Sitting on the couch in the Falconhawk family's apartment is somewhat comforting, even if it is the most uncomfortable piece of furniture you've ever come into contact with. Now that you can look around, your visit a little less rushed than the first time you set foot above the store, you realise exactly why Eaglebones likes it so much here. Plants surround most of the room, making the place seem a lot smaller, but it's not claustrophobic - it's safe. Safe, very warm, and full of sentimental items… No wonder Condor was chiding his son for never leaving the place on the way back. Ricky agreed he'd rather head back here than back home, and Bones seemed anxious to, as the Commander put it, "return to his nest" after having such a fright earlier. Now he's sat next to you, burying himself into the couch and hugging a pillow tightly to his chest, staring at the mugs on the table as you and Ricky chatter about anything and everything over coffee. The Commander's stood with Condor in the kitchen, their extremely raucous laughter echoing through the whole building. After a few minutes of trying to keep talking over their obnoxious noise, you remove yourself from the weaved furniture and head in to meet them, just as Mr. Falconhawk starts to leave.
"I guess that's what you get, being a dad," he observes, shrugging. You're curious at how well they've hit it off, considering how different they are.
"Yeah, tell me about it," replies the Commander with a grin, making you laugh, albeit even more curious.
"You can hardly talk," you say, entering the conversation as the other man leaves, "How would you know? I mean, I know Ricky's pretty childish, but…"
Your question isn't answered, and the smile seems to drop off MCBC's face. And then it drops off of your face as a result, and your judgement is telling you something you never would've imagined. You sort of want to drop the subject, but you can't help it all the same, stuck in another situation where you wish you'd just kept your mouth shut. He doesn't say a word, instead removing a tattered and clearly imitation leather wallet from his pocket, and a slight smile begins to appear again. But it's different now; it's not the amused look he had earlier - it's a wistful look that you've never seen much of on him before as he swings the wallet open and hands you a photograph. You hold it so delicately between your steel fingers, worried that a slight bend could crumble the whole thing to nothingness, and you stare at it in disbelief.
"She's three," is all he says, watching your face and apparently trying to gauge your reaction. You only catch a glimpse of this look before you're staring down at the tiny picture again, a little girl in a flowery dress grinning back at you. The colours on it aren't great, but her vibrancy shines through nonetheless, and you can't help but think of how much she looks like him. Maybe it's the mischievous smile, or the way she's got dirt and Band-Aids on her knees and is holding a worm up to the camera – you're not sure.
"She'll be four in a couple months."
You nod slightly, handing it back to him, and he practically snatches it out of your fingers in a gesture of overprotectiveness, sliding it back into his wallet and hiding it away.
"I got her a bike for her birthday," he laughs, sounding like he's about to fall to pieces.
"So, are you…?" is all you manage to ask, but somehow he knows, preferring to look out of the kitchen window at the doves congregating on the balcony instead of at your face.
"Me and her mom don't really… Know each other anymore, if that's what you mean. I see her once a month if I'm lucky."
Suddenly, the comments he'd made to Eaglebones earlier about not being able to afford his own car make sense, the way he said that he made enough money but it "wasn't for him". You're still nodding slowly, trying to deal with this revelation and put all of the pieces together, when the Commander punches you in the shoulder and walks past you out of the kitchen, cheerfully yelling to Ricky about how he apparently has a dumb haircut.
Somehow - and you really don't know how it happened - when the four of you are left alone in the apartment, you all begin singing. It's completely ridiculous, and for a while you just sit tapping your foot as the three of them holler and wail along to music on the TV, Condor regretfully having left Bones with the remote. Inevitably, the Commander snatched it right off him, which would be funny to you if you weren't still utterly lost in thought at the idea of him having a daughter. It just won't sink in, the notion of him as a dad. Although, neither will the thoughts about the child's mother. Who is she? What's she like? What happened between them?
You try and forget about it, tuning it out and paying more attention to the noise around you than usual, ending up joining their singing to various awfully cheesy pop songs.
"Man, how d'you even know the words to this?" chuckles MCBC, shaking his head at you. "Doesn't seem like your sort of thing."
Ricky laughs too, nodding quickly in agreement.
"Yeah, Jimmy, what the heck? You used to roll your eyes at us and leave the room over this stuff."
"I hear it a lot now," you retort, somewhat offended. "Doesn't mean I like it – I just hear it on the radio a lot."
The smile you give the Commander at the end of your confession makes him stick his tongue out and act out a mock-gagging sound, before punching you lightly in the shoulder again.
"Still a big sap, eh, robot?"
All three of them chuckle, immediately bursting into song again, and you huff before accepting it and intentionally singing as badly as possible, joining in. You thought it was a compliment, but you suppose it might've been a little much.
After Journey comes on the TV and the whole block is treated to a loving cover of "Don't Stop Believing", complete with a capella renditions of instrumental parts, mimed guitar solos, and all-new improvised lyrics, you find yourself in a much better mood. Condor stomps back up the stairs again, standing in the doorway and watching the spectacle of it all.
"Man, why did you guys ever stop performing?" he jibes sarcastically, but while Eaglebones finds his dad's comment funny, you notice that the Commander appears to be lost in thought. You think you'd be able to see gears turning up there if you thought they hadn't been glued up with sugar years ago.
"He has a point," mumbles MCBC, and the rest of you look at him, partially because you can't hear him over the music, but partially because you can't believe what you're actually hearing.
"What?" you ask, the only one who seems brave enough to open your mouth. Ricky, taking the remote out of the Commander's hand, puts the TV on mute.
"Condor-dude has a point," he repeats impatiently, as if it were obvious. "I mean, we could…"
"We're getting along better now," adds Ricky, staring at the Commander with a look of excitement so intense you think he might explode.
"One last gig," offers the Commander, seemingly thinking out loud.
"We'd need to… To practice," you say, the first thing that comes forward from the soup of increasingly deep thought that your brain is turning into.
"I still practice like, every day," confesses Eaglebones.
"Well, my voice ain't changing," the Commander replies. "I can still hit the same notes; you should hear me singing in the shower," he adds, making Ricky snort with laughter.
"I still gotta drum kit in my house and play all the time… If anything, I've gotten better!"
And, of course, you don't need practice, programmed to always do the same thing in the same way, for the most part. It was your argument in the first place, but you can feel yourself turning over to the opposing side regardless.
"Well… What about a bassist?" you offer, struggling to determine whether you should even argue the point, everyone's smiles faltering as you bring up Crash. "I know it's… Not, not a good subject for any of us, but… Y'know, we do need one."
Ricky rubs his forehead with the palm of his hand, before running it back through his hair, hesitating.
"Maybe this isn't a good idea, guys," he sighs, completely changing his tune. "It wouldn't be right to replace Crash."
"We're not replacing Crash," snaps the Commander, raising his voice. "We need a new bassist. A new person. Not a replacement. Nobody could ever replace Crash, nobody could ever fill his shoes."
There's a pause, everyone slightly stunned with how angry he's getting, and he looks over at you, not knowing what to say.
"…Literally and figuratively," you add, saving him, and lightening the mood as he sputters a laugh at your dumb joke.
Condor's still watching you from the door, and you imagine he has no idea what he's done – he's backing up this theory with the disturbed, wide-eyed look he's giving the four of you. There's more thudding behind him, and Eagleclaw appears from the stairwell, trying to gently push past his father and looking somewhat nervous with the amount of people in his house. The Commander jumps to his feet so fast that everyone in the room visibly recoils, turning his head sharply to look at the other Falconhawk brother.
"You," is all that he says, pointing with a sinister smile on his face.
"No," says Eaglebones, almost instinctually.
"Bones taught you to play without trashing guitars any more, right?" The Commander practically yells, smile stretching even further.
"No," Eaglebones says again, more forcefully this time, but it's not really distinguishable as his brother says "yeah?" cluelessly at the same time. Condor chuckles, sighs slightly, and heads for the kitchen again.
"Can you play bass?"
"Really? Really."
Eagleclaw scowls at his brother threateningly, before answering with another agreement.
"Welcome to the band!" cries The MC Bat Commander, full of confidence, going to shake their "newest member's" hand before deciding against it and pulling his hand away. He turns to the rest of you, and you can't decide whether you want to laugh harder than you ever have done in your life, or have a complete and utter nervous breakdown.
"Aquabats, let's go!" he yells triumphantly, arm raised high into the air, and you all get out of your seats just as rapidly as he did, as if it's second nature to you. Apparently excitement has overtaken all common sense, and you're just rolling with it.
"Wait… Where are we going?" Ricky asks finally when you're already halfway down the street, Eagleclaw trailing behind you begrudgingly with no clue of what's happening, but apparently accepting his fate.
"We're gonna go get our uniforms, duh!"