(Author's Note)
Apologies for the long delay! Couldn't make it to January due to work and other personal issues, but the latest chapter is here now! Actually, I've started to draw fanart now! I'm not really good, but I've been enjoying it so much as of late! I've drawn the cover image for this chapter if only you could see it!
If you want to see it, here: Devart (forward slash) kalebishop/art/Cuptale-Chapter-4-Coming-Soon-906587728
Unfortunately it won't be very long compared to the previous chapters. I've decided to cut my word limit in half so that I can work on other things as well, but also so that it won't be as chunky to read.
Anyway, we're almost to the important parts! I've planned this to be a suspenseful and emotionally turbulent type of story.
Thank you so much for all the support and Kudos you have given! Cheers!
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter 4 (Really Not Feeling Up To It Now Sorry)
Leaving behind the room that had the mouse and the cheese, hands holding each other, Cuphead and Mugman entered a box type of room where after they stepped out of the mouth of the narrow hallway they came from, the walls on their immediate left and right widened, went forward a few feet, and then intersected into a very narrow opening. In the center of that very narrow opening was a white semi-translucent ghost, the classically shaped kind that resembled a person inside a cloth, laying in a red pile of leaves. The boys smiled warmly and then walked up to the ghost.
"Hi!" Cuphead waved his free left hand.
Mugman just smiled patiently.
"Zzzzzz… zzzzzzz…" The ghost vocalized with its low, unenthusiastic voice. "Zzzzz… Zzzzzzzz… are they gone yet?"
Cuphead and Mugman cringed (their cheeks squeezed their eyes up, their teeth gritted, and their shoulders tensed) as they looked at the ghost. They looked at each other and were about to say something, but then giggled as they noticed and understood their mirrored goofy reactions.
"Uhh, maybe we should just jump over 'im?" Cuphead whispered, placing his right backhand on the side of his smiley mouth to direct his voice at Mugman.
"Yeah, good idea." Smiling Mugman whispered and nodded.
Still holding hands, Cuphead and Mugman took a few steps back to prepare to run.
"Wait!" Mugman squeezed Cuphead's hand a little as he glared at the opening. "That opening's too narrow for the both of us."
"Oh right." Cuphead looked at the narrow space. "I'll go first then!" He pointed his thumb at himself as he smiled at Mugman.
"Hey, I wanna go first!" Mugman glared at Cuphead as he snapped a look at him.
"No way, I called dibs!" Cuphead jabbed his thumb at his own chest as he glared at Mugman.
"I'm the big bro!" Mugman placed his free right fist on his hip.
Arms folded, shoes tapping on the floor, Cuphead and Mugman glared at each other for a good few seconds.
"Straw rock, paper, scissors?" Cuphead smirked; the tip of his straw turned into a gloved hand and formed 'rock, paper, scissors' shapes respectively.
Mugman smirked. "You're on!"
With confident smiles, Cuphead and Mugman walked towards each other and once they were close they tilted their heads forward and bumped their straw gloved-fists together.
"Rock, paper, scissors, shoot!" Cuphead and Mugman said in sync as they formed a 'rock, paper, scissors and then made their picks; Mugman picked paper while Cuphead formed a finger gun with his straw.
"Ha! I win!" Cuphead punched the air above.
"Heeheheey!" Mugman smiled. "That's cheating!" His straw hand lightly slapped on his brother's straw backhand.
Cuphead giggled. "Still works!" He winked as he splayed his hands and his straw hand just retracted back to a straw. "A gun beats everythin'!"
Mugman laughed. "Whatever, I'm goin' first." He gently pushed his brother's shoulders as he took the center.
Cuphead giggled as just walked backward, letting his brother push him. "Whatever, just go." He waved his 'shoo' hands.
Mugman took the center, faced the narrow opening, and then positioned his left foot behind while bending his right foot preparing to run. "Wait a minute, you let me win!" He smiled and raised an eyebrow at Cuphead.
Cuphead's eyes widened. "No I did no-aaahh, whatever!" He flicked his hand down. "It was worth it."
Mugman giggled. "Aww, baby bro cares about me."
With a smile, Cuphead's eyes widened in reaction, he stomped his foot and pointed to the opening. "RUN! Dammit Mugs!" His straw puffed a cloud of steam as his milk boiled.
After a bubbly giggle, Mugman took a few steps back, then ran forward, and then made a front flip as he jumped over the ghost. He landed on his two feet but took a stumble forward as he fell out of balance.
"Tah Dah!" Mugman said as he held his fists ups and then giggled to himself.
"yaaaaaAAAAAAAGH!" Cuphead came yelling from behind and belly-flopped Mugman's back.
"Ooof!" Mugman fell to the floor face-down. "Heeey!" He looked up above his head where Cuphead stacked his head on.
"Haha. You… 'fell' for it." Cuphead winked on 'fell', which Mugman snickered and rolled his eyes at. "I'm big bro now." He pointed his thumb to himself.
Smiling, Mugman groaned and rested his chin on his hand. "Fine, you can be big bro."
"Ohh…" A moaning depressed voice said behind them.
Cuphead and Mugman blinked in surprise at hearing the voice, and the hearts on their chest became visible with a 'ping!'
Eyes suspicious, they turned their heads a quarter to their back and caught the ghost adjacently behind them.
"AAGH!" The boys' eyes popped out, they panic-crawled away from the ghost and then hugged each other.
Floating midair close to the narrow gap, the ghost made a very depressing sigh. "I guess I deserve that… Oh…"
Tears started to fall from the ghost's eyes in a rushing waterfall of dozens of wormy tears that dropped to the floor and then squiggled like vicious predatory snakes moving at great speed towards the boys. The boys screamed (they jumped up from the ground and trembled midair) and they ran in different directions; Mugman ran to the eastern exit behind him, while Cuphead ran to the northern exit on his right. From the floor, the squiggly wormy tears rose up to the ceiling in a pattern of multiple vertical lines adjacent to each other, blocking the exit in the process.
Cuphead and Mugman took a few steps back as they, in disgust and worry, watched the tears completely box them inside the room. The brothers looked, ran, and reached their hands towards each other, but then a wall of wormy tears erupted between them from the floor. They stomped their heels into a screeching halt, then pedaled their wobbly arms backward before their noses, which they struggled to scrunch up to their eyes, could touch the wall of tears. Stumbling backward to a vigilant stand, they both looked above them and noticed that the tears were forming into large dews on the ceiling. The dews started to drip like rain leaking into a roof.
"INCOMING!" Cuphead screamed as he pointed to the dripping tears; he and Mugman shivered, their eyes popped out, and their straws formed into exclamation points.
Screaming, Cuphead and Mugman ran in split directions, then in circles within their boxes of tears trying to evade the wormy droplets of water. Soon, the wormy teardrops were drawing thicker walls around them, making the space too narrow for them to keep running that they stopped in place. They looked above to see tears starting to drop on them.
With fright in their eyes, Cuphead and Mugman twisted their arms and legs into different directions, struggling to dodge the teardrops by standing like silly statues; Mugman was standing on his right tiptoe while spreading his loopy arms like a goofy airplane, while Cuphead was standing on his right hand and left foot, while his loopy left hand and right foot were twisted around evasively. The rain of tears was increasing, and the boys would tilt their heads, and bend their stomachs, arms, and legs, even more, twisting them into goofy rubber band pretzels just to dodge them, but their bodies were starting to tremble from the prolonged stretch. A couple of tears however managed to land on Cuphead's face and Mugman's nose each, and they yelled as they felt some strange pain and sadness. Finally, the tears stopped surging from the ghost, and then the boys safely collapsed to the floor.
Mugman groaned. "Cuphead… remind me why tears hurt?" He rubbed the spot on his nose where the tear landed.
Cuphead groaned. "That's a good question Mugsy…" He rubbed the spot on his left squeaky porcelain face where the tear landed.
Mugman ran over to Cuphead, and lent his hand to him. The latter clap-grabbed it like a high-five and let Mugman pull him up. They both looked at the doors they were respectively supposed to exit to and saw that they were still blocked by the wall of wormy tears continuously rising from the floor.
Cuphead sighed. "Guess we're gonna haftuh fight this guy." He looked at the ghost and readied his finger gun.
"Aww…" Mugman readied his finger gun while he looked at the ghost with sympathy. "He looks so sad though."
"Yeah, so was the big bully Ollie Bulb." Cuphead hissed. "Woah!"
With clutch reflexes, Cuphead and Mugman bent backward to barely dodge a group of large projectiles of tears that flew like bullets towards them, to the point that their hands caught the floor and broke their fall.
"Hey!" Cuphead yelled to the ghost as they both angrily stood up, but then their eyes popped out as they saw more tears flying towards them.
Mugman jumped over them, while Cuphead ducked them so low that his head almost touched the ground. Several volleys of tears flew towards them, and the boys were jumping, ducking, dashing out of the way, and parrying the tears with their straw hands. With a confident grin, Cuphead aimed his finger gun, which then started to glow bright blue and hum with power.
"Wait!" With shocked eyes, Mugman yelled and belly-flopped Cuphead's back.
"Ow! Mugs!" Cuphead half-pushed his body up as he glared at his brother, whose head was stacked above.
"Don't Mugs me!" Mugman glared back at Cuphead, looking over the latter's forehead. "You were about to shoot 'im!" He looked back at the ghost, yelled in fright, and rolled himself and his brother to the left to dodge some tears that splashed on the spot they were previously on. They lay face down on the floor side by side.
Cuphead grunted from the small pain from the roll. "Yeah? So?" He pushed himself up.
"You wanted to kill the ghost?!" Mugman pushed himself up as well.
They both ran forward to the ghost in evasive serpentine swerving.
Cuphead's eyes narrowed in confusion. "You do know it's a ghost right?" He looked at Mugman.
"Yeah!" Mugman raised his voice as he barely ducked under a large teardrop. "So is Spectre from the Phantom Express! Which we had to shoot to get his contract from!" He spun his body and managed to parry whip four tears with his straw hand.
Cuphead groaned. "Why do ya always have tuh be the smart one?" He started to smirk
Mugman giggled, noticing his brother's smirk. "Yer welcome."
Cuphead yelped and tackled Mugman to the right as a fan of tears was about to hit them. They both landed on the floor grunting and then they looked at each other smirking.
"Thank you." Closed eyes, Mugman nodded.
"Yes!" Cuphead punched the air. "One-Zero!"
"Hey!" Mugman glared at Cuphead "It's one-one!" He pushed himself up at the same time with Cuphead. "I said you're welcome!" He resumed running together.
"Uh-uh! I didn't say thank you!" Cuphead jumped over a fan of five tears.
"No fair!" Mugman ducked those same tears while maintaining his glare at Cuphead. "You already got the big bro card why do ya need to win more! Woah!"
Standing, Cuphead and Mugman both hugged each other as the wormy tears boxed them within a small space.
"Uhh… maybe we should try tuh talk tuh 'im?" Mugman smiled sheepishly at Cuphead. "Ya know… calm 'im down a bit?"
Cuphead smiled. "Ya wanna try?" He raised an eyebrow.
Eyes brightening with excitement, Mugman smiled and nodded.
The box of moving wormy tears disappeared in a poof and Cuphead and Mugman let go of each other and ran forward towards the ghost, who was laying on the bed of red leaves.
"Hey!" Mugman yelled at the ghost, coning his hands into a megaphone. "You okay?"
The ghost gave a heavily depressed sigh. "Life is never okay…"
Mugman frowned even more; his eyes dilated as a great sadness overwhelmed him. Meanwhile, Cuphead just cringed in reaction at the ghost; his shoulders tensed, his teeth gritted, and his glare narrowed.
"Well… that's good!" Cuphead smiled, trying to be enthusiastic while cringing. "I mean, you're a ghost right? You're not alive anymore." He grinned and splayed his hands.
The ghost gave another depressed sigh. "And yet I'm still here…." Tears started to flow from his eyes to the red leaves. "Does this mean I can never pass on?... Will I be miserable forever?... Ohhhhh nooooo…."
Cuphead cringed (his eyes squinted narrower this time). "Sheesh! He has no sense of humor! N-hot like us right Mugs?" Proud fists on his hips, He smiled at his brother but was (eyes-widened and gasping) shocked to see Mugman was starting to sob.
"Mmm-! M-make him stop…" Mugman whimpered as he pointed to the ghost and as tears started to drip from his eyes.
Still lying on the leaves, the ghost made a depressed moan. "You should leave…"
More tears came out of the ghost's eyes, and the boys jumped back a few inches away to avoid the new volley of tears.
"Hey!" Cuphead glared as he coned his hands like a megaphone. "Can't you just talk to us?!"
The ghost gave another very depressed sigh. "Not really feelin' up to it right now. Sorry."
Cuphead grumbled in frustration, but then heard some whimpering next to him. As he looked to his right, Cuphead gasped in alarm (his straw made an exclamation point) to see Mugman start to bawl.
"I'm sorry C-cup…" Mugman sniffled. "His blue is making me bluer than usual." Mugman said as he curled into his ball tighter.
"Aww…" Cuphead creased his eyebrows in pity, but then a chuckle escaped him, knowing that Mugman still made a pun regardless. Then he looked above Mugman's head and noticed that continuous droplets of wormy tears kept dripping into Mugman's head milk.
"Mugs!" Cuphead shivered, his straw stiffened into an exclamation point. "Get out of the way your head's-!"
Cuphead felt a sudden sadness overwhelm him like he feels worthless and garbage, his eyes started to water, and his body started to become heavy. When he looked above him, there was a continuous pitter-pattering of wormy tears dripping into his head milk. He recoiled out of the way before any more tears poured into his head milk, then pinched his nose and blew it, causing the bendy straw to literally spit out part of his head milk to the floor (the end of his straw turned into a mouth and did a spit take).
"Mugs!" Cuphead ran over to Mugman and tackled him out of the dripping waterfall of tears. "Mugs, snap out of it!" He shook his shoulders as he glared fiercely and with concern into his brother's eyes.
"I can't!" Mugman wiped his right eye with his wrist. "I-I really feel like nothing!" He continued to sob as his trembling hands held onto Cuphead's arms.
Cuphead groaned and rolled his eyes. "Bro, how many times do I have to tell ya? Yer my best pal!" He gave a confident smile.
Mugman's teary eyes looked into Cuphead's confident ones, and the former started to smile due to how infectious Cuphead's smile was.
"M-maybe!" Mugman shivered. "Maybe you s-should tell 'im that!" He pointed his eyes to the ghost while he tried to wipe more tears that came out of them.
Cuphead's eyes lit up as he understood the idea. "Wait here!" He gently patted both Mugman's shoulders.
Cuphead ran over to the ghost, leaving Mugman to continue crying by the wall (he was covering his eyes with his hands and trembling). He swerved past dripping tears from the ceiling and jumped over a few bullet-fast large tears, and then landed onto the red leaves next to the ghost.
"Hey! Buddy!" Cuphead made a big smile while standing proudly with his fists on his hips.
Still laying on the leaves, the ghost made a depressed sigh. "There's no buddy but me… oh… wait…"
Ciuphead's hand-covered snicker turned into a stomach-hugging bubbly laugh. "Good one!"
"N-noo… that was just… an accident…" The ghost's eyes started to well up again.
"Well I'll take it! That was a good one!" Cuphead made a right hook to the air in front of him.
"Oh…" The ghost looked at Cuphead above its head. "…haha…" he looked at the ceiling.
Cuphead looked around and beamed to his eyes as he saw the tears were starting to dry up and disappear.
"Hey! Mugsy!" Cuphead looked at Mugman behind him with the same beaming smile.
Mugman was still sobbing but then started to relax as he noticed the ghost's wormy tears were starting to fade. "Y-yes?" He looked at Cuphead.
"I come over 'im and say 'Hey, buddy!' and then he says 'There's no buddy here but me.'" Cuphead imitated the ghost's depressed voice and made the silliest sad face.
From sobbing, Mugman started to smile and then giggle (his outermost knuckles squeezed his chin as he did).
"….oh…. he laughed too… haha…" The ghost started to float to the space above the boys. Slowly he was turning to face the boys.
Cuphead gasped with glee, while Mugman to a space across Cuphead's right side and just smiled patiently while wiping his tears.
"…heh…" A smile escaped into the right end of his mouth... but then faded again. "Let me try…"
The ghost's eyes started to waterfall with tears again, which earned a couple of shocked gasps from Cuphead and Mugman and they cautiously poised at the ready to move. However, instead of flying towards them, the tears started to 'fall upwards' and form into something cylindrical above the ghost's head.
"I call it 'dapper blook.' Y'know… 'cause I'm Napstablook. Heh…" The ghost looked down and frowned in doubt. "Do you…. Do you like it?" The ghost looked eagerly at the boys.
Mugman wiped his eyes as he smiled. "You look… really dapper buddy!" He made a big smile.
"Uhh, yeah!" Cuphead grinned and held a thumbs-up, but then whispered to Mugman. "What's a dapper?"
"Some fella wearing a nice fancy suit." Mugman whispered back patiently, his curved left backhand covering his right side mouth.
"OHH!" Cuphead snapped his fingers and beamed. He aimed two fingerguns at Napstablook. "Lookin' reaaaal fancy there fella! Woah!" Cuphead's finger guns accidentally fired two blue bullets and Mugman gasped as he noticed.
The two blue bullets phased through Napstablook, and after a delay of two seconds, the ghost slowly looked down at his stomach where the bullets phased through.
"Did you…" Napstablook sighed, his eyes drooped to the depressed shape again. "Did you just…. Fire bullets at me…?"
"No! No! It was-!" Eyes widened in shock, as he explained, Cuphead's waved his hands frantically in random directions.
"I knew it…" Napstablook's eyes started to well up again.
"Cool!" Mugman said as he shot two blue bullets at Napstablook which phased through the ghost again Napstablook looked at his stomach area again, and then at Mugman.
Tears were still welling up in Mugman's eyes but he kept trying to maintain his big trembling grin. "Y-y'know, I mean, ya ever seen two guys go 'Eyyy!'" He points his finger guns at Cuphead, who gasped in shock as he was aimed at. "And then shoot bullets at each other?" He winked at Cuphead.
Cuphead read the wink, and then the end of his right lip nervously curled.
Mugman nervously chuckled, a sweat formed on the right side of his head. "Eyyy!" He aimed his finger guns at Cuphead.
Cuphead nervously chuckled too. "Eyyy!" He aimed his finger guns at Mugman.
"Pew! Pew!" Mugman fired one blue bullet each from his finger gun.
"Pew! Pew!" Cuphead fired one bullet each from his finger gun.
The blue bullets zipped past each other and flew towards Cuphead and Mugman, who gasped, and then bent backward goofily trying to evade the bullets from hitting them; Cuphead tried to do 'The Matrix' dodge but fell down instead, while Mugman just stumbled backward sitting on the floor.
Facing Napstablook, Mugman's mouth squiggled even more as he struggled to maintain his smile. "S-see!" His trembling head turned to Napstablook. "I-it's a buddy-buddy thing!"
Cuphead nervously chuckled. "Y-yeah! W-we're all buddies here!"
"Ohh…" Napstablook looked at them blankly for a good second, then looked at his abdomen, raised both his fingerless ghost hands which then formed into finger guns, and then aimed those same finger guns at Cuphead and Mugman each. "…pew… pew…" He pretended to fire those same finger guns each.
Cuphead and teary-eyed Mugman beamed. "Yeah! Pew! Pew!" They both pretended to fire those same finger guns at Napstablook. "Eyyyy!" They both winked; Mugman's wink-closed right eye streamed a tear.
Napstablook noticed Mugman's tear. "Why… are you crying…?"
Mugman trembled. "T-tears of joy!" He grinned. "B-because… I'm happy to see ya buddy! And ya learned the buddy finger guns!" He winked, causing a tear on his right eye to stream down.
"Ohh gee…" A couple of wormy tears dripped onto the pile of red leaves below Napstablook as he looked at the boys.
A few tears formed into Mugman's eyes involuntarily, and he wiped them with the back of his wrist.
"I usually come to the RUINS because there's nobody around…" Napstablook said with his depressed voice.
Cuphead and Mugman snickered, covering their mouths as they did so.
"…heh… I did not even make a pun…" Napstablook said with a slight smile. "And yet you think I'm someone you can tolerate… even have a little laugh with… haha…" Napstablook looked down at the grass pondering for a few seconds. "Oh…. I'm rambling again. You… you guys should go…"
With that, Napstablook faded into nothing or at least turned invisible. Cuphead and Mugman smiled as they watched him disappear. They then smiled at each other, but Cuphead noticed that some tears were forming on Mugman's eyes and he grew concerned.
Cuphead gave a confused chuckle. "Why are you crying?" He walked to Mugman, held his face with his hands, and wiped a few tears with his thumbs.
Mugman's body trembled as his tears welled up. "S-some… some tears…" He pointed to his head milk. "A-are still in…"
Cuphead snickered and then clamped his brother's big blue nose with his right hand while saying "Honk!"
Mugman gasped. "Hey!" The tears started to stream down his face as he glared at Cuphead. "Cuphead I'm seri-!"
"Just blow your nose Mugs." Cuphead looked at his brother with endearing eyes. "While I get to enjoy honking your blueberry." He giggled.
Mugman grumbled and looked back with a cute grumpy face.
"Blow!" Cuphead's eyes widened, he smiled wider, and he giggled.
Teary-eyed Mugman looked at Cuphead confused for a while (he raised an eyebrow and scrunched the other) but widened his eyes in sudden realization at what he meant. He squeezed his eyes shut, and started blowing through his nose. Immediately, Mugman's milk started to bubble, then a lump grew on his straw and the end of that same blue straw turned into a mouth that inflated its own cheeks, and then the straw mouth sprayed a long trail of milk onto Cuphead's face.
Mugman took a deep inhale and gave an exhale of relief. "I feel so much better!" He opened his eyes to smile at Cuphead but then gasped.
Cuphead's entire face was splattered with milk. He opened his eyes and smirked at Mugman.
Mugman trembled, trying to hold back with his bubbly laughter behind his squiggly smile. "I…" He giggled. "I'm sorry I-!"
Cuphead pinched his own nose and blew through it, making his straw spray a large stream of milk towards Mugman's bubbly laughing face. Mugman blew his nose again and milk was blasting against Cuphead's blasting milk. Shortly after a few seconds of spraying each other with milk, their heads started to hurt, but they both were still bubbly cackling and they collapsed sitting onto the floor.
"C'mere!" Cuphead attempted to pounce Mugman.
Mugman jumped up to the air and then belly-flopped Cuphead's back.
"Hey!" Cuphead smiled behind him, but then felt something wiggle his tingly side stomachs. "HEY! MUGS NO!" He tossed his body around and pushed laughing Mugman away.
Hysterically yelling and laughing, Mugman ran towards the east exit, followed by Cuphead who let out a joyous war shout as he chased after his brother.
-End of Chapter 4-
(Author's Note)
Did you like the Napstablook boss fight? Or do you think I could've done it differently?
Let me know in the comments below!
See you next month!