Sanders Sides One-shots

To Be Human (BROT3/OT3 - Analogicality)

Ship: Analogicality with side pairing Roman x Thomas.

TW: Swearing, suicide, death, neglectful parents, excessive use of italics and dashes

Word count: 24,649

Yes, you're reading that word count right.
As a (late) Happy New Years present from me to you, here is the LONGEST FUCKING THING I've ever written, quite literally.

Human AU with ghost elements. Despite the TW this is honestly not that sad, it's just bittersweet.

Note is at the bottom!

Mulling crowds, moved by forces none other than powers higher and lesser, horde together in little companies of half-hearted chatter. Voices, nothing more than noise used to inflict their colours to the otherwise tacky walls. Wafts of toxic fumes in cheap cups filled the air; it was no wonder their faces were slowly sinking into themselves.

A lone hushed zombie amongst them, pushing against the flow of time and space-the people. Eyes sunken and skin pale, the undead can barely call himself alive as he stumbles through, feet uncoordinated.

He wanders alone, gaze searching but unfocused. As if looking for a particular unknown amongst its crowd.

The weight on his shoulders aches. He casts sweeping looks amongst the seemingly unending hallway, furrows his brows, and ignores the way the hordes mindlessly pass by him.

He slows his trudging, the ache too much and the search too fruitless.

"Patton!" Virgil bursts through the swarm of students. "Fuck, dude. You look dead."

"Mm." Patton hums, peering up at Virgil through his drooping lashes.

"Nothing about the language? Geez, how much sleep did you get?"

"Too early," he yawns, "can't math."

"What the hell?"

He hums again, feet dragging as Virgil pulls him towards the lockers. Shifting his bag, he rolls his shoulders to ease the soreness as he's tugged along. Virgil casts him a concerned glance, no doubt noticing the bruise-like appearance of Patton's undereyes and the pallid wash to his skin, comparable now to Virgil himself.

When they arrive at Virgil's locker, he leans his head against the cool metal of the adjacent one, slumping against it in exhaustion.

"Did you sleep at all last night?" Virgil asks, watching him from the corner of his eye as he rummages through the chaos that is his locker.

"Mm..."

"What were you even doing? You're always on my case about me drinking more cups of coffee than hours of sleep I get."

The question swims, unanchored, in his head as he tries to make sense of it in his drowsiness. Head lolling about, glasses askew. Virgil waits, foot tapping in a combination of impatience and worry.

Patton's head snaps up.

"I have a math exam soon, and I have no idea what I'm doing, Virg!" He all but throws himself over Virgil, whining. "You gotta help!"

"Patton, you're in the class above me. I have no idea." He sighs, indulging and patting him lightly on the head in sympathy.

Groaning, Patton manages to disregard the fact that his glasses pinch the bridge of his nose the more he tries to suffocate himself with Virgil's shoulder. From here, he can smell the coffee clinging to him like a second skin, and the scent, usually so bitter and gross to him, seems heavenly.