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Skizz was barely even dead when he heard Gem over the radio.
"And Skizz is dead! Are you going to be playing with us buddy 'cause you haven't been alive for more then three minutes combining all the rounds we've played today."
She was laughing over the radio and he heard Impulse doing the same somewhere in the house.
The first few times he had died it had been funny, sure, but now this was getting on his nerves. He also didn't know why the ghost kept getting him killed first thing when he stepped in the house! It wasn't his fault.
And yet he kept dying and they kept making fun of him for it. Not that he wanted them to stop. They were having fun and he had to admit he wasn't the best at the game after all.
Being dead still sucked tho.
He was constantly cold, he couldn't play properly and everytime they got back in the lobby it felt weird to feel his heartbeat and he caught himself forgetting to breath a few to many times.
He found himself standing over his lifeless body that was slumped unnaturally against the wall.
The first few times he died, he had found it unsettling to see his dead body, but now he was almost immune to it.
It helped that the last few times they had played Phasmo, his brain started to almost feel clouded over after him dying back to back. He sure didn't like the feeling, but it was better then the self depricating thoughts he knew he would get otherwise.
Not that that wasn't still a problem, it was just that in the lobbies he could speak them out loud as jokes the others could laugh at.
That was his mission in life after all, make others laugh.
Impulse, with his good soul, had of course asked him about it multiple times. The demon was always worried about others, definetly Skizz. Skizz had assured him it was just meant as jokes however, and the demon had somewhat hesitantly dropped it.
That's one thing about angels, they are very good at letting people hear what they want to, as his parents would say.
Skizz, well, he just called it being naturally good at manipulating and lying.
Not his proudest skill, but sometimes it came in usefull.
It took him a moment to notice Impulse was trying to talk to him over the radio.
"Hey Skizz, could you please make that polty pile we've been asking for?"
Shit, he hadn't been paying attention, still just staring at his dead body in the hall.
Couldn't even make himself usefull in the afterlife.
He quickly set out to find where the demon was, as he also didn't know where the ghost was residing. He found his friend in the basement, including all their equipment. He started throwing any small object on a pile in the middle of the room, before going back upstairs to grab more stuff.
When he found Gem in one of the clossets hiding, he decided to poke a bit of fun at her.
He carefully pulled at the closset door, opening it slightly and chucked a small cup inside.
The girl was to occupied with the parabolic microphone to see it tho, so he whent to find more stuff.
The small pile was steadily increasing when his newest item, a small spray can, made the pile topple over onto Gem.
"Skizz! Stop it and go be usefull for once, god." she exclaimed.
He decided he was just going to keep himself buisy rather then acknowledge that the playfull jab hurt.
He also ignored how his mind was, although very slowly, still steadily feeling more clouded and stuffed up.
He indeed tried to make himself usefull for the rest of the round, restacking the polty pile, following the ghost around trying to catch the speed, trying to figure out what the ghost could possibly be.
Once Impulse had ran out of incense they all collected back in the van.
"I think it mite be a Goryo, 'cause it hasn't moved at all." Impulse came to the conclusion, and of course, he was correct.
It was a bit of a shock spawning into the lobby. The feeling of his heart beating felt almost foreign and he already had to think about every breath he took.
"Skizz you really need to stop dying buddy." Gem laughed, shoving him with her elbow.
He chuckled, replying something without really processing anything. He was still mainly focussing on keeping his breathing at a steady pace and his brain just kept getting fuzzier.
He barely even noticed when Impulse had started up a new map.
"Skizz ready up, ready up Skizz, Skizz ready up-" Impulse and Gem were both singing the little tune he had made up, getting him out of his thoughts.
They arrived at the next house, grabbing all their usual equipment.
"Okay Skizz, now don't go dying on us again buddy, I like playing with you!" Impulse put his arm around the angel, still laughing.
"Yeah yeah, I'll try my best." he replied back.
They walked in the house and the door, as expected, practically instantly closed.
He frantically ran to a nearby hiding spot, and waited for the ghost to inevitably find him. But it didn't. He survived the first hunt!
"Hunt's over!" Gem announced over the radio.
"I'm alive baby!" Skizz called out over the radio.
"Hey good job Skizzle!" Impulse hugged him from behind and he leaned into the hug for just a moment. It was nice maybe living through a round for once.
He was starting to get his hopes up.
They found the room before another hunt could start.
He got freezing temp's first thing when he got to the kitchen.
"Guy's, it's in the kitchen with freezing temp's." he called out, placing down the camera he had brought in so Gem could look for ghost orb's.
"Thanks Ski-" Gem's voice turned into static, and the lights above his head started flickering,
A hunt had started.
He ran into one of the clossets, slamming the door behind him while he heard Impulse run around the kitchen island.
"Hunt's over!" Gem yelled through the door.
He had survived, again!
"Guess who's still alive!" He jumped out of the closset, scaring Gem who let out a yelp.
"Skizz, you can't just scare me like that!" she laughed however, bringing the dots projector to the kitchen.
This went on for a while. They failed to get any evidence, but Skizz lived every hunt.
They decided to try for one more hunt, as Impulse only had one incense left, and then try to guess what it could be.
Skizz went to hide in the closset like he had done for the whole round and waited.
"Hunt's over!" he heard Impulse yell from the kitchen.
He stepped out of the closset, happy to have lived an entire round, when he saw the ghost standing infront of him. He yelled, trying to get back to the closset but it was already to late, the ghost had seen him.
He felt the familliar feeling of cold hands stangeling his neck before he fell to the ground.
He blinked and he was floating over his dead body once more.
"Sorry Skizz, I genuinly thought the hunt was over!" he heard Impulse laugh from the other room.
Gem was laughing at him over the radio but he couldn't even hear it properly.
He sunk to the ground. He didn't have the power to float back to the van.
He had survived the entire round, but ofcourse he still had to die! Ofcourse he just had to show everybody that he was still useless.
He didn't notice when his friends yelled at him over the radio to come to the van. He didn't hear what ghost they ended up going with when they left.
What he did notice, was the immediate overstimulation that happened when he spawned in the lobby.
His heartbeat was to loud, his friends were talking loudly about the ghost, his clothes felt uncomfortable.
And the thing that was freaking him out the most, was the fog in his brain.
The stuffy feeling he had in his brain was overwhelming now. Every thought seemed jumbled up and the world felt so much bigger then he could handle. He felt so incredibly small and his body felt way to big.
He had absolutely no clue about anything that was happening around him.
Not that Impulse and Gem were talking to him, not that he wasn't breathing properly.
So, he did the only thing his brain could come up with in that moment.
Cry.
He ran towards a corner of the room, clumsily falling to the floor and curled up on himself.
And he cried, and he sobbed.
He was so scared, and he barely even knew why, and just the only thing that felt sort of okay was crying.
Until big but gentle arms were rapped around him. He was pulled into a hug and he knew immediately that it was Impulse.
"It's okay Skizz, it's okay." the demon whispered, stroking one of his hands through the angels hair. "I think I know what mite be going on, but you'll first have to breath, alright? Just follow my breath"
Impulse made an effort of making every breath he took as exagerated as possible so it would be easy to follow. And thats what Skizz did. It took a few minutes and it still wasn't perfect, with him still crying, but he wasn't hyperventilating anymore.
He looked up at his friend for the first time, meeting his worried looking eyes.
"Hi baby, are you feeling a bit better?" the imp asked, and he could only nod tentatively, not even thinking about the nickname.
"Good job kid! Now, I get that this is a bit scary and weird, but I have a question for you, okay?" Impulse pulled away a tiny bit, and it's only then that Skizz notices that he was sitting in the younger man's lap.
"Can you tell me how old you feel up here?" He poked Skizz's forehead, and the angel couldn't help but giggle.
Then he thought.
It was a question he recognised, it was the question they always asked if someone was regressed. It then clicked that he, mite be regressed right now, altough he had little of a clue how old he felt.
He wanted to give an answer tho. He almost started crying again when Impulse quickly shushed him.
"It's okay if you don't know love, but I think you are somewhere under five, that feel right?" Impulse talked so caringly that it stopped his tears almost instantly. And when he thought over the words, under five did feel right.
He nodded, and flung himself over Impulse's shoulder, looking around the room. He just spotted Gem playing with a basketball, when he felt Impulse stand, easily picking him up with it.
"Okay little one, let's go to Gemmy, yeah."
It wasn't like he had much of a choice in the matter, but he didn't even care right now. He just laughed, excited to see the girl.
"Hi Gem, we have a tiny Skizz on our hands now." Impulse greeted, as Gem came up to meet them.
"Skizzy! You little now, you never little! That so much fun!" It was clear the fox hybrid had also slipped as she was bouncing around the aquipment nook.
"Well it's his first time, and I think it happened 'cause he died a few to many times, so we are going to be gentil, okay Gem?"
Gem came to a stop, listening to Impulse as he spoke, before nodding with a serious look on her face and sitting down.
"Okay, good. Now how old are you feeling kit?" Impulse crouched down, still holding Skizz tightly in his arms.
"Am five!" she said, holding up her hand for the guys to see.
"Good job, thanks for telling me!" Impulse ruffled the top of her hair before standing back up.
"Alright, I think it's time for a snack break, what do you think angel?" He looked down at Skizz, who was nodding.
"I want peanutbutter and apple slices Impy!" Gem was already running to the parked van where she knew they kept snacks for inbetween rounds.
Impulse caught up with her, moving a bit slower with Skizz in his arms. He put him down when they stepped into the van. Gem had made a pile with blankets, so Skizz crawled onto that, leaning on Gem. Impulse cut up an apple and spread some peanutbutter on the slices. He then filled up a bottle with milk and brought the apples to the littles.
"Here are your apples, I'm going to warm up a bottle for Skizzy in the microwave, yeah."
"You can go, I keep baby safe!" Gem announced while biting into an apple slice.
Skizz, didn't really know what was going on however. The guess of his mental age being under five was still very brought, an he definetly felt very young, probably somewhere under three.
When he saw Impulse leave the truck, and move out of his sight, he started sniffling. He just wanted him to stay but the demon was already to far out to notice.
He started crying when it was clear to him that Impulse wasn't coming back. He vaguely noticed Gem trying to calm him, but it wasn't really working.
By the time Impulse came back with a warm bottle of milk, Skizz was full on sobbing again and Gem was also close to tears, not knowing how to help the other.
"Impy!" she cried when the older walked into the van. "Skizz started crying and I can't get him to stop! I'm sorry!"
Both of them were now crying, with one not knowing what was going on and the other scared she failed to do the job asighned to her.
Impulse set down the bottle on the desk and sat infront of the two littles. He picked Skizz up, the mentally younger noticibly calming when he was held, and sat down next to Gem.
"It's okay Gemmy, you did nothing wrong." he assured the girl, who had thrown herself against his side. "I think Skizz just didn't know where I was for a second, he'll be okay."
And he was in fact okay. Now that he knew Impulse was back, all was good in his little world. Impulse grabbed the bottle from the desk and started feeding him. The milk was the perfect temperature and he couldn't help but feel extremely sleepy by the end of it.
Impulse removed the bottle from his lips when the thing was empty, but he quickly missed the feeling of having something in his mouth. He brought his hand up to his mouth, gently sucking on his fingers.
"Hey buddy, lets not get your fingers all sticky yeah, wait." Impulse pulled his hand away from his face and opened one of the drawers from the desk. He pulled out a bright red pacifier they kepped in their with some other little gear, and offered it to Skizz, who gladly took it.
It didn't take long for him to fall asleep. He was all comfy cuddled up in Impulse's lap and he was tired from all the crying he had done.
Gem wasn't far behind him, also falling asleep leaning onto the demon, cuddling into his side.
Impulse ended up calling Tango to ask if he could help bring Gem back, seeing as he could only carry one asleep little at a time.
When Tango joined, he walked up to the little group.
"Hello, how are you all doing?" He asked, getting shushed by Impulse to lower his voice, motioning to the two sleeping littles.
"Ahw, I didn't know Skizz regressed aswell, look at him!" the blaze whispered, crouching in front of Impulse to take a better look at the angel.
"It is his first time actually." Impulse sighed and Tango looked up concerned. Regressing for the first time always seems to be a bit rough for the individual.
"He died a few times in a row first thing when he stepped in the house. Then the last round he managed to survive for almost the whole game, but we thought the last hunt had ended already, but it handn't. So then he was still killed, and I think that made him upset with himself to the point of regression." Impulse explained.
"Poor baby had a rough night then huh." Tango hummed, moving so he could pick up Gem. "Lets get them home, I feel like a sleepover is in order." Impulse agreed and they whent back to hermitcraft.
A sleepover was held at Impulse's base, and if in the morning Skizz would still be little and confused about it all, they would help him through it.
But for now, everyone got some well deserved rest.