Sam & Max In - Baby Blues

Prologue

(Authors Note - Thank you for reading the prologue to my first ever fanfic! I've had this story idea for a while now and just managed to get the beginning typed out. I would like to state that my intent is not to trivialize or mock mental illness, having multiple diagnoses myself. Canonically, as of the Telltale Game series, Max is depicted as mentally ill and on medication, I feel it is appropriate to depict his cartoon counterpart as the same. My writing comes from a place of love for these characters and I hope to improve and expand on my ideas as I go along. Again thank you for reading, enjoy.)

It had been a surprisingly normal case for Sam and Max, a little dull even. Turns out those capybara just wanted people to stop disrespecting them on the internet. Sure they were large rodents with amusing coconut like physiques, but they deserved at least a cut of all the novelty stickers and marketable plush toys being sold in their likeness. Taking all those hostages was a little excessive but, it had worked out in the end. The part where they demanded payment in mandarin oranges was a little tricky but they'd settled on accepting 50% Valencia. That all said and done, unfortunately it was the least of our crimefighting duos concerns. Over the past week something had been increasingly...off, with the lagomorphic half. He seemed to have something he desperately wanted to talk about, but adamantly denied it every time he was asked. Even more disturbing was his lack of enthusiasm about work and life in general. Every day he seemed to get more tired and irritable, spending time alone and becoming almost completely distant physically. Something was wrong, very wrong, and it was about to come to a head.

The ride home was strange and quiet with Max having fallen asleep almost the second he was buckled in. The first and only time Sam had attempted to gently nudge the little guy awake was around 9:30 pm. They were fast approaching a Denny's restaurant just off of the freeway and in his mind deserved a late night 'Moons Over My Hammy'. Normally Max would have jumped at the chance for greasy ham, egg and cheese bliss, but not this time. He'd awoken with a start that any other day would have resulted in a reflexive bullet through the windshield. Looked like his quickdraw was deactivated in this abnormal, groggy state, fortunately in this case. All he could manage was to ask what time it was and then claim he wasn't hungry, before closing his eyes again. Of course, he was never hungry lately. He was 'just tired', always 'just tired', leave him alone. This had gone on too long, Sam's heart sank a bit thinking of how helpless his dear friend's condition seemed. He was very unwell, be it physically, mentally or both, and dammit Sam wasn't worth his salt as canine detective if he couldn't get to the bottom of it.

The duo arrived at their suburban home, the Desoto backfiring something awful when the old girl was parked in the driveway. They'd have to get the Geek to look at it tomorrow. Relying on your adopted adolescent daughter for auto maintenance was morally ambiguous but, it was fine right? She had her own lab space and they'd even let her have a pet recently. Okay, the latter was more, she had reluctantly accepted a very unexpected 'pet' but still. The kid loved all that mechanical stuff anyway, it was no big deal. Inside at last Sam wasn't the least bit surprised when his rabbit companion announced he was going to bed and of course, still not eating anything. The canine just sighed and bid him goodnight as he removed his jacket and hat and draped them over the back of the couch. He was tired and starving and knew one of them had to stay well for both of their sake. Although his mediocre restaurant stop had been denied, there was left over lasagna in the fridge with his name on it. No really, it had his name on it. A few months ago he'd taken to labeling Tupperware containers, in the hopes Max would at least feel a little bad when he ate his food anyway. The semi dried out pasta was half heated in the microwave, quickly consumed and the container added to the pile of dishes in the sink. Sam made a mental note to try to remember to wash them, lest they resort to eating cereal out of the those commemorative beer steins they'd bought in Stuttgart back in 88', again. Loosening his tie he entered the hallway and approached the bedroom, greatly anticipating the coming rest. That's when he heard it, soft but unmistakable to his sensitive hearing...crying.

For a moment Sam stood in the doorway, surprised by what had unfolded. It wasn't much but it wasn't normal either. In the dark he could just barely make out his husband, curled into a fluffy white ball of tears on the edge of their bed.

"Max?", Sam called out, gently as possible. No response, more crying, he went to the bedside table and fumbled with the lamp. It flipped on filling the room with soft light. The large dog took great care to sit down beside the tiny rabbit whose body he felt tremble when he stroked his soft fur.

"I knew something was wrong with you chowderhead", he said drawing him up into his arms, "I probably know you better then you know yourself.".

Max emitted several more shuttering sobs into Sam's fairly new shirt, wetting it with his tears and likely by now, snot. He'd let it slide this time, nothing a good wash wouldn't fix, hopefully. Over the years they'd shared enough bodily fluids anyway, why should it matter now. After a few more moments of sniffling and having his surprisingly velvety head stroked, Max sat up a little from the cradled position he was in. His dark eyes were red rimmed and tear filled and he wiped his nose on his arm. His partner watched with admittedly some disgust. Yep, there was snot, lots of it, they'd both need to bathe now at this rate. Sam was at least, the slightest bit relieved. Despite not having seen Max eat in what felt like forever, he didn't feel like he'd lost weight. If anything, he strangely enough, seemed to have gained some. You had to be careful with rabbits, as prey animals they naturally tried to hide if they were sick, consciously or not.

"Feel better?", Sam asked, "Maybe you just needed a good cry?", he speculated to the distressed lagomorph.

"I...I", Max finally spoke, "I should have just told you...", he stuttered.

This little display was disturbing, not only with Max being so upset but also, for once, seemingly lost for words.

"I mean, you'd be there for me through anything right?", he continued, making weak, bleary eye contact, "Right?".

"Of course little buddy.", Sam replied with a slightly unnerved chuckle, the mood in the room had gotten decidedly heavy, "We can get through anything together...besides it can't be that bad.".

Max's expression turned to an odd mixture of love and innocence, "The truth is Sam", he said one hand gravitating to his naturally pudgy abdomen, "Your gonna be a father, I'm pregnant!". To this proud proclamation Sam had no idea what to say, even one of his famous exclamations of surprise were to lost to him now. All this stress, all this worry, just to find out Max had gone off his medication again and entered another delusional episode. Tonight he didn't know if he wanted to hug the poor thing or throw him out of a window.