Chapter Text
"Umm, excuse me? I asked for no dairy in my coffee."
You turned to the customer with a polite smile, mentally taking note of the neat blonde hair that fell on the woman's shoulders. Although your boss specifically advised you not to, you found that noticing such things was a highly beneficial habit for a barista such as yourself.
"Thank you for your feedback, but I specifically made your coffee with almond milk, just for you."
Correcting customers, like the woman who stood before you at that moment, was often fruitless. Still, it was worth a shot.
"No, you didn't. I can taste the dairy in this. Remake it, and actually do your job this time."
Too predictable.
Your kind customer service smile refused to falter as you replied, accustomed to this sort of attitude and nonsense from customers.
"Of course, ma'am."
Picking up the milkless drink, you poured it into the sink, and remade it identical to the first. This time, the blonde-haired woman watched with a victorious smile as you, a minimum-wage worker, poured almond milk into her coffee, making sure she didn't miss any of your attempts to sneak in dairy and poison her. What a shame; you were actually tempted to try for a minute there.
"Here you are, thank you for visiting us today." You spoke, thoroughly fed up, in a merry tone, handing the woman her drink. Only 10 minutes until your shift was over, and you could see what on earth the news was on about these days, involving the monster race.
A mere three months ago, a large group of monsters emerged from a large mountain somewhere in another country. Since then, the world was a bit on edge. I mean, if you were president and you discovered that there was an entire group of people wanting to break free from the earth below you, you would be a bit concerned as to how you were unaware for so long. You almost couldn't blame them for making the monsters stay close to Ebbott for weeks after their appearance, despite how thrilled they all were to adventure the rest of the planet. Every single one of them was well known by the public by now, and a lot of monsters even had fans. They were such a big deal now, that there was hardly anything on the news aside from them, even though you had never seen a monster in real life before.
The woman took the drink you were holding out for her, a prideful smile on her face.
"I will be leaving a one-star review, you almost lost a customer!"
"Have a good day." You replied, glancing up at the television in the corner of the shop. A feminine robot sung dramatically on the screen, his hair neat, despite the exaggerated movements he acted out during the performance. Monsters weren't common in real life, but they sure were online. For a minute, you questioned whether the robotic movie star even counted as a monster, before you remembered that he was somehow sentient. Magic is strange.
The arms on the clock ticked to 7 o'clock, and your shift was over. Your boss stepped into the main shop from his 'office', which was really a room with a couch and a television that he said you weren't imporant enough to gain access to. The moment he spotted the show on the television, he switched it off and sighed, looking at you. Unlucky for you, your coworker left sick today, so you had to deal with his yapping all by yourself.
"(Y/n), what did I say about monster shows?" He scolded, annoyance in his voice. It wasn't you who controlled the channel, it was your ill coworker. You hadn't cared enough to change it after they left, and you wouldn't throw them under the bus like that, so you had to sit through whatever your boss had to say. Not everyone was too welcoming of the monster race, and unfortunately, your boss just happened to be one of those people. And, what's even worse, is that he assumed that everyone else was too.
"I don't know how many times I've told you this, but putting monsters on the television makes us lose customers! Nobody wants to see this crap, and it brings the business down." He barked, gesturing at the screen with his hands. You idly nodded in a silent plea for him to shut up, wanting to be anywhere but there at the moment. All of your applications for other jobs were left unnoticed and ignored, leaving you trapped with this bigot of a boss. Well, it could be worse. As long as you kept telling yourself that, then everything would be okay.
When his lecture was finally over, you sighed and closed up the coffee shop. Grabbing your bag, you left the building, locked it, and climbed into your car, visibly exhausted. Well, time to do it all again on Tuesday. And the next day. And the countless days after that. God, when will you finally be able to afford college, or even get accepted for a different job? Everyone was so focused on the monsters that nobody stopped to think about the people struggling paycheck to paycheck, hardly surviving on their own.
It will get better. That statement was getting harder and harder to believe as the months passed. Nothing changed, and it didn't look like it was going to, anytime soon. Well, all you can do about it right now is drive home, and think about it later.
And that was exactly what you did. Or, started to do, anyway.
Driving down the road, you zoned out as the cars passed, knowing the route home by heart. You turned away into a neighbourhood a few miles from yours—a shortcut, saving a few precious minutes at home, to relax. No other cars followed behind you as you cut through the silent road. An empty stretch with nothing but feilds on either side of the road was coming up, and usually, you thought nothing of it, yet today, it felt a bit off. You were slightly tense, but you couldn't seem to put a finger on the reason why. You started paying more attention to your surroundings. You didn't usually feel like this out of the blue, so it was a tad worrying.
Just as the feild was about to pass, you saw something you never expected to see in your lifetime. A gap in the air, an invisible doorway opened up, and a skeleton was thrown out of it and onto the grassy plain. You slowed down, a bit shook, and wondered what on God's green earth was happening. Glancing at the skeleton now bleeding on the ground, you came to a full stop. Taking a closer look, you saw that they were wearing a blue jacket with basketball shorts. They shuddered on the ground, in obvious pain and discomfort.
Coming to your senses, you swung your car door open and approached them, cautious as ever. You looked around frantically, nobody else in sight. Oh, what would you do? There were no monster hospitals anywhere for hours, nobody had ever thought there would be a need to build one in a place with no monsters. You kneeled next to him, searching your mind for the next reasonable action, in a panic. You heard faint whispers from him, now being so close.
"Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow.." You could hardly hear him. His reaction was fair, he was bleeding so much that you could hardly pinpoint where exactly from. In fact, you didn't even know if he was aware someone was next to him.
You had some monster candy at home. That would heal him.
...Screw it. He's getting in the car.
"Uhh.. Hello? You alright? I can, uh, help you. If you want." You said, second-guessing every word. You were so unsure of what to do, how to act.
The skeleton opened his eyes, glanced at you with a frantic and fearful expression, before passing out cold.
Well, you weren't going to leave him out here to die.
Being as careful as you could, you scooped him up into your arms, his head limply resting on your shoulder. You opened the back seat of your car, laid him down, and resumed the drive back home. It was very unprofessional, but it was better than nothing, you guessed. Hopefully he wouldn't mind waking up in a stranger's bed, likely bandaged up. You arrived at your apartment, and with loads of luck and subtle pleading glances, nobody questioned you for carrying a bloody skeleton into your room. Laying him on your bed, you whipped out the first-aid kid you've been keeping in your kitchen for situations just like these, and gently wiped and bandaged his major visible injuries. There were cracks and scratches everywhere, and you couldn't help but wonder what did this to him. You didn't spot whoever threw him into the field through that strange portal thing, but you doubted that they were good news. His blood was dried enough that it didn't stain your blanket, which was about the only lucky thing to happen to you on that day.
You pulled your blanket over his shoulders, deciding you would be sleeping on the couch tonight. God, your hospitality was going to get you killed someday. You just silently hoped that he wouldn't freak out too much, and that he would get some professional care when he recovered enough to stand on his own. You could only hope that things would be okay.
They had to be. Eventually.