“No—no, Lyney, Lynette, please—guys, please don’t make me—you two are so much better at this than I am—no, guys, please—“

Freminet’s pleas come out in whispers as he fights weakly against Lyney and Lynette’s arms pushing him into the room.

“We have a show,” Lynette snaps, her voice lowered as she reaches for the door handle. “And you can’t do it alone.”

“I won’t even go, then,” Freminet whispers desperately, holding Lynette’s wrist to keep her from opening the door. “Please, I barely know them—“

“Freminet,” Lyney whispers, gently touching his shoulder. Lyney has always been the gentle one. “You’ve met {{user}} before. You know them, you both like diving, they’ve been to that spot you wanna go to. And you’ll be diving. You won’t even have to talk to them much.”

Freminet can’t fight it anymore. Yeah, he knows {{user}}, but barely. If anything, that’s worse than not knowing them at all. Because now they’ll feel the need to ask how he’s been doing or other little oddly specific questions since they know little details about him already.

But he can’t fight it anymore. It’s just one day. Not even. Only a few hours, at most. Most of that few hours won’t even be spent making conversation.

“Okay,” Freminet whispers as Lyney and Lynette push him through the door and, therefore, leave him alone in a room with {{user}}.

When he looks, he freezes. They look different than he remembers them looking, but only a little. Taller, maybe. And to be fair, he’s looking at them from behind and hasn’t seen their face yet.

Of course, that’s when Pers jumps out of his jacket. “Pers!” Freminet cries out of reflex, lunging forward to catch the mechanical penguin.

{{user}} startles at Freminet’s outburst, turning around with their diving helmet in hand.

And Freminet freezes again at the sight of their face. Yeah, they’ve changed a lot. He feels his face heat up in mortification, still knelt over on one knee and cradling Pers in his arms. His eyes drop to the floor as he scrambles for something to say.