#queerplatonic pardners

[teknikolor-walters]

This has a cut on it because it's REALLY self indulgent and I'm embarrassed<3 also it's kinda long. But whatever cowboy wives be upon ye

"Fuck-! God, Bug, what the hell?"

Bug didn't say anything. Everything was happening too fast. Cassie was covered in blood and so were their hands (the hands holding the calculator) and their face was bloody and it hurt. Everything smelled like blood.

"Jesus Christ, I think you broke my nose. What's wrong with you? I've housed you for three years now, and this is how you repay me? A broken nose? Fuck you."

"I'm- I'm sorry- I'm sorry, Cassie, I didn't mean to- My- my face hurts and you charged at me- I panicked-"

"I don't CARE about your sob story, Bug. I'm not letting you leave me like this. And for what? People that don't even love you? Don't be ridiculous."

"Cassie, please-"

"Please what? Let you abandon me here? Let you waltz off to your partners without a care in the world as I tend to a broken fucking nose?"

"I don't- I- I'll come back, Cassie, I'll come back for you. Okay?"

"Bullshit."

Bug knew Cassie was right. He also knew that he couldn't stay here and his face hurt in the same way that it did when Ty would punish him.

"I love you Cassie. I really do."

"I love you too, Bug, that's why you need to stay-"

The time travel hurt more than it usually did.

---

"Hey, Fox, C'mere." Jessie kissed her wife quickly on the cheek. "Ah'm sure it's gon' be ok. Ah'm sure wherever our Bug is, they're doin' alright. They're real resilient, y'know. It's gon' be okay. Ah love you."

The two of them had just gotten back from Walters Base, asking if they knew where Scarab had disappeared to. They didn't.

B0UNTY sighed. "Ah love you too, Capybara. 'M jus' a bit worried."

In truth, Jessie was also worried. Scarab had been gone for two days now. It had never known him to just disappear. And with how badly Cicada had been doing, and how poorly B0UNTY had been handling Scarab's disappearance- Jessie felt like it was watching H1VE crumble around it.

Yee couldn't let that happen. H1VE was one of the few things keeping haw from missing haw's own time period. It was her home. So Jessie tried her best to throw on a smile and make sure everything was okay.

"How 'bout we throw on a movie an' relax? Ah think snugglin' in mah Fox's arms t'night is jus' what ah need."

B0UNTY smiled and nodded. Jessie tried to ignore the way he held onto her as if he was scared he was going to lose her too.

They had just started the movie- a shitty western, something to zone out to -when there was the unmistakable feeling of time travel. Nothing changed in the room, but it could feel it. It sat up and looked over.

There Scarab, her wife, her Bug, stood, in the middle of the living room, shaking like a leaf and holding a calculator. They didn't have their cowboy hat on. There were two fresh cuts on their left cheek and the side of their neck. He was crying. Jessie nearly started crying too.

"Beetle?" Yee heard B0UNTY ask from behind haw.

Jessie ran forward, crushing Scarab in one of haw's infamous bear hugs. She felt Scarab tense up in her arms, then relax.

"Capy... Bara? Jessie?" He asked hesitantly, leaning into the hug. The southern accent was gone entirely. He sounded so much like Cicada without it, but Jessie knew instantly that she was it's Beetle.

"Bug! Oh, Lovebug, we missed ya so much, ah love ya, so much." Jessie continued to whisper sweet nothings into her hair as she cried harder.

B0UNTY ran over too, and the three of them stood there for awhile, holding on to one another.

"'m sorry," whimpered Scarab. "'m so- so fuckin' sorry."

"Fer what?" asked B0UNTY.

"Ya didn't do anythin' wrong." Jessie added. "Ah promise."

"No, no, no, no, you don't understand." Scarab was hyperventilating now, and the panic was clear in their voice. "Cas- Cassie's gonna tell Ty, it's all my fault, he said he'd tell Ty about H1VE if I left and I ran anyway, I'm sorry-"

B0UNTY cut haw off. "Hey, Beetle, look at me. It's okay. We ain't mad. Ty tries doin' anythin', an' ah'll kill'im, alright? We've got each other now. He cain't do anythin' to us. We're cowboys. Who the hell told'ja that, anyway? I'll kill 'im too."

It was obvious that he was trying to keep the anger out of his voice. Nonetheless, Scarab's breathing slowed. Jessie slipped it's cowboy hat off and put it on their head. They smiled.

"How 'bout we go an' get that cut 'f yers cleaned up, alrighty?" asked Jessie. "Then we can ask questions 'bout where've ya been."

After they were all cleaned up, relaxed, and fed, they laid together on their shared bed. Scarab nuzzled himself right in between Jessie and B0UNTY, laying his head right over her heart. Yee ran a hand through her hair.

Scarab made a noise.

"You doin' ok, Cuddlebug?"

"'m jus' glad'ja ain't floatin' in the pacific ocean. Ah missed y'all."

Jessie laughed and kissed her on the head. "We missed ya too. But yer here now. Get some sleep, mkay? Ah love you."

"Love you too."

#look folks i dont have an excuse for this one #tolouse enabled me to be as self indulgent as i want and now you all have to suffer #scarab walters #queerplatonic pardners #H1VE #cascarab #<- technically? whatever ill tag it #the suffering may be eternal but so is the love they have for each other. amen #everyone say thank you to toby for being the reason i got over my anxiety about this

[ty-bayonet-betteridge]

Home

A rumination on the H1VE and the meaning of home.

H1VE has a base of operations. At least, that's what they call it around other people. Cicada said he thought it would lend an air of legitimacy to their operations, and B0UNTY said it might be good for morale to call it a proper base too. But most of them don't call it that amongst themselves. They tend to call it home.

Because that's what it is. It's a shitty two-bedroom apartment that they rent, on the very fringes of what's technically considered Oldbrush Valley. And it's home to their little found family.

They weren't always in that same apartment. When it first started, when it was just PR1ZE and Cicada trying to stay alive, they'd been in a different apartment in the same building. One bedroom, a bathroom, and a living room. Technically, according to the landlord, there was a kitchenette too, but neither of them really liked the look of the stove - and they weren't exactly cooks either. They microwaved their food and told themselves it could be worse.

They'd initially planned to rotate out who would sleep in the bed and who would get the couch. That plan lasted about three weeks. After that, they'd given up on pretending they weren't together. They shared the bed after that.

The place was garbage. Bad water pressure, the ugliest and least comfortable couch you've ever seen, walls that had been damaged and that the landlord either didn't care or couldn't afford to get contractors in for. It reminded Cicada of Matt's house. And that stung for more reasons than bug felt comfortable unpacking.

But it had one thing Matt's house didn't have. It had PR1ZE. And that was enough to make it home.

B0UNTY and Scarab had made their way in a few weeks later. They were there to help, and Cicada and PR1ZE accepted them in. They didn't mind sharing the couch, and they didn't ask questions about Cicada and PR1ZE sharing the room. It didn't escape either of their notices that B0UNTY and Scarab had matching rings on their fingers.

They managed to upgrade to a two-bedroom apartment after that. Lord knows where the money was coming from. None of them were employed exactly, and time travel wasn't lucrative. But somehow they managed to scrape it up every month. (Cicada once suggested that they try to apply for government relief, and Scarab very patiently pointed out that neither of them had a social security number and that PR1ZE and B0UNTY were legally dead. Xhey ceded the point.)

The two-bedroom was worse somehow. They were all pretty sure that it violated about a dozen different regulations - but it meant that the landlord accepted payment in cash and didn't ask why none of them had a credit history or any ID, so they didn't press the issue. It was theirs as long as they had the money. None of them could tell exactly when it started feeling like home, but somehow, unmistakably, it was.

And then Jessie and Jessica joined them and it started to feel foreign again. The girls slept together on the couch when they first moved in, and everyone was very awkwardly aware of how the apartment was much too small for six. This was made worse by the fact that they were still trying to figure each other out. Cicada confided in Scarab that bug worried Jessie and Jessica were just there to try and steal H1VE's calculator. Scarab promised to keep an eye out.

Jessie was the one to break up the tension of that first week. It came back to the apartment at eight in the morning with three grocery bags loaded under her arms. She complained jovially about how poorly stocked their kitchen was, then offered to make biscuits and gravy as an apology for waking everyone up. Cicada and Scarab agreed before haw was done with the sentence.

Jessie wasn't really a great cook. She was a passable cook, which is all you need to convince someone that you're a great cook - as long as you're confident, and the person you're talking to is hungry and doesn't know anything about cooking themself. She worked the dough, chopped onion, and mixed spices into her gravy with the sort of body language that projected self-assuredness. Jessica was pretty sure it was an act, but it was a good one, and the other four warmed up.

Their table was barely big enough for three. A few of them had to sit at the couch while they ate. PR1ZE spilled gravy on the cushion. None of them noticed. They were too busy talking.

Scarab noticed during a lull in the conversation that - with the smell of black pepper, sage, garlic, and onion in the air, and six gently smiling people talking about nothing at all and eating good food - that the place felt like home again. That was nice.

The cowboys warmed up to each other pretty quickly after that. Scarab started using yee/haw pronouns after Jessie explained its reason for having them, and Jessie made haw a pronoun patch for haws jacket, to match hers. Cicada and Jessica commiserated over how Western the whole place was getting, but of course neither of them begrudged their iterations for their happiness.

At some point, Jessie started sleeping in B0UNTY and Scarab's room. At some point, they started calling haw Capybara. At some point, B0UNTY gave the three of them matching stick-and-poke tattoos - a design of a capybara and a fox curled up together, with a scarab beetle on the capybara's head.

Jessie hadn't had something that felt like a home in a long time. Not since before she'd been displaced from her future and sent back here. Not since before she became a cowboy. Not since before she'd gotten dragged back into the world of time travel. Not since before she'd killed herself in an attempt to escape WOE.BEGONE. Not since before she moved to OVER. Not since before her third challenge, when she died. But it knew that it was home now.

It took Jessica a bit longer. Move nights with PR1ZE and Cicada, dinners shared between the three of them, her desperate attempts to teach them some basic kitchen skills, to no avail. Learning their little injokes and references and adding her own to the pile. Getting used to their macabre and gory tastes in horror, introducing them to her favorite psychological horror movies. PR1ZE went along with whatever - Jessica suspected he was much more interested in the company than the movies - but Cicada had strong opinions and wasn't afraid to make them known. They ended up doing a lot of good-natured bickering over the movies they'd just watched. They bonded over how overrated Skinamarink was, but she couldn't get him to see the light on how the merits of The Babadook.

And then suddenly she was no longer Jessica, PR1ZE and Cicada's friend, but rather one third of a trio. PR1ZE and Jessica and Cicada. It happens in pieces until she's not sure where she stands with them. She's always been bad at the "what are we" talk, and she suspects that they aren't the best at it either. It's a mess, and she doesn't know how to untangle it, but there are some things she does know.

She knows that PR1ZE leans against her one night while they're watching a slasher movie and that she lets him. She knows that she doesn't mind when Cicada starts calling her Capybara. She knows that at some point, hearing PR1ZE's voice is enough to make her feel safe. She knows that when she's holding Cicada against her chest and she calls him Bug, she can feel xhem soften in her arms.

She knows that she kisses PR1ZE first. She knows it's Cicada who invites her to share their bedroom.

She knows she's home.

#H1VE #our writing #jessica baker #jessie baker #PR1CAD1CA #queerplatonic pardners #theo isnt included in this not because i forgot about her or want to exclude her #but because. i dont really know how to write him yet #also it doesnt seem like he feels like theyre Home in H1VE yet the way the others do? soon though #also the Supplemental Members (Jess and OVER Jess and Jay/A.J.) arent included either. #maybe ill write a sequel to this #or yall can #make them all be Home <3 <3 <3

[ltacryptid]

the QPPs all open the doors for eachother and say “ladies first” every time. They constantly fight over who can do it. They run to doors to try and do it first. Nobody knows why they do it

#h1ve #queerplatonic pardners

[sofd-maybe]

Sorry to be queerplatonic on main but happy Valentines to @4lic7ron and other ppl in qprs!!! Hope you had a good day 2day

#queerplatonic relationship #queerplatonic #putting this out here not only bc I love my pardner #but bc I also want more qpr visibility and so on so on #it’s got the flag colors……….. kinda #my art #sure I’ll tag it as that

[assigned-cryptid-at-birth]

this is what being qpps is about (don’t start qpp discourse on this post)

#i love them #queerplatonic #qpp #i love my qpp #qpps #platonic love #platonic relationship #platonic #best friends #queer #queerplatonic partner #howdy pardner #yeehaw #lgbtqa #lgbt #lgbtq+ #lgbt+ #queer love #whatsapp #friendship

[catboy-beb0p]

yellow and pink but in a queerplatonic way bc i love you, pardner <3

I'm so lucky to have you

#love you partner #I am manifesting in your house and giving you a kiss on the forehead #asks.txt #starlitspacecloud

[teknikolor-walters]

Hey sorry I made your boyfriend just so much worse. Yeah he had to kill the first friend he ever made because Ty manipulated him into doing it. Oh also their choices are no longer their own and they're so fucking tired. Hope that works out for you guys!

#scarab walters #queerplatonic pardners

[teknikolor-walters]

Ok so there was one point where I said I was gonna write a drabble based off of toby and tolouse's scarab dreams. Yeah here it is. But in all honesty this was just an excuse to write cascarab angst </3

Scarab leaned forward slightly on their cane, breathing heavily. The hike they had just gone on with their wives had been ridiculously hard, much harder than B0UNTY said it would be. But when they looked up, they realized why he had dragged her and Jessie all the way out here.

The view was breathtaking. The sun peeked out just barely from behind the other mountains, tinting everything a soft orange. She heard B0UNTY laugh from beside her.

"Pretty, ain't it?" He asked. They just nodded.

"Ain't nearly as pretty as you, ya'know." He wrapped his arms around her hips, making her yelp. Jessie snickered.

"He's right, ya'know. Both'f ya are the prettiest damn things 've ever seen."

Scarab just made a hmph noise. "Well, ah'm starved, so if the two 'f ya are done bein' gross, ah'll set up for the picnic."

That was the idea behind the hike, to have a picnic together at the summit to celebrate their 6 month anniversary. The happiest 6 months of Scarab's life.

The other two ended up helping her with the picnic supplies and soon they were sitting together, nothing saying a word, just enjoying the moment. Scarab's head was on B0UNTY's shoulder and Jessie was curled up in his lap. The plan was to sit there and watch the sunset, then transport back to H1VE.

"Ya'know, we've got no way of tellin' if these berries're the poisonous sort 'r not." Jessie grabbed another raspberry from the pile. "Ah probably shouldn't be eatin' these."

"We brought the field guide, Capy." B0UNTY reminded it. "But just in case.." He took one out of it's hand, popping it in his mouth. "Ah cain't be havin' mah Capybara gettin' sick."

"How kind of ya t' steal 'er food."

Scarab lifted haw's head from B0UNTY's shoulder long enough to sit up and kiss him. Yee could taste the raspberry in his mouth. B0UNTY's hand reached up and traced the scars on their neck, causing her to hum in pleasure.

When they both broke the kiss, Scarab returned to snuggling into her Fox. She lifted a hand, holding up her wedding rings to the light, studying the words engraved on each one. Fox. Capybara.

For some reason even just seeing the words filled them with peace. It was a reminder that they had each other, they were okay. Scarab sighed with contentment.

---

Scarab sighed. They knew it wasn't good to let themself linger on memories, but they couldn't help it. They wanted to remember everything about their partners.

Even if she would never see them again.

Another sigh. It was for the best, yee reminded yeehawself. If they left, Cassie would.... well. They didn't want to think about what Cas said he would do, and had already done. The tattoo (brand) was just starting to heal. At least it didn't hurt anymore.

She looked over at Castiel, asleep and nestled into her shoulder. He looked pretty. Really pretty, with his hair down and an almost softness to his face. Without really thinking about it she leaned over and kissed him on the forehead.

Their mind began to wander. Nights like this had been common, back at H1VE. Nights curled up next to her partners, slowly falling asleep, knowing she was safe and cared for and loved...

"Mornin', Bug." The jolt of panic yee felt when Castiel spoke up is something yee didn't quite know how to deal with.

"It- it ain't mornin', Capy-" Shit. "Cassie. It- it's still dark out, Cassie. Ya've only been asleep fer an hour 'r so." It was hard to keep up the cowboy voice without their hat, but Scarab managed.

They realized that they'd been fidgeting with their wedding rings while they zoned out, running their thumb over the words engraved on them. They stopped when Cas opened an eye.

"You doin' ok, Bug?"

"'m fine. Jus'... ya'know, thinkin'."

"Mhmm. 'bout your partners?"

Scarab froze. Yee didn't really know why, only that Castiel mentioning haw's partners scared haw.

"Yeah. Jus' a bit'f heartsickness is all," they made themself respond after a little bit.

"Bug, you know it isn't healthy to constantly think about them. You have me now!" He smiled up at them. Cute. "Besides, you know that they didn't love you, right? Not really. Nobody from H1VE did."

Scarab didn't say anything.

"Bug, are you even listening? You know they don't. If they loved you they would've come and found you by now."

"Y-yeah. Yeah. 'm listenin'."

They didn't love her. They didn't love her. They never loved her. She just needed to remind herself of that. They never loved her. They never loved her.

"C'mon Bug, let's get some sleep. It's late."

Scarab let Castiel pull them on top of him, and pushed down the memories of this happening a million times before with two other people. They didn't love haw. They never did.

"Love you, Bug."

They were so lost in their own thoughts they barely heard him.

"Bug, say it back. I love you!"

The sudden change in tone is what shocked haw into replying.

"Love you too, Cassie."

#smiles and bats my eyelashes #scarab walters #queerplatonic pardners #cascarab #one of these days i will write a cascarab fic that isn't just Scarab Torment. today is not that day

[teknikolor-walters]

B0UNTY W4LTERS-B4KER stepped outside while it was barely dawn. The sun had only just started to rise but it was already incredibly hot.

It was summer, which meant cicada season, which meant cicada shells. B0UNTY had been collecting them for weeks now. He held his newest art project in one hand, wrapped in paper, as he walked through the woods.

Eventually he reached his destination. A clearing in the woods that nobody ever went to except him. B0UNTY crouched down in front of a couple sticks stuck in the ground. He unwrapped the paper and set his artwork down in between the makeshift graves.

The artwork itself was a collection of cicada shells and flower petals arranged in patterns, carefully pinned down.

"Hey Bugs, I, uh, made this for you." B0UNTY cleared his throat, brought up the accent, and tried not to cry. "Ah know it ain't much, but you always got real excited when we found cicada shells, so..."

He always felt a little stupid, talking to Cicada. He only ever halfway believed in ghosts.

"Ah love you so fuckin' much, Cicada. Ah'll always love you."

...And shit, he was crying anyway. Seeing the graves always made him cry. He tried to tell himself that it was just sticks, but that felt disrespectful.

B0UNTY took the cowboy hat off his own head and put it on one of the sticks, causing it to sink further into the ground.

"Sorry ah haven't been back to visit in awhile, things at H1VE've been real messy. But we're ok. Things're gonna be ok, Bugbear."

"Ah love you. Always an' forever."

He let himself sit there and cry until the sun came up.

#queerplatonic pardners #PR1CADA #wanted to write some kind of B0UNTY thing about him grieving. so here u go #im the normalest ever actually #also might write a sequel about his partners comforting him #who knows!

[teknikolor-walters]

Jessica/PR1ZE/cicada is so important to me on a fundamental level no matter what the iteration

#PR1CADICA #<- proposed ship name #queerplatonic pardners

[teknikolor-walters]

So. So anyways. Did you guys know that capybaras are very affectionate creatures and are known to cuddle even with members of different species. Did you know that capybaras love their chins being rubbed. Because I do.

#PR1CADICA #queerplatonic pardners

[teknikolor-walters]

Scarab and B0UNTY aren't really married because they technically don't exist they just bought rings and started calling themselves married and B0UNTY's name is B0UNTY Walters and they iterated the rings for Jessie (sobbing my eyes out)

#H1VE #scarab walters #queerplatonic pardners

[teknikolor-walters]

My big problem with the queerplatonic pardners is that I love them so much and they are There in my brain but I can never figure out what to draw or write for them

#queerplatonic pardners

[teknikolor-walters]

Queerplatonic pardners elijah council shootout and send post

#H1VE #elijah alexander mayfield #scarab walters #queerplatonic pardners

[ty-bayonet-betteridge]

I'm so fond of the idea of Jessie introducing Scarab to yee/haw pronouns. B0UNTY gets them mixed up and uses those pronouns for Scarab and Scarab's like "hold on. do that again"

thats so real... i love using the Jessicas to explore gender so much <3 gender is stored in the Jessicas and they give some out to their friends whenever they need

#H1VE #jessie baker #queerplatonic pardners

[teknikolor-walters]

Writing shitty scarab centric queerplatonic pardners content that I'm never gonna post is actually really good for my enrichment I think

#queerplatonic pardners #scarab walters