could punch the large man.
"Well, he's a merchant. what does he want for it?" Heisenberg asks still clearly annoyed by this revelation.
"He wanted the piece of Moreau that I have," she hesitantly admits.
"That's it? Then give it to him," Karl says surprised that this was even a question. he needed his powers back.
"NO," Charlotte adamantly shut down the idea with a frown as her eyebrows scrunched together.
"Why? the fuckin blob doesn't even remember you," He points out in his frustration with this situation.
"which is your fault," she points out, irritated at how callused he was being.
He forced a neutral expression with that reminder "Fine! Fine, what if we just do a bait and switch. get a different pearl that looks similar and give him that instead?"
"That's not going to work, he'll figure it out once he tries reviving Moreau," Charlotte counters "besides, that would be pretty counterproductive, Right now we're on his good side and that's where we need to stay until we have a decent enough counter."
"And that's not going to happen if we keep backing ourselves into a fucking corner," He points out as he tosses his plastic silverware into the foam box. He wasn't hungry anymore.
"Well if you have any brilliant ideas I'm all ears," Charlotte says as she continued to frown.
"I already shared that. Give him the fuckin pearl," Karl says once more.
"and I said it's not happening," She counters once again.
Heisenberg forces his chair back as he quickly stands up and walks out of the house to go back to the forge. Fuck this shit.
Charlotte Gets up after hearing the door slam shut and moves to lock it. He can spend the night outside for all she cares. He was being such an ass about this, it was a sucky enough position to be in and she didn't want to sell her friend to a life of tests and experimentation and what she could only assume would be further mutilation. She walks over to the TV stand and looks at the small glass box that held the pearl before tucking the business card under the box for safekeeping. As much as she hated considering it, if she did want to use that dumb card the only reason she would, would be if she was going to hand over the pearl.
She shakes her head at that thought before heading back over to the table to throw away Heisenberg's meal then collect her own to head up to her loft. "Alexa, shut off the lights please," She requests as she walks up to her room.
"Turning off the lights, good night." She replies and the house goes dark. once in her loft she turns on the light for just that area and sits at her desk to get some work done while she ate.
Heisenberg made his way back to his little factory in the meantime and looks around at the mess he left behind earlier. Might as well get to work. He starts cleaning up around the area and finds that the laptop screen cracked in the miniature explosion. "Great..." he grumbles while looking it over. he could probably fix the rest of it. for now, he stows that away and makes a mental note to make a blast guard to protect it in the future. It took a few hours but he got everything cleaned up and looked over what remained of the robot.
What if you made something that amplified the abilities you already have?
Yeah, okay. As if he was going to admit that he was that weak. He'd get his powers back somehow. He looked at the laptop again and put that back on the desk to start tinkering with the screen to fix that. he'd probably need a few new parts. Parts meant money. which he didn't have anymore. He cursed under his breath. This really sucked. He thought he was trapped back in the village. Here it was worse. At least in the village, he was someone. He had funds, he could make whatever he wanted, take whatever he wanted.
"Suppose this is still better than being stuck in that void with The tweedle Dee, tweedle dumb, dumb and dumber bunch," he says under his breath as he moves to sit down and get a cigar and beer from the stash under his workbench. He was alive when they weren't which is what he wanted, He had access to scraps to tinker with when he wanted and a bit of space to himself, and the cherry on top being his relation with Charlotte.
Well, a cherry that he pretty much just pitched considering the argument they had. She was always so difficult when she got stubborn like that, he thought as he completely failed to consider his own stubbornness. A tired sigh crosses his lips as his anger had finally managed to subside for now. Suppose he should head back inside... With that thought he finished up his drink and smoke before tossing the remaining butt of the cigar into the bucket outside of his shed. He closed up for the night, It was dark out and the only light coming from the house had just turned off.
"Guess she's not waiting up," He grumbles to himself as he makes his way over to the front door.
Click-click.
The door didn't budge as he tried and failed to turn the handle. She locked the door? When was she going to learn that didn't work. Heisenberg gave half of an amused chuckle before channeling what energy he had left to try and move the lock.
It didn't budge.
"Seriously?" he asks the door as he felt his eye twitch behind his glasses. he runs his hands through his still very dirty and greasy hair. before patting himself down to see where his phone was, only to remember that he left it in his room. whatever. Fine. He wanted to move out to the stupid shed anyways. he storms his way back over to the shed and tries to set up a place to sleep for the night.
It was probably the single most uncomfortable night's sleep he'd had in a long time. he was left on the floor with no pillow or blanket or mat of any form. not that he really needed that but they were luxuries he started to become accustomed to. not to mention the muggy late summer weather since they were now entering September. He eventually managed to fall asleep and woke up with the rising sun.
he felt sweaty and gross and even he knew he needed a shower. He walked back over to the door and yep. still locked. He looked around at his options and now that there was enough light he was able to more clearly see the support beam of the deck to his lift. It didn't exactly have great gripping points since it was a solid round metal beam but at this point, he didn't really see a better option aside from breaking a window which would be a less than great way to start off communications again.
Heisenberg walked over to the beam and got to work. it didn't help that he was already sweaty but he eventually made it up far enough that he was able to reach the base of the deck and hoist himself up further and ultimately far enough up that he could get over the glass walls of the deck and onto it.
Please say she didn't check his room. Please say she didn't check his room. He walks over to the door and it slides open. He silently cursed himself for not thinking of this last night but all the same, he made his way inside, closing the door behind him before heading over to the bathroom so he could wash up. The same as always get the one bottle of soap, lather, run that through his hair and rinse off.
He walked down the stairs of the loft to find Charlotte watching a movie while eating a bowl of cereal.
"How did you get in?" She asks confused with clear annoyance on her face.
"Magic," he replied sarcastically.
"Well magic your way out, I didn't invite you in," Charlotte states flatly. "You walked out instead of talking it out so you can stay out." She says pointedly but admittedly much calmer than the night before.
"Well, I'm here now so let's talk," He says as he moves to sit on the other couch, "You kinda dropped a nuke on me, oh hey by the way all your efforts are useless because some fat asshole decided to be a creep and keep a chunk of your crystalized innards. So yeah, after that, I needed time to cool off."
as much as it annoyed her, he had a fair point. "Fine."
"We need to do something to get that shard back," he says bluntly.
"And you're asking me to pay that price, didn't I give enough already?" Charlotte asks in return. She brought him back from the dead, which took months, on top of the years that she was stuck in that stupid village where she did everything she could to help him even when he was being a jerk. How much more did he expect her to pay on his behalf? "I already have those BSAA guys digging around in my stuff it's nerve-wracking. It's only a matter of time and I just found out that no matter how hard we try we're not going to be able to keep up."
"Only if we keep the Pearl," Karl points out.
"Which we're not getting rid of," Charlotte once more states whiles staring Heisenberg down, daring him to start that argument back up.
"Fine" he grumbles while thinking it over. "Maybe we can think of something else but it's not going to happen if we're at each other's throats. We're both going to have to compromise here or we might as well just roll over and give up."
"Fine," Charlotte agrees still annoyed but as long as her point was accepted that she wasn't giving up the shard of Moreau then she'd listen to other options. "There's cereal in the kitchen if you're hungry," She offers as a partial olive branch.
Great, cereal. "Nope." He says getting up and walks over to get the keys from the hook. "That compromise is starting off with better food. Get dressed we're going shopping."
Charlotte shakes her head but gets up all the same. "You need a way to make your own money. When we get home we're using your laptop and I'm showing you how to open an online store so you can sell whatever contraptions you make," she says and heads up to her room to switch from pajamas to day clothes.
Heisenberg winces at that. "Right, so about that..." he says as she makes her way back down the stairs.
"Did you break it," she says more than asks as she had a good reason to believe he did considering the smoke.
"Within reasonable repair," He replies while avoiding eye contact.
"God damn it..." She gives a quiet sigh as she takes the keys. "Alright but this is the last one. you're learning how to make an income so you can fix it yourself next time."
"Not gonna complain about that," he says with a nod, it was kinda one of his complaints that he couldn't do anything on his own since he didn't have his own money so, win-win.
30 minutes of driving later and the two ended up in the parking lot of the local grocery store. "Alright, here we are. now what. we already have enough Freezer meals."
"Yeah, we're pitching those once we get home," He says as he goes to get one of the shopping carts. he hated these stupid things but he hated microwave meals more. The initial novelty of a 'heat and eat meal', only lasted so long. "That bull shit is going to kill us in a slow painful radiated death."
Charlotte rolls her eyes in response "Says the Immortal," she rebuttals but follows him into the store all the same. a quick jaunt through the produce Isle added several bags of fresh fruits and vegetables. up and down various rows of dry goods added bags of rice, flour, sugar, and pasta.
as they walked down a small aisle of baking supplies he stopped at a display of spices. "Bingo, and ever the American you had NO spices at home."
"I have salt and pepper," Charlotte defends.
"Congratulations, you have table condiments." He says back as he added a container of each spice to the cart. "How you've survived this long without basic cooking ingredients is beyond me."
Charlotte nudges him in response and he nudges her back in return causing the two to chuckle. a trip through the meat and refrigerated section of the store saw the addition of packaged raw meat, various milk goods like cream, butter and various types of cheese.
"Okay we need a carton of eggs," He says as he focuses on controlling the cart, which was not an easy task thanks to a broken wheel.
Charlotte walks over and just grabs a box of eggs.
"Check them first," he says stunned that she genuinely knew nothing about groceries.
"For what?" she asks confused and hands over the box which Heisenberg accepts.
"You don't want to buy broken eggs, you check them first," he says and uses his thumb to pop the lid open. he nudges each one to make sure it wasn't stuck in place which would suggest a leaking egg and closes the lid again. "Alright, you got lucky these are fine."
"And you doubted me," Charlotte replies shaking her head.
"With good reason," He says with a laugh. A loaf of bread was added to the cart along with deli meat, some cheap pots and pans were added as well as a few cookbooks from the cooking supply aisle.
The purchase was made and after another lovely half-hour drive, the two very hungry individuals made their way back into the house while carrying some of the many bags of groceries. "Pardon me I will be enjoying this," Heisenberg says as he gets the plethora of boxes out of the freezer, walks over to the trash can, and drops them in. So cathartic. good bye evil box meals. You were somehow worse than the styrofoam boxes that were sitting out for 30+ minutes.
By the time Noon rolled around the purchases were all neatly stored away. Heisenberg's stomach loudly protests as it had not had anything to eat since last night and even then that was only a few bites. "Alright get over here," he instructs as he takes out a stick of butter, the container of eggs and digs out the frying pan that they just put away.
"Now what?" Charlotte asks with mild amusement.
"You're learning how to fry an egg, it's basic cooking," he says and motions for her to join him.
"You are being so stubborn today," Charlotte says as she walks over.
"Might have something to do with getting locked outside for a night," Heisenberg points out in return.
Charlotte chuckles a bit at that and stands next to him waiting for instructions.
"yeah haha real funny," he says before shaking his head. "anyways start off by buttering the pan. just take off a bit of the wrapper and rub the end on the pan until the bottom is evenly covered." He says and moves to turn on one of the burners. big surprise the coil gave off a slight odor as it warmed up, suggesting it had not been used in a long time at least.
Charlotte does as she's instructed and butters up the pan. "Alright, easy enough," she admits.
she missed some rather large areas but hey points for trying. "Put the pan on the burner," he says as he opens the container of eggs.
Charlotte smiles a bit as she puts it on one of the inactive burners.
"The active burner you smartass," He says as he gives her a nudge.
Charlotte chuckles a bit at that and moves the pan causing the butter in the pan to start to melt. "What do I do with this?" She asks as she holds up the remaining stick.
"just put that on the counter for now," he replies and offers her an egg once her hand is free. "Hold the panhandle with one hand and the egg in the other and use the side of the pan to crack the egg,"
"Okay," She says and moves to stand in position to do that. tap.
"you're gonna need to use a bit more force," he says amused by her gentle approach.
CRACK.
"Not that much," he corrects while holding his face.
"Oh, well now what?" She asks with a bit of panic in her tone as she held the cracked leaking egg over the pan which was now sizzling and popping.
"get your thumbs in there and open the egg to drop the rest out into the pan, try not to get the shell in there with it or you will taste it and it will taste gross," He instructs before mimicking the motion she'd need to make to finish cracking the egg.
"Ew ew ew ew ew," she repeats whiles doing so, this was gross and slimey.
Plop.
the egg landed on the frying pan and continued to cook and sizzle. You'd think she would have learned a bit more while spending time at the castle but she usually only had to carry things not make them and mixing a cocktail was a different beast from using a stove. While it cooks Heisenberg digs out a plate.
"Is it supposed to be popping? OUCH!" Charlotte asks as a bit of hot butter pops and hits her hand.
"Yeah that's normal," he confirms and puts the plate down next to the stove. "now you're going to need a spatula to move that over to the plate."
Charlotte grabs the rubber spatula from the utensil container next to the stove and starts poking at the edge of the egg.
"it's gonna burn if you don't move it," Heisenberg points out.
frustrated grumbles were heard in response and eventually, a broken over-easy egg was added to the plate.
"Well, you tried," he says and hands over the plate for her to have. he'd just make his own for this one.
"Yeah I'm pretty sure I'm just never going to be able to learn to cook," She says with a laugh as she watches Heisenberg make his own and sure enough does so with ease.
A small smirk crosses his face. "So are you saying that because you think you're too stupid or is it that you think you're too good to learn how"
"Bold words from the man that cant wash his own hair properly" Charlotte rebuttals. "Besides you already seem to know what you're doing and it's not like you have anything but free time when you stay home, so you do it if it's so important to you."
"How is it even possible to do that wrong. Take soap, apply it to hair, wash it out." He replies with a frown "And like hell, I am not being a stay-at-home husband."
"You're not a stay-at-home husband. We're not married." Charlotte points out.
Oh... right. he clears his throat a bit and goes back to focusing on his cooking.
Before she can put much more thought into that another realization dawns on her "... you're not using the same soap in your hair that you use on the rest of you right?"
"Is there different soap?" He asks with a raised eyebrow. That would explain why there are 3 containers in shower...
"YES! Oh my gosh." She held her face but pretty quickly moves on. "Fine you eat that, and I'll be right back because if we're doing this and I have to learn to cook because you want me to, you are learning to take care of yourself properly," she says and walks away.
Heisenberg rolls his eyes and finishes cooking his egg before putting that on another plate and starting to eat.
Charlotte collects a few products from her bath, Shampoo, conditioner, hair repair serums, and microfiber hair towels. How to do this without just throwing him into the tub... the kitchen sink had one of those hose nozzles. that might work. Just lean a chair against the counter... Charlotte grabs a few towels instead of just one. then heads back downstairs.
Heisenberg watched with mild curiosity as Charlotte put down her arm full of supplies on the counter before moving to clean up the area from the cooking experiment. One of the dining room chairs was leaned back against the counter in front of the sink, and towels surrounded the chair to catch any stray water.
"Are you done eating?" Charlotte asks and Heisenberg nods.
"Still hungry but for now I'll live," He replies with a shrug.
"When you're ready sit in the chair and make sure you're leaning back so you're head is over the sink," Charlotte instructs.
Heisenberg puts his plate down and walks over to do as he was told. Charlotte turns on the sink and messes with the temperature of the water. "Your poor hair feels like dried leaves." She says with a hint of sympathy. Hopefully this would help, no wonder it was always so clumpy and wirey it was dried out from body soap.
"Real kind of you to say sweetheart," He says sarcastically as she starts to get his hair damp using the hose.
"Hey, honesty is the best policy right?" She says in return, "okay so body soap goes on the body hair soap is for hair, it's labeled shampoo use that first. it's gentler." Charlotte explains and massages that into the wet hair. "your hair is pretty fried so after washing out the soap we're going to use a repair serum." she explains while washing out the soap... This would be easier if she had a better angle. With that thought, she moves to straddle the chair so she could stand over Heisenberg.
"Hello," he says surprised by the choice but chuckles all the same as he puts his arms around her waist to keep her there.
"Yeah hi to you too," Charlotte says and goes back to washing out the soap so she could add in the oil-like product.
At this point, he was barely paying attention. The scalp scratching and hair scrubbing were actually pretty relaxing and he was already tired after not sleeping well. Apply product wash it out, apply another, wash that out. It was a lot of effort. He'd just stick to using the right soap in his hair and call it good.
The water was turned off and that was enough to get Heisenberg to focus again. "and that's that," Charlotte says as she starts drying his hair with the hair towels and moves to stand to the side again. Instead, Heisenberg sits up causing the chair to move forward so it could rest on 4 legs again and applies downward pressure on Charlotte's waist to get her to sit facing him. This manages to toss a good amount of water as well since his hair was still pretty well soaked.
Charlotte sputters a bit before laughing. "You are going to be the death of me you know that?" she jokingly accuses before going back to drying his hair and fluffing it up with the towel.
"Mmm nope, pretty sure you're stuck with me," he says in return with a slight smirk as he continues to hold her close.
"Well at least now you know how to wash your hair, it already looks a lot better," Charlotte says as she continued to towel dry it.
His hair did feel lighter. "you're trying to turn me into a poodle."
She bobs her head. "At least you're a cute poodle."
He rolls his eyes though it was hidden by the towel and moves a hand to hold the back of her head so he could lean forward to kiss her.
Charlotte returns the affection before taken the towel off his head and gives a content sigh. "Look... I know things arent really going how we wanted them to." she admits quietly. "but we'll figure this out okay?"
It takes a second but Heisenberg nods. "Yeah."
Days turned to weeks and September was over. Even with their relationship, away from the rocks again the two still could not think of a way to get back Heisenberg's shard. Not from a lack of trying, just about every idea under the sun had been suggested and each one was rejected by one or the other and usually for good reason. He stared up at the ceiling unable to sleep as he continued to puzzle over what to do about the elephant in the room. Eventually, he gets up and heads down the stairs to the main room of the home and over to the TV stand where a small glass box held an oversized pearl. Heisenberg stared down at the little glass box before noticing the sliver of white underneath the box. he gently scoots the box and finds the business card from before which he picks up and looks over.
no matter how hard we try we're not going to be able to keep up.
Ripe.
Dun dun duuun~ bit of a cliffhanger here but I felt like this would be the best place to kinda leave it off. The next chapter is gonna be fun X'D hopefully I'll have that ready soon. Lots of different plot points coming to a collision.
Review Responses:
nadillaandlaprasthefireandice - lmao X'D seems only fair to show Heisenberg being a hotty that can attract the cuties when Charlotte's had her fair number of potential ships. Duke is shady as Foop and that is a hill I am willing to die on X'D like never liked him for a second in-game, all his lines seem so two-faced.
Charadrius - Beach Heisenberg is superior X'D hehe I'd definitely having a good time breaking up this plot progression a bit. It's definitely not something I wanted to have resolved in a single chapter. And thank you for the twitter follow ^u^ hopefully I'll have some doodles up soon. kinda got taken out at the knees as far as free time goes this week but I have some vacation time coming up soon ^U^
BlackMoonsDaughter - Glad you found the last chapter entertaining :) yeah the poor guy can't really catch a break, he's in a pretty crap situation. But it's the little things that add up and hopefully make it more bareable XD