(This chapter is a pretty big heart cruncher, and I guess there's some trigger warning for implied abuse. Nothing really descriptive or heavy, but yeah, a bit of implied abuse. We go even deeper into Randall's backstory, and you find out more about his family life, and Silver (who is to be a very important character). There's also a bit of Mike and Randall development cause I'm a sucker for their wayward friendship.

Next chapter won't be until after I get back home in two weeks possibly. Silver is copyright my friend Floridias_Firefly)

Randall hummed as he blissfully stirred some batter up in a large, metallic bowl. He was getting the batter absolutely everywhere, but his mother didn't rebuke him and only cleaned the spills as she watched with an affectionate smile.

"Giving the counters a taste of your cupcakes too, sweetie?"

The four year old blinked down at the spills from his batter, and his scales flushed an adorable pink. "Oops. Hehe, I guess so! I can't wait til Silver tries a taste of these! I know he's gonna love 'em!"

The door opened the moment he finished speaking, and he gasped when his eleven year old brother slowly trudged in. As he did every time, he ran up and threw his multiple, tiny arms around Silver's waist. "Silver! Hi!"

The older sibling mumbled a hello and petted his head. He avoided eye contact with his mother as he tried to go to his room. Elsa stopped him.

"Now wait a minute, young man. Don't you have a report card to show me?"

"No...I..uh, left it at school."

Randall was only four at the time, so he only understood half of what was happening as his brother was scolded for a bad grade and tried to run off. He blinked as he watched his mother accidentally yank on Silver's tail, which had always been crooked at a weird angle for as long as Randall could remember. He was always told Silver bumped it when he was his age.

But as he watched his apologetic mother try to soothe his now sobbing brother, something told him his brother hadn't just bumped his tail. And it wouldn't be until later that Randall would learn about the real reason for his brother's funny tail, and the many marks on his mother and brother that had never healed.

The moon was lowering past the horizon when three tired and yet strangely content monsters made their way down the dark streets at five in the morning with two children-taking care to make sure the streets were vacant and lights were off before doing so.

"So this is what you two do every night with the shrimp?" Randall asked as they made the ten minute walk to the factory. "How have you not gotten caught yet? Either by the kid's mother, or by some other monsters roaming?"

Sulley chuckled. "Well when you do this every night, you catch onto schedules pretty quickly. You have to. Boo's parents wake up for work at six in the morning, and so that's when they come to check on her." He shrugged, a somewhat sheepish look on his face. "I make slip ups now and again. Once I got her in late, and they were looking for her."

"You've gotta be careful with that, Sull'," Mike advised. "When kids go missing parents alert the authorities in their world. If that happens enough she could be taken by the authorities. You'd lose her forever." He patted the furry monster's shoulder sympathetically as he inadvertently seemed to grip the sleeping toddler tighter.

"It's risky no matter what way you swing it," Randall said. "Even if the twerps' parents check on them at a certain time, they could always come in earlier. Or sometimes, parents just peek into the kids' doors for the heck of it. I know my mom did that a lot. This really shouldn't be made into a habit." Of course, that ship had already sailed.

"What about you, kid?" Mike asked Emma—the only one of the group who was still skipping along with plenty of energy. "What's your schedule?"

"Well my Dad works away in another city all week. He comes home on weekends only. Mom's usually the one that stays and looks after us, but last night she went next door for a few hours. And since it was next door, she thought we'd be okay for a bit. Tina is nearly twelve, after all...

"I've got this system going, where when I shut my door it means I'm in a really bad mood and I don't want anyone coming in. It hasn't failed yet-except for when Mom had to drag us out of the house when the fire alarm went off. As long as I have the door closed I can probably come over anytime!"

The other monsters chuckled but Randall blanched.

"I don't think so," the lizard snapped. "I just said we can't make this out to be a habit!"

"Aw, but Boo could use a friend Randall," Sulley practically pouted, gesturing the sleeping girl up with a paw. "She doesn't have any other kids to play with here."

"Oh, she has plenty of kids to play with in her world I'm sure," he snipped back, grabbing Emma's hand and dragging her down the hall of the factory in case she tried to make another get-a-way. "She doesn't need one every night."

He pulled the child along until they reached the machines by the door slots on the laugh floor. Swiping her file card through the machine slot, the creamy blue door slowly descended into view.

"My world sucks compared to yours," Emma griped as she flopped down onto her mattress. Scowling, Randall came over to her side. "I don't see why I can't just stay in the monster world. After all, it's not like anyone here even appreciates me anyway..."

A conflicted look crossed his face, and his mouth creased in understanding—which he quickly shook away. "If I can do it, you can do it, kid," he mumbled as he turned to leave.

"Wait!"

He hissed, ready to bark at the girl to stop stalling her bed time. Every second he stayed here so early in the morning risked someone bursting in at every moment. "Look, kid-"

But whatever he was going to say died and was swallowed as the nine year old abruptly threw her arms around his waist. His multiple arms went up in alarm and he staggered from the impact, staring wide-eyed down at the little thing latched to his waist.

"Thanks for taking me tonight," she mumbled into his chest.

He utterly froze, and couldn't move a muscle.

Emma hopped back just as quickly in embarrassment. Her cheeks were beet red. "You're the first person—er, thing—I've hugged in a really long time." She played with her hair nervously. "I don't do it a lot. Like you, I usually hate touching anybody, but...it felt right." She blushed more. "Ya know?"

There was a barrage of things running through Randall's mind, the warmth of the girl's arms still lingering. No one had ever done that to him before—no child anyway. And he couldn't explain what it felt like.

Or how it had touched him somewhere in the depths of his closed heart.

"Uh-uhhmm...yeah, well...good night, kid." Refusing to look into the bright, smiling face, he shut the door.

Randall scowled in annoyance and turned the volume up higher on the tv as Mike's pitiful pleads and Sulley's firm "no"s grew louder. At least back in the basement it was quieter—up until he broke the silence himself with his pitiful coughing. After his last bout of illness had landed him in the nurse's station he somehow found himself permanently residing with Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dumber.

"Look Big Guy, I love Boo, I really do, but there's no way I'm taking a three year old on a date!" He looked down at the little tot that was poorly attempting to do a headstand by the front of the couch. "She'd hardly add to a romantic atmosphere, not to mention the fact I don't even think you can bring children to an opera. Why can't you just put her back into her door?"

"Have you lost your mind?" Sulley snapped back. "I just told you I'm going to the factory to help Roz out with something. What am I suppose to do—just waltz in with Boo? I don't even know if her old costume would fit her."

Randall stood there and watched as the conversation and eventually insults were thrown back and forth between the two squabbling monsters, until he eventually rolled his eyes and held up one of his hands. "Uh hello, twerp sitter number three here?"

The shouting stopped as both of them eyed him as if he had four heads instead of multiple limbs. "Yeah, I expected that reaction. Anyway, I'm going to my mother's." His frills flattened, irked by the way they further looked at him. "Don't look at me like that, even bad guys have moms."

"You're not taking Boo," Sulley growled sharply, in a tone that made even Mike shut up for a second. "There's no way that's gonna happen."

Randall snorted. "Oh what, you give me a practice kid, you make me play with the practice kid, you even let me stay here in your crumby apartment, and you still think I'll put the twerp in danger?" His tail twitched in impatience when he felt the girl bat at it. "I'm going to my mother's, Sullivan, I'm not taking her to a battlefield."

"I remember your mother!" Mike blurted out without thinking. "Didn't you tell me she taught you how to bake?" Randall flushed and the fury fell from Sulley's face. His lips twitched up in amusement.

"You...bake?"

"Shut up!" He was mortified when the brute started snickering, claws curled and threatening to grab his throat. "Ugh, fine, yes I can bake! Look, the kid will be safe at my mother's. She...ugh, loves kids, so I'm pretty sure she'll go crazy over the shrimp. The worst thing that could happen would be her winding up with a belly ache from all the treats my mother will probably try to stuff into her." He winced as Sulley's eyebrows shot up. "I didn't phrase that well."

"We may as well let him, Pal," Mike suggested with a shrug. "What have we got to lose? Literally speaking, you could lose Boo if Roz catches her wandering there. You can't exactly put her back in that monster costume, Roz can see right through it."

Sulley glanced down at the three year old still trying to catch Randall's tail, and at the glaring lizard that tried to hold it out of reach of her grabby hands. "I don't know..."

He couldn't believe he was actually considering this and not blurting out with a straight, angry no. This was Randall, the deranged monster that had tried to kidnap the girl, strangle him and...do gods know what to the helpless toddler. And yet... He glanced back.

You wouldn't even be able to tell that ever was the case now, between the giggling toddler trying to nab the lizard tail, and the lizard that seemed to be playing keep-a-way with it with a somewhat fond look.

"...Alright," he finally agreed, shocking both monsters. "We don't have much of a choice anyway." A growl rumbled him and he took a step forward, towering over the lizard. Even Randall found himself taking a step back and staring up at him. "But if you let ANYTHING happen to her..." He remembered the lizard's old threat. "I will put you through the shredder."

He backed off and stepped away. Randall felt more annoyed than anything, raising an eyebrow at the brute as he backed off and turned to leave with Mike. He snorted and heavily rolled his eyes, snatching up Boo and making his way to the door. "Come on twerp. If I have to choose between a night with the two ding-dongs and you, I'll choose you."

"Keep the zipper up, kid!" Randall growled for the umpteenth time as he banged Boo's curious fingers away from the metal zipper. "We're still out in the open and if someone sees you out here you might never be able to come back."

She got the message and tugged the green little hood down over her face. The green disguise looked so much better, Randall thought. He didn't even know how Sullivan's chair-fabric-creation had passed for believable now that he looked at it, but this costume was high quality fabric, and it looked exactly like scales; slick as if it was slimy too.

"That's the best, most realistic monster costume money can buy," Randall told the little critter-kid as she toddled after him up the gravel path. "In fact I spent most of the money I had on that dumb costume, so you better appreciate it."

Gods, the lengths he was going to protect Sullivan's dumb little twerp. He glared down at the little three year old, but the moment he set eye on the dopey, innocent little thing as she blissfully chased after a butterfly, he found his lips twitching.

"You'll like my mom, because she's nothing like me. She loves kids. I bet she'll spoil you rotten." The girl wriggled her face slightly through the hood to grin at the monster, eyes wide and excited as they made their way to the door.

A hand raised to knock on the door, but it paused in mid-tap, and started shaking. It had been years. Too many in fact. For all he knew his mother had moved past him. It wasn't as if he was a very accomplished son. ...None of her children were that way. Would she even remember him? Did she even want to?

"Let's go, twerp," he mumbled as he turned to leave, feeling his voice turn funny and his eyes starting to sting. "We'll just go back to the apartment or something." He started marching off the porch, but Boo lingered there and glanced at the door in confusion. She made a few sounds of distress, and Randall rolled his eyes.

"I said let's go."

She must have whimpered enough because the front door opened as a perplexed, light magenta lizard poked her face out of the doorway. Her eyes fell on Boo's costumed form, and she gently picked her up. She didn't see her son in the background, who was currently frozen in fear. "Hello, sweetheart," she crooned as she situated the child in a cradling position. "Who do you belong to?"

Randall was literally petrified to the walking path as he heard his mother murmur to the little girl. He didn't know what to do. His feet twitched with the urge to run, but he knew he couldn't just leave the twerp with her. Not if he valued any of his limbs.

"...Randy?"

His heart leaped to his throat, and he suddenly felt that emotional vulnerability he hadn't since he was a child. His mother was the only one who could break his walls down as if they were made of paper.

Foot steps became louder until they were right behind him, and Randall could hear the tears as his mother breathed behind him. He was caught, he knew it, and he had no choice but to turn around. The moment he did, his green eyes met the same misty ones.

The female lizard stared at him as if he was an apparition. She must have thought he was because she reached out and gently cupped his face in her hands to see if he was real. Feeling her touch, still gentle and tender as it always was, Randall felt tears threatening him.

"...Hey Mom," he finally mumbled, his throat feeling clogged with tears. Elsa's face broke into a large, quivering grin as she wrapped her multiple arms around her baby, and hugged him close. Automatically, without giving it a thought, Randall returned the gesture.

"Oh Randy, my baby boy," she whispered breathlessly as she swayed him gently back and forth. "My precious little boy..."

His face pressed against his mother's top shoulder, Randall felt the sting in his eyes that came before tears. He sniffled and flushed with shame when he realized Boo was still there, and worse, looking up at him.

"I can't believe it's you," Elsa whispered as she eventually pulled back and wiped hers and her baby's eyes. "I thought you were..." Her voice trailed off, but Randall could tell by the way it hitched painfully what she had assumed.

"I know, Mom." He gave a wry, watery smile. "Still kicking though." The Mama's-boy part of him that never grew up smiled inwardly when she affectionately tapped his nose, and opened the door for him to go into it.

Nothing looked different. It seemed like it was decades ago, when the quaint little cottage was filled with laughter, love, and family. He gazed outwardly to the living room, to the worn leather chair his brother and him always chased each other around, and the carpet full of spills from those jittery nights they watched scary movies with pop and snacks.

"Everything looks the same," he commented to his mother as he grazed a hand fondly over the dulled edge of the counter where he remembered bumping his head running to get dessert. "Literally everything." He chuckled awkwardly. "You didn't even change the carpet, even though it's ridiculously stained."

Pulling out a pan of cookies at the oven's ding, Elsa gave a melancholic smile. "I kept it for the memories. When you and your brother...left, I wanted to make sure I kept every memory of you both that I had." She smiled as a curious Boo caught the scent of the cookies and toddled over. "Is she yours?"

Randall gave a loud snort. "Oh yeah, she's mine alright." He kept quiet on the girl's identity, unsure if his mother was ready for that yet. "No, I'm looking after her. Don't feed her or else she'll never leave." He rolled his eyes affectionately as his mother scooped the toddler into her lap and set a plate of cookies in front of them both. Boo instantly began chowing down.

The lightheartedness had begun to fade from the air with each passing second and each munch of a cookie. Randall could feel his mother's sharp, disapproving eyes staring him down from across the table and he bit his lip. Boo of course remained blissfully unaware to everything but her treats.

"I couldn't believe the stories I had heard," his mother began. "I didn't want to believe the stories I heard. My son, my baby being banished...kidnapping, attempting murder..." She shook her head. "The city is unkind and unreliable, I know. Many of those could be rumors, but..." She looked painfully at her son, silently pleading for him to clarify they were all lies, but he never did.

"Everything I did was...supposed to be for the good of our world." The justification felt so stale now, because he knew it wasn't the reason and he had far more malicious intent than that. "I mean...I was only trying to end the energy crisis. The machine was supposed to work, and we never cared about kids so I didn't think it'd be a loss."

"Scaring them is one thing," Elsa began, shaking as the tears spilled over her cheeks. "But...hurting them? There had to have been other ways to solve the problem!"

She was right, there was. Obviously there was if they were doing so well today in the company. He never made the effort to find a more benign solution because the lives of the kids had supposedly meant nothing to their kind. Yet still...

"I...I knew it was wrong."

"And you still did it." Elsa's voice was ice cold, and hard in disappointment.

"Yes..." That was perhaps what hurt the most, knowing he had utterly ignored the inhumanity he knew his mother would disapprove of. He never stopped to think about what it could cause, or how it would affect his mother. He was supposed to be the good one, the sweet child that was an example of his mother's shining upbringing. He was never supposed to be like his brother.

He shut his eyes when he felt Boo clamber up onto the couch beside him with her tiny little arms and legs. He wouldn't look at her, but he did flip down the startled child's hood.

Elsa, understandably, gasped in shock at the sight of a real, genuine human child there on her couch. It was like seeing a zebra outside of its pen at the zoo. She looked at the baby. She squinted, and slowly shook her head in denial when it dawned on her.

Randall felt his blood turn to ice when his mother made the connection. She glanced from him to the little cookie-crumb-faced toddler sitting on the other side of the couch, and one of her hands flew to her chest.

"Gods, Randy, no..."

The lizard bit his lip and found his head hanging in shame, much like when he was a child and did something wrong. For some reason the guilt weighed much heavier just being around his mother. Perhaps it was because all a child wanted in life was their parents' approval and pride, and to know he had shattered hers like this...

"Randy, she's a defenseless baby girl, tell me you didn't." His mother's voice became choked with sobs, because she remembered it, the headline in the paper that made her heart stop. The news her son was banished, the photo of a young two year old with pigtails. "Randy..."

Boo gazed up when she heard the elder reptile sob, and glanced from Randall to his mother.

"I know," Randall croaked. "Mom, I know. I wasn't thinking, and I-"

He shut his eyes when he heard his mother give an anguished cry and start to sob. Boo turned over to the female lizard with a worried pout and creased eyebrows. Randall unzipped the rest of her costume and she toddled over to his mother.

Elsa shakily picked the toddler up when she whined in distress, and gazed into the wide, innocent eyes. The pain was greater as she looked into them. knowing her baby had nearly been responsible for taking this baby's life. "I never raised you to become this...to do this." She shook her head at her son, who painfully gazed back. "You were...supposed to turn out different."

His vision blurred when he realized what his mother was implying, and he had to take a few breaths before he spoke again, or a sob had the danger of slipping out. "I guess...I didn't."

He had loved his brother, he had feared him, and now, he had become him. He became the very image, the very person he promised his mother he'd never be. He had barely just gotten out of college when he heard the news of Silver's banishment. And by then he was too far gone to even let the grief effect him. Never having a father in his life, he relied on Silver to fill the void, and he had become a Dad as much as he was a brother. But never was he a good role model.

There was no doubt in Randall's mind, had he not been in college at the time that he would have been behind bars, and banished like his brother.

Oh, but you managed to get there pretty easy without him, didn't you? A cold voice snickered at him in his head. You don't need him to teach you everything after all.

"I should have done more for you both," Elsa whispered, her voice grated with tears of regret and self loathing. "I should have done more to help your brother. After the incident with your father I tried to...make up for all that had happened, but I knew it was too late. Something had...happened. I just know he would have turned out different if your father hadn't-"

"Mom." Randall stopped her there as he glanced over pointedly to Boo. The child was listening intently, staring worriedly between both mother and son.

"Mom, you can't blame yourself for how Silver..." He paused, and took in a difficult sigh. "How w-we turned out... Look, I made my own mistakes. It was never anything you did. I let myself get in with the wrong crowd, and started to follow Silver's motto...we don't need anybody else. That was...probably the biggest mistake I made."

Boo slipped down from Elsa's lap and toddled over to Randall. She didn't say a word or even whine as she held her arms out to him. Without even thinking about it, Randall lifted the girl onto the cushion beside him.

His mind was just a jumble of emotions as he looked at the child who had a tiny hand rested on his knee. "I don't know what to do. Humans are so confusing. This one should hate me." And yet she was the first one to ever show him kindness. "I miss when kids were toxic, when we didn't have to wonder about what went on in their heads. Everything was so much easier."

He extended a hand almost curiously, cupping the side of the toddler's head. Boo tilted her head sideways so that her cheek was laying in his palm.

"Maybe you should count this as a blessing," Elsa said softly, lovingly smoothing back her baby's frills. "For whatever reason, you have a chance to make things right now. You can make up for the wrong you've done."

Randall hesitated, his mind flashing back to Sullivan, to Mike, Boo, and especially to Emma. They were all willing to give him a chance and see past all he did. But how was he supposed to repent for it? And was that what he really wanted?

He looked up when he felt his mother wipe his face from the tears he didn't even realize had fallen. "Why don't you go lay down for a bit while I make dinner? I've kept your old room..."

He nodded and started slowly slithering to his room with the toddler in toe. Elsa watched him go. Her frills flattened disapprovingly against her head and she abruptly turned and whipped her tail across the younger lizard's backside, making him give a loud yelp and quickly skitter through the door.

He groaned and rubbed the red stripe across his rear. He should have expected that. His mother had never been one to raise a hand—er, tail, on him, but then he had never attempted kidnapping nor murder growing up. He glared when Boo giggled.

"Stuff it, shrimp."

His mother hadn't been lying when she said she had kept all the memories she could. Everything in his room was placed in the exact same position it had been in when he left it. Yet, none of it carried a speck of dust; it was clear she came and cleaned it often.

He smiled fondly at a worn, foam football Boo picked up curiously. "I remember that old thing. It was my favorite thing to play with when I was with my brother. This was his first football, and when I got older, he taught me how to play with this thing."

The evenings frittered away out in the yard, where his brother had a makeshift football field with the little space they had, chalk drawn across the grass to mark the border. He remembered staying out so late Elsa often scolded them to come inside. They did that every night, until his brother decided he didn't want to play with the crumby thing anymore.

He ran a hand over the furnishing of his and Silver's old bunk beds and looked at the wall when something caught his eye. He grabbed Boo in his tail and scaled to the top bunk. Next to the Monsters University banner his brother always hung there for inspiration was a new board with pictures tacked all over it.

It was him and his brother as children. They were so young in some of the photos, their wide eyes still full of innocence. As the years went on there was always a distinct lack of sparkle and happiness in Silver's eyes. It had been that way since their father left.

Randall chuckled tearfully as he gingerly picked up a pair of large, purple glasses. Turning them over fondly in his hands, he looked over as Boo pointed inquisitively to the photos.

"That's my family. There's Mom." He pointed to a class photo of a silver lizard with more frills than him. "That's my brother, Silver. I grew up with them both."

Daddy?"

Randall turned to see Boo pointing to the photo collage with a confused expression on her face. She touched a photo of his mother, and of his brother and him, and glanced back at him, seeming worried.

He swallowed when he felt a pang in his chest. "There wasn't really one," was all he said. Even he knew you couldn't tell a three year old this kind of stuff. "It doesn't matter."

She kept looking at him and back at the photo. Her little eyebrows creased and she bit her lower lip as she kept looking at him. This didn't make sense to her. She was still at an age where her idea of a perfect family wasn't missing a parent.

Randall shook his head as she kept staring at him. She was smart, remarkably so; so much more than any adult he knew. She always knew when something was wrong, and she always pressed to get it. He found it so much easier to talk to her than anyone else he knew. A baby.

Maybe he was going insane.

"I never grew up with a…Daddy." The nursery title felt wrong to say, and not just because he should be passed the age of using it. "Well he was gone before I was born. My brother was seven when I was born. So he had him for seven years. He was…" He tried to find a way to phrase this for a child. "He was really mean, my father. He got…mad a lot. He hurt people."

Memories flashed through his mind, of the scars adorning his brother and his mother's skin.

"You don't hurt family. You aren't supposed to. I might be the meanest, scariest monster you know but I never hurt my mother or my brother. That's not the way it's supposed to go." Especially when you trust your parents to be the only ones to never hurt you…

A part of him felt guilty and sick at the look of pain on her face, like it was taking a piece of the girl's innocence. She was too young to have to know the ones you were supposed to trust were capable of hurting you. He felt an odd sense of protectiveness, like he wanted to shield the girl's mind…just as he could never shield his brother.

"I've said enough," he told the child in a shaky, gruff voice. "There's a lot of things you're too young to know." And a lot of details that he wouldn't even tell another adult. "But, uh…promise me something."

She looked at him curiously with tears in her eyes.

"Promise me that if anyone ever hurts you or tries to…you'll tell someone. Tell your Mommy."

She kept looking at him.

"Don't ever keep it from her…"

Somehow, the three year old understood the question because she gave him a serious nod, and he picked her up and crawled back down to the floor. He felt too restless to lay down.

As he opened his door to the kitchen, his eyes widened in excitement and surprise by the nostalgic scent of batter and sugar. His mother was baking cupcakes.

"Randy? I thought you were going to lay down for a bit."

He snickered as he slithered out to the kitchen. "The smell of baking woke me up I guess. Making cupcakes for old times sake, huh, Mom?"

His mother laughed and ruffled his frills. "I thought you'd like it. I remember you were just three when you tried to make me your first cupcake."

"Out of mud," he laughed. "Oh and what were the sprinkles? Pieces of twigs and pebbles. I still can't believe you took a little bite out of it."

She grabbed his cheek. "I didn't want to hurt your feelings. If you ever get to be a parent you'll understand."

"You were sick that night."

"Again, you'll do anything for your child. I couldn't let a perfect cupcake go to waste, could I?."

"Yeah? Well my baking skills can possibly rival yours now. In fact, I'm probably better." He sneered playfully as his mother gaped at him. "Oh come on, I was at university! You have any idea how many cook books the library had?"

His mother smirked back at him. "Challenging me, are you? Fine, get the sugar and eggs and we'll just see who's the best out of this household."

"Got it. Hey twerp, wanna help your old pal bake? Maybe I'll let you lick the bowl if you're good."

Boo gave him a deadpan glare, and he rolled his eyes.

"Fine, I'll let you taste test one of mine if you get me the bag of sugar." Boo skittered over to a small sack rested against the fridge, and Randall took out the carton of eggs. "There, now we're all ready for our bake off!"

Elsa looked over at something in his hand. "Not quite."

"Huh?"

He blinked as she took the purple glasses out of his fingers and put them on his eyes. She smiled at him. "Now we're ready to bake."

It was past seven when Sulley and Mike got back home. The apartment was dimmed and quiet, but it had been unlocked so they knew Randall was back with Boo. Sulley had finished going through scattered forms with a very irate Roz, and managed to catch a ride with Mike, who got out of the opera at the same time.

"Tired, Pal?" Mike asked as they shut and locked the door behind them. "You've got bags under your eyes."

"Yeah, and you've got stars in yours," Sulley commented, and snickered as Mike flushed.

"Yeah, well, love will do that to you, Big Guy." He sighed dreamily. "Or just Celia. Celia has that affect on everybody."

"Mhm, yeah," the large monster responded dryly. "Cause I turn into a pile of romantic goo too when she's here." He looked around when he noticed how quiet everything was. "Hey, where's Randall?"

On cue a serpentine silhouette slithered out to the main door. He flickered on the light, and the moment he did, it somehow felt as if a block of cement had slammed Mike in the chest.

"Hey there, I'm your roomie! Name's Randy Boggs! Scaring major!"

"Oh well, Mike Wazowski, scaring major!"

"I can tell we're gonna be best chums, Mike!"

The green monster was horrified when he felt the tears well in his one eye. "Okay Sull, I'm gonna go, and uhh..." He didn't even finish his sentence as he abruptly left the room, covering his eye.

Randall and Sulley exchanged looks, but didn't think much of it. Sulley snickered as he passed the lizard, into the kitchen. "Nice glasses."

"Huh—oh." Randall's scales flushed a light pink when he realized the nerdy frames were still on his face. He snorted and went to carelessly toss the frames aside, but had a second thought and instead held onto them. "Oh, you're not gonna like the condition your kid is in."

"What?" Sulley instantly snarled, turning to the lizard with wild eyes. "What did you do?" Undaunted and in fact amused, Randall pointed over to the corner of the kitchen, where a certain little girl sat amongst a pile of cupcakes, covered from head to toe in fluffy icing. She grinned when she saw him.

"Kitty!"

"Oh Geez..."

Randall snickered affectionately at the girl. Whatever benign way he could use to make Sullivan miserable was always just fine with him. He left the furry monster with the mess and wandered his way back into the living room, where a small green form sat hunched in the darkness. And it wasn't hard to tell he was crying.

"What's with you, Wazowski?" He received no answer and was ready to give up and walk off( what did he care if the little green bean was crying?) until it struck him when Mike had left the room earlier. When he was wearing his glasses.

Oh.

For the second time that day he froze, the same kind of twinge of pain hitting his chest. And unlike when he finally saw his mother again for the first time in ages, he had no explanation for what he felt now. He stood there as he listened to the sniffles. It annoyed him, but not because the sound itself was annoying.

But because he utterly had no idea what to do.

Slowly, he found himself sinking onto the couch as well, wondering if his presence, however awkward it was, somehow was enough of a comfort. He heard the tears drip onto the cushion even as Mike himself remained pretty quiet otherwise.

"Look uh...I didn't mean to leave the stupid glasses on. It's just, my mother wanted me to wear them for some reason and I guess I forgot. I didn't think you'd go off with the waterworks!" Mike looked over at him, and Randall really froze there.

"I'm fine," Mike lied. "I just didn't expect to see you in them...I was surprised."

Randall gave him a deadpan look. "You were surprised, so you cried."

"..."

"That's what I thought." He gazed over at his enemy—ally? Companion?-and grunted in self-annoyance when he realized he felt a twinge of concern. "I..." They were living together now, and he depended on both monsters in order to survive right now. He knew he couldn't just side step this. And he had bled his heart out today, why not do it again?

"I never should have let myself get so caught up with everything in college. I should have been there when you needed me." His eyes were shut, and he was relieved he couldn't see Mike's expression. "I mean...there's no sense dwelling on things, but I've been doing that all day, so." He gave an almost playful shrug and sighed when he saw Mike was still crying. "Aw geez, would you stop it already?" he snapped, greatly uncomfortable. "What else do you want?!"

Mike finally did laugh a little and wiped his eye. "Nothing buddy, I just...I've waited a while for this I guess. Actually I stopped waiting cause I didn't think the monster I knew was still in there. But... Heh, I guess he still is. Somewhere."

Randall's frills inadvertently flattened and he frowned skeptically, but for some reason he didn't bother to tell him not to call him Buddy this time.

"...There's some cupcakes left. Uh, if you want them, I mean." He couldn't help but smile slightly when the green monster gave him a shocked look. "You didn't think I'd completely stop my baking, did you? I lived on my own for so long, who else would provide the sweets for me?"

Mike chuckled. "Yeah, sure Randall. Hope I don't accidentally knock the tray over this time."

"You do and I'll toss you in the garbage compacter."