AN: Got to finally see the third season of the cuphead show. And it was great, and the implication it will follow the events of the Videogame. Though I'm a bit dissapointed that we didn't meet the other bosses and see hwat their personality is like especially some of the other NPCs. But that's what fics are for.

Anyway let's just say the cups are going to be doing their own sleuthing to help their friend. Meanwhile the Aunt and the villains will instigate a man hunt or girl hunt for our heroine.

Chapter 6: A home away from home

That same evening, Tazita followed Chalice on a forest path before reaching a stone path, leading to a particular house on a small hill.

The house looked like a teapot with two round windows, an aegean colored door, straw roof in front. It had a garden, a white fence decorated the small hill, with a well, with a tree on the right side. Nearby, tied by a rope was a black goat resting on the grass.

Chalice motioned Tazita to follow, as they stepped onto the stone path. She knocked on the door. To Tazita's surprise she saw a familiar face. It was Mugman who answered the door.

"Hey, guys, it's me, Chalice!" Chalice happily says.

Cuphead rushes over to greet the girl, "Chalice!"

Chalice quickly lets herself in, "Shh! Not so loud!"

"Another mob?" asked Mugman sternly.

"No," Chalice answers, "A friend of mine needs a bit of assistance." She steps aside and gestures the younger cup girl to come in.

Tazita hesitantly steps in, looking timid.

"Tazita!" the boys greet her excitedly.

"I see you met our friend, Chalice." said Cuphead to Tazita

"Yeah, I ran into her while I was in town." she replied

"So, what brings you here?" asked Mugman

"The girl needs a place to hold out since she's on the run." said Chalice.

"The proper term is running away," corrected Tazita

"Running away?!"

"Yep, running away," Chalice says, before looking outside as if looking out for something. "And not just from her home. We found out something big." Then she gets in between the two brothers, "So I thought she could stay here, since we had such great times."

"Tazita could hold up in the attic." suggested Cuphead

"Cuphead!" protested Mugman

"Come on Mugsy, let's hear them out at least!"

Chalice with Cuphead and Mugman's help, managed to sneak Tazita up in the attic. "If we get caught, we'll be in trouble and so will Kettle." said a concerned Mugman

"And if anyone finds out you're here, they'll blow whistle on you." added Cuphead

"But you had a home, three meals a day and a warm bed. Why would you leave?" Mugman inquired Tazita.

"I asked her the same question." interjected Chalice "She says her Aunt Ruer is overbearing and fussy."

Tazita groaned "More like suffocating! She never lets me do anything and always assumes the worst."

"Not always, she did seem pretty insightful about King Dice being shifty." said Chalice, remembering what they discovered when they snuck into the studio that night.

"Whaddya mean shifty?" asked Cuphead

"Well, it was like this: you heard about her humiliation on the show Roll the Dice?"

Both the cup brothers nodded. "Yeah."

"With my charms and slight of hand, I helped her sneak back in to the mystery prize room."

"You snuck in like we did in the cookie factory?" said Cuphead remembering an incident that happened a few months earlier.

"Not exactly,"

"Wait! You guys snuck in a cookie factory?!" Tazita questioned, making a weird face that was a cross between envy and concern.

"We'll explain later," whispered Mugman before motioning to Chalice to continue explaining

"The guards left and we overheard them mention looking for some worker or something. And not wanting problems for their boss and other Big boss."

The cup brothers listened intently as Chalice explained with Tazita sitting nearby.

"Anyway, we found the empty gameshow and the mystery prize room, but when we looked in, we found out it's not so great!"

Tazita added sounding worried. "Yeah! Some big black furnace had a vacuum tube come out and almost stole my soul if it hadn't been for Chalice."

"Then a trap door drops us out and then we were safe for now." Chalice finished the story before explaining her suspicions.

"There's only one person who'd want to steal people souls and it's the Devil, we found out King Dice is working for the Devil!"

"What?!" Cuphead said in alarm

Mugman gasps looking horrified.

"Come on, you two are joking! No way, Dice could be the Devil's goon." said Cuphead in denial.

Chalice and Tazita shook their heads grimly.

Mugman thought for a moment before adding his input. "Hmm, now that you mention it, hardly anyone lost in the game Roll the Dice. And lately, there have been some people looking like the life had been sucked out of them."

"I think the gameshow is rigged for anyone in order for them to intentionally win and go into the room then rip their souls out there." said Chalice

Tazita nodded "The worst part is we can't warn people because no one will believe us without proof."

"Sad, but true…so it seems your aunt was right to be suspicious," said Mugman

"Hey, I'm not happy about it! I want my independence and freedom. Just this morning I was denied having an education because I need an grown up for assistance!"

The cup brothers look at her before Cuphead comforted her, "Relax, Tazita, we'll figure something out to get ya to join school."

"Speaking of figuring out… you said your aunt never tells you anything about your folks? Well, what's say we do a little sleuthing of our own?" Chalice suggested.

"You mean do some research?" inquired Mugman

"It might help on the long run, to know what's got her so worked up on your folks." Chalice then thought suspiciously, "Then again how do we know they are dead? Did she at least let you visit their graves?"

"No. No she never let me step out of the cottage property line for nothing."

"Maybe it's just emotionally draining," shrugged Cuphead.

"It won't hurt to look into the matter." added Mugman. "All we got to do is visit the library."

"Why the library?" Cuphead made a face.

"They tend to have newspaper articles, that could provide the answers about Tazita's parents."

"While we're at it, can I look at the scary books?" asked Tazita eagerly

"Sure, why?"

"I never was allowed to read horror stories." grumbled Tazita

"Sheesh! Your aunt sounds as if she likes to take the fun out of everything." Cuphead griped.

"Hey it's alright to read horror genre books, just look at the rating." Mugman said calmly.

"Mugsy, that didn't stop us from watching that movie." Cuphead pointed out.

"Still there are some stuffs that is too grotesque."

"Aw, nothing wrong with a good scare, now and then." Cuphead said nonchalantly.

"Which reminds me," Chalice added, "Tazita, there's something you might want to know."

"What is it?"

"Watch this!" Chalice then shapeshifted becoming transparent and glowing blue with her legs disappearing.

Far from being frightened, Tazita gaped in shock. "Wow! Great trick, how'd you do that?"

"Sorry girl, that kind of trick is something ya can't learn, not while you're still alive."

"Oh yeah, forgot to mention that Chalice is sort of a ghost." said Cuphead shrugging.

"That's alright." Tazita said before looking at the three cups and asks "uh, what's a ghost?"

The three cups stared before facepalming. The cup girl had been so sheltered; she doesn't even know fear.


Ruer, meanwhile, had to resort to asking the police for help in looking for her runaway niece. At the moment she now sitting across, a bird policeman.

"What's the child's name?" he asked

"Tazita." replied Ruer.

"How long has she been missing?"

"It was a few days ago."

"Any ideas why she ran away?"

"I don't know. We've gotten into a heated discussion because she snuck out. And I dragged her out of that suspicious studio."

"HEY!" A voice from another policeman rang out, "You're that killjoy who humiliated her niece."

Ruer just glared at the policeman, "Would you let your underage child run off with an absolute stranger?"

"I won't mind if he happens to be a celebrity." replied the other policeman obnoxiously

"Yeah, everyone's dreaming about that mystery prize!" added another cop.

"Bah! You're only in trouble if it happens to be the Devil." Joked a third policeman

The policemen just laughed at the comment as they undermined the teapot lady's concerns.

The main policeman on the other hand was calm and spoke to Ruer, "I'll notify the rest of the station to be on the lookout."

Ruer looked at him, she was still worried about her niece.

"Until then we'll need a picture in order to make local missing posters in order to put in the newspaper and put them up all over the city n towns. The odds are she'd still be on the isles." he added.

"Thank you" she said

"It's highly unlikely she'd be anywhere else."

AS Ruer stood up to leave, the Policeman then spoke again. "But if by any weird twist of fate whether we find the girl or not, perhaps you may consider seeing a family counselor."

Ruer gets upset at hearing the suggestion, as they were implicating, she was crazy and needed to see a shrink on her parenting methods.

She huffed in indignation as she storms out.


The next morning, Kettle woke up to start the day. Only to see something that delighted him, then called the cup brothers.

"Oh boys!"

Cuphead and Mugman, climbed out of bed sleepily and got dressed before reaching the first floor of the dining room.

"Boys, you cleaned up and made breakfast!"

The cup brothers looked at each other in surprised and even more so when they what Kettle was talking about.

The table was set along with some fresh baked bread, a bottle of milk, a carton of juice and fried eggs. And the room was clean it shined sparkly.

Kettle with a sniffle, smiles in delight says, "You actually did your chores diligently for once. Thank you, boys."

The cup brothers were at loss for words, before they hear a whisper. They look to the window to see Tazita waving to them then winks while signaling silence.

"Oh… Tazita," they whispered.

The cup girl had woken up early to help with the chores and prepared breakfast for the small family. It was the least she could do since the boys were helping her hide. When Kettle had awoken, she had to jump out through the window so he wouldn't see her.

While the family settled for breakfast, Tazita kindly placed a basket of raspberries and blueberries for the goat to eat. It appreciated the girl being thoughtful.

Later that day as Kettle tended to his garden. The two cups snuck out with Tazita to the city to meet Chalice at the library.

They made a silence motion to the goat to not alert Elder Kettler about the cup girl's presence.

Reaching their destination, Chalice waved at them. The four kids entered the library and approached the desk where the head librarian was typing.

Mugman was polite enough to help Tazita get her first library card, while reminding her to keep an eye on the reading level and what books are recommended for their age.

The librarian pointed them in direction of the old newspaper articles, and when asked about the horror section, she gave advice on what books to avoid due to most of them having questionable things that teens and adults can handle.

They politely declined, stating they can manage.

As for their research, there was nothing much for the kids to read about, they could only rely on the year Tazita was born. And the names of her parents: Barrel Stein and Crista Lina.

"I don't see why we should be here when we could be doing something else." Cuphead complained.

Mugman shushed him "You have to be real quiet in here."

"I don't like it either, even with little information to go by. But you want to help Tazita too, don't ya?" said Chalice

Tazita meanwhile was enjoying herself in the horror section. Though she had to keep looking up a few words she didn't understand or wasn't familiar with the types of monsters and ghosts.

Mugman had to pull out a dictionary for her at some point.

It wasn't long before the boredom and silence was getting to Cuphead. Sadly, this wasn't one of the places that had comic books or graphic novels. Not wanting to sit still, he walks off noticing something of interest.

Mugman was looking over some info while Chalice looked at records of residents that lived on the island, when they heard some squeaking wheels.

It was Cuphead using a trolley that carried library books as if it was a go cart.

"Cuphead! You mustn't do that!"

Tazita looked up to see Mugman trying to stop Cuphead from playing around with the library trolley.

He crashes into another cart knocking some books down. He kept going until Tazita with Mugman grabbed him from falling with the cart down to the basement stairs which lead to a lower section of the library.

But the books on the cart still fell down the stairs causing a huge racket which the patrons just held their fingers to their mouths and shushed them.

Chalice approached the trio. And spoke "If you're done with the thick books, you might wanna join me, I think I found something."

The older cup girl leads them to the table where they were doing research.

"This is an ancient phone book, that narrows down the search. No wonder we couldn't find any record on them here, they lived on the 4th inkwell island."

"That explains everything." said Tazita

"Then that's where we're supposed to go." said Mugman

"But how do we get there? We don't have a boat."

Cuphead piped up. "You're in luck, I know who can give us lift."


Back in the Underworld, Henchman had been watching the search progress involving the cup girl, using the Devil's magic Mirror.

Just then, the Devil comes out wearing a bathrobe as he asks, "So, how are they doing?"

Henchman explains, "Not good, I think they just missed them but, on the upside, they found out why we couldn't find her" He gestures at the mirror for the Devil to see.

In the mirror it shows King Dice with the cards, dumping some herbicide on some mushrooms that were surrounding the cottage.

Henchman continued to explain, "Turns out this Ruer lady used some kind of plants to conceal the cottage from our eyes."

The Devil grumbles in anger while glaring. "Why am I not surprised?"

"But according to Dice and his cards, the cup girl ran off and one of our spies said they spotted Ruer placing a missing person's report. Maybe we can intercept them to our advantage."

"Meaning?"

"Dice says we can offer a big reward for her. People will do anything for money. Someone will turn her in."

"Oh?" The devil stare before snickering evilly. "So, all we have to do is wait…"

"Looks like it."

"Somebody better do it soon, before Stickler starts pestering me again."

Ruer won't be the one, getting the cup girl handed over to her so whoever finds her, will deliver Tazita directly to him.


As it turns out, Cuphead led them to the Inkwell pier, they walk past sailors who are patching up their ships, pulling ropes to lift their cargo, and gathering up their supplies.

They stop at red ship as Cuphead climbed the rope ladder on the ship.

But Mugman quickly stops him, "Hold it. Not again. You need permission climb aboard someone's ship."

"Hey relax, Brineybeard's alright." Cuphead replied.

Tazita followed Cuphead, and Chalice to the top, climb on to the deck of the ship. After much reluctance, Mugman followed behind.

The deck of the ship, had a cannon with cannon balls, sword stuck to the mast, rope ladders, and a steering wheel.

But what the cups paid more attention to a pirate who was on the ship adjusting his supplies.

The pirate was a man with a short fuzzy beard and a lightly long red nose. He wore a gray long sleeve shirt with his sleeves rolled up, red pants with a black belt with gold buckle, a red bandana with a yellow stripe on it, a black eye patch on his right eye, and yellow hoop earrings. But also had two peg legs. And accompanying him was a small green parrot.

"Hey Brineybeard!" Cuphead greeted the pirate.

The pirate turned around and greeted the cups. "Ahoy there, lads,"

"You know him?" asked Tazita

Cuphead nodded. "Yeah, we had a high seas adventure and had a close encounter with a sea beast while we were on his ship."

"Though she has a beautiful voice and is gorgeous when she's off the clock." Mugman said dreamily

"They must be referring to Calamaria," said Chalice to Tazita.

"What brings ye here mateys?" inquired Brineybeard

"We need a lift to the fourth island." explained Chalice, then brought Tazita up for Brineybeard to see. "It's a matter of importance for our friend here."

"What a coincidence. I'm headed there me-self, to drop off some cargo." said Brinerybeard, "I'd be happy to drop ye off, least I could do for helping deliver goodies to me love."

"Thank you, sir," Tazita said gladly.

"Just get everything ready to set sail. It'll take some elbow grease to handle a ship."

"No problem!" Cuphead replies excitedly, he rushes to the crow's nest, calls out. "Anchors aweigh! Hard to starboard! Ready the gangplank!"

The group shook their head and spread out to help Brineybeard in getting the ship ready to sail.

The view on the crow's nest was spectacular. Sword fish, a narwhal flying fish and a dolphin swim up near the ship as it sailed across the sea.

Though the direction to the fourth island was foggy. The place had different types environment, like the previous islands it had its own town.

"Land ho! Island dead ahead." The group rushed over and looked delighted at seeing the view of the island.

They reached the docks, Brineybeard said not to dillydally while there because he'd be casting off in the afternoon.

The cup kids fan out in town, following the address but it looked like it had seen better days.

An old house with a barn was shown, any sign of life was nowhere to be seen. Tazita just stared at the place, what could have happened to cause it to be so abandoned?

They spotted a face that usually visits the previous islands to expand their bakery business and worked with living kitchen utensils.

It was an anthropomorphic salt shaker. Dresses in a chef's uniform with red-trimmed sleeves, and a red ascot around his neck. His cap was metal with holes. His name was Chef Salt Baker.

"Hey Salt Baker," called out Cuphead "you've been around here most of the time? Did you know a Barrel Stein and a Crista Lina?"

Chef Saltbaker looked at the young cup. Surprised at the question, involving the past.

He spoke, "Haven't thought of them in years. Sure, I knew them. Barrel was a devoted husband, and Crista was like any lady. Came such a long way, hardships during the season then luck, joy only to end in tragedy."

"Why how did they die?" inquired Chalice. "Was there an accident?"

"No, not an accident. It's the darndest thing, they were living the impoverished life about to lose their livelihood, then all of sudden, they come across a fortune and the birth of their first child all in the exact same day."

Mugman raised an eyebrow as the others listened.

"I suppose fate was against them having a long happy life."

The cup kids listened intently as he continued.

"Usually, they mention it in the news and history nowadays. It was a deadly plague, that affected everyone. Last I heard they told their SIL to get out in order to save herself and the baby from being infected. Then they moved away to the islands, I hope they're alright."

They all nod. As much as Tazita wanted to tell the chef, the aunt and child in the story we're doing fine, she couldn't. What if he blows the whistle and sends her back to Ruer? Then her dream of freedom and independence would have gone up in smoke.

Mugman broke the silence by asking, "Thank you for telling us. But one thing that's confusing me: how in the world did they suddenly earn the fortune so fast the day she was born?"

Salt baker shrugged. "Nobody knows. It's if lady luck visited them that day."

"And…there's your answer Tazita." Cuphead turned to Tazita and said, "Your Aunt's fussy cause she thinks you'll get sick and drop dead like your folks. It's terrible. But there's nothing a little medicine can help."

"Wait a minute." Tazita interjected, "Ruer let me step out for fresh air every as long as I stayed in the garden and front yard. And I do recall, she usually makes house calls to the doctor when I needed a booster shot. I don't think that's the reason."

"Ok so much for that theory."

"Something else is making her so frightened. But what is it?" She said looking as if giving some thought.

"There's only one way to find out." Said Mugman, "I don't you're going like it though…you have to confront your aunt."

"No way! I tried she always clams up! And I'm not going back!"

"I know but don't you want answers."

"You could always give an ultimate to make her talk," said Cuphead

"It's ultimatum, Cuphead" corrected Mugman

"Whatever it works for grownups when they force them to decide." He said shrugging. "Saw it in a comic."

"Guys I'm not ready! There are so many things I haven't done yet. I want to have fun!"

Chalice placed a hand on her shoulder. "I know how, you feel." she said empathically.

"Can you at least give it some thought?" said Mugman

"I'll think about it."

The group headed back to the docks, lost in thought. They learned about the past but there are a few things that didn't add up.

Little did they know there was another person who had answers, however they all knew that wasn't an option. They'd rather keep running than ask innocent questions to the Devil himself. Afterall he was the prince of lies, but sooner or later they will meet.


AN: I was going to add the cups visiting the graveyard with Tazita to see her folks grave but I believe it's more of a family thing (something Ruer and her will do together in the future) n plus the boys still have the heebie jeebies regarding the incident with the ghosts. XD