twisted wonderland one-shots (requests CLOSED! for now)

idia x fem!reader

synopsis: just some gaming fluff

a/n: request one DONE onto the next one now

"Don't tell me you're still on character creation," Idia gripes, smashing the buttons on his controller a bit more aggressively as you cackle. "You've been on there for a whole hour!"

You grin, making the little person on your screen spin as you get a better look at the way you've designed it. "But Idia, this is the most important part of the game!" You'd done nothing but customize the player character the whole time Idia has been grinding through each level of the game, more invested in getting the appearance of your little guy to be as accurate as possible than actually playing through this video game.

"You can just help me when I start. Where are you at, anyways?" you ask from where you lay on your boyfriend's bed while he sits at his desk, eyes locked on his monitor, looking away briefly from your screen to peek at Idia's before you go back to mulling over the custom character options. He's busy blasting a few people off of the screen, eyebrows pinched together as he focuses on moving forward.

"I've already passed the first checkpoint. Seriously, are you just gonna, like, actually stay on the character screen the whole time?" he asks you disbelievingly while you flip in between looks.

"Maybe. For a rip-off, it's surprisingly detailed," you muse, squinting as you try to figure out which hairstyle fits your character the best. The differences were minimal, but hey, you want to get it as close as possible as you could, even if your boyfriend complains about it the whole time. Besides, you're having too much fun teasing him and watching him get all wound up over something so insignificant.

As soon as Idia opens his mouth to whine again, you cut him off. "I'm gonna grab us a drink," you say, meandering over to his mini-fridge and sifting through its contents. You squint, looking at the labels on each can. "Hey, babe, do you want green apple or strawberry?"

Idia finally looks over from his screen, lifting up one of the cushions of his headphones. "Are there any raspberry's left?" he asks, leaning back in his chair. You shake your head.

"Nope, all out."

"Could you bring me the strawberry?"

"Maybe."

Idia shoots you a look, which you return with a cheeky grin. After a second, you relent and pick up the can of strawberry soda, popping open the tab and handing it to your boyfriend on your way back to his bed. As soon as he sets it down, you're reaching over and taking a sip of it for yourself, just because you can and just because you know Idia isn't able to stop you while he's so immersed in his game.

"So," you start, still tweaking a few things on the character creation page, "tell me more about this game. All I know about it is that it's a rip-off."

A small grin tugs at the corner of Idia's lips before he begins his spiel. "You remember Battle Stars, right? This is a lot like that—they're both third-person point-of-view shooters, and the main goal is the same, too. Getting past all of the galaxy-themed levels and releasing the space princess at the end—but it's not actually a princess, it's just a witch in disguise, and you realize that you've been helping her the whole time and now you gotta go back and undo everything you did in the past levels to free the real princess."

"Uh huh," you say, flipping between two types of nose shapes. Damn, they're really similar!

"And—yeah, it's kinda the exact same premise for this game," muses Idia, mashing at the buttons. "On the surface level, the only things that have changed are the designs, some of the levels have different bosses, and the treasures have different uses—but the treasure designs are clearly copied-and-pasted and the damage per second is a lot less than the OG thing. All of the mobs have the exact same damage and the difficulty goes up as the number of them increases—in the last game, each enemy had different stats and weaknesses, but in this one the only thing that's different is the size of them. The graphics here are a shit ton better than Battle Stars' are, but it's just a cover-up to conceal how unorigical the game itself is. This was just a quick cash grab made by people who thought that someone like me wouldn't notice the lack of effort put into their game." He talks as he mows throw row after row of tiny moving monsters, marching forward through the galactic dungeon.

"Damn. You really remember stuff like damage?" you ask, looking up from your screen. You huff incredulously as Idia nods, biting his lip in irritation as he tries to get to the next checkpoint. "That's...really impressive, actually."

Idia's face lights up at the same time it turns red; his head whips towards you, eyes wide, like he's not completely processing what you've told him. "W-wait, really? You mean that?"

You grin softly, nodding and quelling your boyfriend's insecurities. "Of course I do, babe. C'mon, you already knew how smart you are—it's not too hard to believe it when you hear it from me, is it?" Idia is starting to look nervous, but when you raise an eyebrow he shakes his head, eyes flickering down for a moment.

"I...I guess it's—"

Idia is cut off as his little character makes a distressed little sound, eyes snapping back to his screen. He groans in despair as the player character is overrun by enemies, hitting buttons as hard as he can but—it's too late, a sad little trumpet sounds and the screen goes black. Idia drops his controller and crosses his arms, glaring at his computer.

"I hate this game," he announces, childishly, while you try and fail to hold back a snicker.

"Well, since you're done with that game, come look at what I made," you say, turning your screen around so your boyfriend can see. Idia's still pouting, but as soon as his eyes land on the character you'd spent nearly an hour creating, his fiery hair explodes in shades of pink.

"Is that—?"

"Yeah, it's you," you tell him, a bit bashfully as he leans closer to get a better look. "The game may be ass, but you said it yourself—the graphics are pretty good. What do you think? Did I get it close enough?" you ask while your boyfriend's brain sputters to a stop.

"...This, like, totally gave me an extra heart," he utters, and you can't hold back the laugh that escapes you. You scoot to the side as Idia join you on his bed, still staring at the screen in awe as the character that's a near-perfect replica of him hovers in place.

"Glad you like it. I think it's the only good part of this game, honestly. I wish all of them could be as detailed as this," you sigh, leaning onto Idia's shoulder. When you look up, it's impossible not to notice the gears turning in Idia's blue head. "...What are you thinking about?"

"I'm gonna make a copy of a copy of a game," he says, sounding determined. "Just for the character creation page. You're right—this is the most important part of the game. Maybe I can find a way to transfer this format to a blank slate of my own and do something even cooler with it!"

You grin and tuck your head against Idia's neck while he rambles on about his newfound project.