Chapter Text
“I hear this is a reputable dive?”
Goopy looked up from wiping a glass clean to see who the strangely familiar voice belonged to. The guy looked tired. And dirty. And not like he had money for drinks. But that was what tabs were for.
“Sure is, mister. What’s your poison?” he asked, putting the freshly cleaned glass on the counter in front of the new customer. The wild-haired man stepped forward and not-so-gracefully seated himself on one of the barstools. “Something strong,” he muttered. “Don’t care what, long as it’s quality.”
“Mm-hmm,” Goopy hummed in reply, turning towards the cabinet of drinks behind him. “Let’s startcha off with a pint of whiskey, then.”
“Sounds promising.” That voice really did sound familiar, and Goopy could not for the life of him pinpoint where he’d heard it before. “What’s your name, mister?” the big man asked casually, filling the glass with whiskey.
The guy just grunted and took the glass. “What’s yours?” he countered, before gulping the drink down with surprising gusto.
Goopy’s eyebrows went up a bit. “I’m shocked you’ve never heard the name Goopy le Grande!” he exclaimed. “You must be from the big city or somethin’. But y’know, a few days ago I just so happened to remember the name I used to have, before I, ah, got mixed up in a silly little feud about ten years back,” Goopy explained vaguely. “An’ I tell ya, after forgettin’ what the hell my old name was, I never woulda pegged me for a Louis!” he continued with a deep chuckle. “Yessir that’s right, I was once one monsieur Louis Grant. I must be the least French Frenchman around, eh?”
The man said nothing, just pushed his glass back over to Goopy and pointed at the whiskey bottle. Goopy shrugged and kept talking as he refilled it. “‘Course, I still went with ‘le Grande,’ proll’y the most French thing I’ve ever done in my life. But it ain’t like I particularly wanna be a Louis at this point, hell, I renamed myself Goopy an’ I’m stickin’ with it!”
The strange customer finally looked up from his drink and quirked an eyebrow. “You don’t hate the name you picked for yourself?” he asked.
“Uh… no. Why would I?” Goopy asked.
“Well, you made a contract, didn’t you? I’d think you wouldn’t want to be constantly reminded of that one time you sold your soul to the Devil.” The glass was emptied again, and pushed back towards Goopy, who refilled it without much thought as he kept talking.
“Eh, wasn’t all that traumatic for me. I mean, don’t you dare tell this to mister Art Phyllis, but the whole ordeal didn’t change up my life all that much. I was still me at the end of it all, an’ I had some fun to boot! Even if I did get the tar beaten outta me by a pair of kids,” Goopy elaborated, careful not to idly lean his entire weight on the bar. It had already been splintered in a couple places over the past year.
The guy murmured his understanding. “Art Phyllis, that’s… the gardener, right?”
“Correctamundo, mister. No one calls ‘im that, though, my glorious self included. Can’t blame ‘im, it’s a pretty funny name. Wouldn’t say it’s any sillier than Cagney Carnation, but I don’t make the rules,” Goopy shrugged. “Matter of fact, I make staying outta that little guy’s business priority numero uno.”
“...Mm, yeah, I remember him. Just had tunnel vision, didn’t even ask the usual ‘ohh, is this one of those things where you actually just take my soul and I get tricked or whatever?’ I mean, I’d say ‘bout two-thirds of my clients asked somethin’ like that at some point, but nah, Phyllis, he was all in…” Goopy raised an eyebrow at that. The guy was undoubtedly drunk by this point, if his progressively slurred speech was anything to go by, but his words could possibly explain why Goopy was so sure he’d heard his voice before.
“Takin’ souls, you say? Didja used to work for that casino before it shut down a few days ago?” he asked nonchalantly, opening another bottle and subtly sliding the whole thing into his customer’s hand. The guy didn’t even question it, just took a swig and laughed sloppily.
“Hyeah, you could say that. Could even say… that casino worked for me! But, y’know, you… you could say that. I-I-I ain’t sayin’ that,” he stammered quickly, taking another swig of the liquor. Goopy’s suspicion must have been showing.
“So, wonder what happened with the Devil, after the place shut down,” Goopy mused conversationally, watching the shorter man’s face as he spoke. “I would expect he just packed up the place, but eh, some things don’t add up for that. The red cup, for example, he’s, uh… kicked the bucket, I hear. Must be tearing up that brother of his…” Goopy trailed off solemnly for a moment, before returning to his original train of thought. “But anyway, if that Devil bumped ‘im off, I don’t think he’d just up an’ close down his big ol’ house of soul-stealing.”
“He wouldn’t,” the guy murmured. “The cup boy didn’t matter to ‘im, not really. Just a damn nuisance, needed to be put in his place, but it wasn’t about just him, that’d be stupid.” He groaned and looked up towards Goopy, seizing his unkempt hair in his fingers. “You got me, okay? Just spit in my face an’ be done with it.”
The boxer grinned. “So you are him, huh? In that case... have another drink. Whiskey still what ya want?”
“What’re you talkin’ about…”
“Like I said, your big ol’ science experiment didn’t do much of a number on me. I got just what I needed, an’ I came back jus’ as handsome as before. Can’t do much complaining about that, mister Devil.” He slid another bottle over towards the man who had, up until a few days ago probably, had been some kind of immortal demon. Something to think about, Goopy supposed.
“Heh, well, s’ a rare opinion, apparently. Anyone who saw me right after I got changed up wants nothin’ to do with me, and… ahh, well, I guess I can’t blame ‘em. Didja know… immortal demons can’t get sloshed? I’ve been drinkin’ for centuries, an’ yeah, it tastes good, but man, actually bein’ able to drink ‘til I can’t hear myself think is somethin’ else. Dunno how all you folks survived not havin’ that for what, uh… ten years? That’s a lot of time for you, ain’t it…” the Devil trailed off. Goopy wanted to laugh; when he’d made his deal, the Devil had been so articulate in his wording, even though Goopy hadn’t needed much convincing. The big man was definitely not the type for conversation, but he distinctly remembered appreciating how the Devil used his words. Thus, hearing that rough, hypnotic voice of his spill out rambling, disjointed sentences in a drunken haze was admittedly pretty damn funny.
“Eh, I s’pose. Flew right by for me. Proll’y ‘cause I was busy givin’ ol’ Cagney a hard time… which hey, I still think he needed. The guy went bonkers, y’couldn’t go two feet without crushing one of the umpteen millions of flowers he planted, an’ when you did he just flipped his damn lid like it was your fault. I mean…” he trailed off, tapping his fingers on the counter. “I was the one who sent ‘im off the deep end in the first place, I ain’t denying that. But… ah, whatever. All that matters is he’s better now. Sweet as sugar some days, I hear. Sent me a real terse birthday card a few months ago… what a weird guy.”
Upon hearing the door to the deck opening, Goopy looked up to see one of the farmers, from up the path. The tall one. Goopy hoped he had come to drink himself to sleep. “You’re Psy, right?” he asked. “Ya come back from yer trip today?”
The farmer’s eyebrows went up a bit as he sat down beside the Devil. “Who told you I was off on a trip?”
Goopy rolled his eyes. “Yer pal Tato comes in here ‘least twice a week to pour his heart out with two pints of rum. M’sure I know more about you an’ your damn farm than I ever needed to know in my life.”
“... Well, that is a discussion for another day. Just provide me with a tall glass of cognac so that I can think,” Psy replied distractedly, massaging at his temples with his fingers.
It was Goopy’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “Think? Kid, you drink so you can forget stuff and go braindead and do things you regret later.”
“Oh, for myself it’s quite the contrary!” Psy insisted. “Except for the latter, I suppose. Anyhow, I find myself able to think tenfold faster with a bit of liquor in my system. And goodness, I have far too much in my head to sort it all out sober.” As soon as Goopy finished filling the glass, the skinny man snatched it up and began feverishly sipping at it.
“Sooo, what happened?” the Devil asked, hardly even holding his gaze on the man next to him. “You, er… dammit, I forgot which one you were... ugh, how many redheads did I help out…”
Psy was hardly listening to him. “Well, I… first things first, I’m on my way back to the Isle by boat, and all of a sudden, I get an absolutely nasty headache as all of these… memories just pop up out of nowhere! Memories decades old, that I hadn’t even thought to think about in quite some time, and on top of that, names come waltzing through my mind! Old names, caught me by surprise, they did.” He finished the glass and indicated a need for a refill. Goopy obliged and he continued. “I return home to my oldest, most valued friends, whose original names I could not recall up until a few hours prior, and they’ve got… ohh, so many things to tell me. Apparently, things only get interesting around here when I leave! ‘The casino’s closed, Cuphead’s gone, the Devil’s not the Devil anymore!’ Honestly, part of them had to know it was too much for a mind as complex-yet-delicate as mine to handle.” The Devil gave Goopy a lazy side-eye and the latter snickered. “In summation, it has been a most unacceptable day,” finished Psy with a huff, just as he finished his second glass.
“Y’sound pretty, uh, disturbed about all that,” the Devil remarked before taking another long drink.
“Well, I… I wouldn’t say I’m disturbed, per sé,” Psy scoffed. “This kind of nonsense is just what I’ve come to expect from Inkwell Isle. Nonsense I once partook in, no less! I simply wish my compatriots would not just overwhelm my thoughts all at once with their… hmm,” he trailed off, his bright eyes focusing on the Devil beside him. “You… look… familiar, sir…”
Goopy watched with amusement as the once feared and powerful Devil inched away towards the edge of his barstool. “Why d’you say that?” he slurred. Psy leaned forward and squinted, adjusting the monocle over his left eye before widening them both in surprise.
“Goodness, you’re the Devil, aren’t you!” he exclaimed, words spilling energetically from his mouth as he tapped a finger against his chin erratically. “I was told you had changed, certainly, but I was not expecting this particular development…”
“How didja know, mister… mister smarty...tall… guy…” rambled the Devil, pulling the collar of his coat over as much of his face as he could. Psy was faster: he seized the Devil’s lapels and drew him in close.
“Ah, yes, I never forget a face! And even on a different canvas, yours is… quite distinct,” noted Psy, jabbing a long finger at the shorter man’s nose. The Devil swatted his hand away with a sneer.
“Y’could ‘least clean my clock ‘stead of pokin’ fun at my dumb body. This is the stupidest revenge you could think of,” he snarked, taking the half-empty bottle of cognac meant for Psy and gulping down the rest of it before cringing. “Blegh, stuff tastes saccharine…”
“Oh, because I would presumably not be particularly enamored with your presence succeeding a period of my history defined by the absurd workings of your arcane manipulation?” questioned Psy esoterically, talking even faster than before. It looked like drinking just made him more of a nuisance than usual. “Goodness, I would be a rather immature mind if I were to place all the blame of my predicaments upon you, I mean, it was in fact my spontaneous burst of innovation that landlocked my companions and myself, and you know it did indeed take me some time to realize that, you only supplied the means to an end, an end that I so erroneously conceived!”
“So you’re sayin’ you don’t think it’s my fault,” summarized the Devil wearily. Psy pinched the bridge of his nose and narrowed his eyes in the Devil’s direction.
“Well, you… certainly had a role to play in this conundrum of ours, but… ugh, I’ve been sick of discussing this little lapse in judgement for months! Weepy and Moe are as well, they’ve got other things to think about, we all do! It’s in the past, goddammit… it doesn’t matter anymore. None of it does. Only thing we have to remember all that are our names, and goodness, it’s been far too much time for us to just go changing those back, I mean, my name used to be Cornelius! Who wants to go through the trouble of using that?! Not even myself!”
“S’better than Psycarrot…” Goopy muttered facetiously. As Psy prattled out a strongly worded rebuttal, the boxer’s attention dwindled towards the Devil, who was getting off his barstool. “Where’re you goin’, lord of evil?”
“Outside,” muttered the Devil, wobbling from side to side. “I’ve got uh… I’ve got, someone, I gotta go see…”
Goopy watched the man stagger towards the door and swing it open with a sloppy flourish. “Hm,” he muttered, mostly to himself since Psy was pretty much lost in drunk-lousy-smartass land. “I don’t think that Devil knows he needs to pay for his drinks.”
---
Seeing double was still a pretty novel phenomenon, but at the moment it was just a little bit inconvenient. The Devil had no idea where the hell he was, even though he’d walked to the bar barely an hour ago completely sober. Well, not completely, but he was having a hard time remembering anything that had happened more than a few hours ago. He just needed to find his way to… the farm, maybe? For someone who had set up shop in Inkwell Isle for over a hundred years, the Devil had next to no idea where anything was. That, and he was so plastered he could hardly get a clear view of his own two feet.
“Right, uh… left, I guess,” he muttered, stumbling up the stone stairs away from the boat that housed the bar. Half of him didn’t know where he was even going, but one tiny part of his brain did have some weird, moronically invigorating plan in mind. He stumbled a little farther along the wide, grassy road, before the subject of his drunken quest happened to cross his path. Convenient, though the Devil hadn’t expected the kid to be out so late.
“Heyyy, mug-kid! Mug… guy? I’ll, uh… I’ll work on that. Maybe. Might forget to work on it,” he rambled, wobbling closer as he did. Mugman looked him up and down and made a face.
“What do you want?” he asked tersely. “Looks like you’re drunk, so I’m guessing nothing important.”
“Ohh, it’s important! Yeah! Very! I, um… I just wanted toooo…” he trailed off. “To tell you, I’m… I’m sorry, about your brother. Um… dammit…”
“Cuphead,” Mugman reminded him flatly. “And I’m not really looking to receive your sympathies, especially after all you’ve done just for your own amusement.”
“Yeah, well, you ain’t allowed to not accept my apology!” snapped the Devil, his already hazy tone wavering. “I’m just… I dunno, y’don’t really, think about how big death is when you’re in charge of one of the places folks go when they kick the bucket. That, and, uh, I ain’t sure I’ve ever cared about anyone, least not enough to care when they die.”
“That’s… not very reassuring,” Mugman muttered. “Guess it makes sense, though. If you are being honest, I guess… thanks for still thinking about him, at least.”
The Devil ran a hand through his hair. “Actually, eh, wasn’t really thinking about him ‘til that big bartender guy brought ‘im up. And then I thought hey, I probably should say somethin’, seein’ as I’m the reason he decided to get all self-sacrificial or whatever. But eh, don’t worry about it, kid. It’s uh… it’s in the past, right? Just like those contracts your debtor pals made. Doesn’t matter anymore. None of it does.”
Mugman narrowed his eyes and averted his gaze, biting his lip and appearing to choke down some kind of sob. “... I haven’t exactly had a whole year to get over things,” he muttered. “I lost Cuphead not five days ago, and… I guess you don’t know how grief works, but that’s not enough time to say that it’s all in the past. And I’m… in all honesty, I’m not ready to talk to you. Especially not when you’re so out of your right mind. Give me time, and… when you do decide to have a good talk about everything, please be sober.” He turned away, and started leaving towards the second isle.
“Wait, kid, I – ghh!” exclaimed the Devil in annoyance, tripping on a rock and landing square on his face. At least getting hurt was something he was familiar with. Some seconds later, he felt a pair of large, gloved hands wrap around his torso and lift him up.
“Y’see who you needed to see?” asked Goopy casually, putting the Devil over his shoulder and walking back towards the boat. The Devil groaned.
“I jus’ don’t get it, whyyy’s everything such a damn problem around here?! Everyone’s mad at basically nothing, an’ that guy with the stupid hair said it doesn’t matter, so why…” He was too tired to keep going. Goopy chuckled.
“I’ve got a spot at the bar you can hole up in ‘til you find a place of your own. You can work for me for a few weeks, too. Get used to bein’, uh, human, I guess, an’ work off the tab for all those drinks you ordered while you’re at it,” he offered coyly.
“... Alright… but I’ve got… things to do… with people…”
“Those folks’ll still be there in the morning, pally. An’ so will you.”
The Devil groaned, and allowed his eyelids to droop as he began to fall into a deep, drunken stupor that would hopefully erase his memory of everything that happened the night before.
“... Can’t complain about a good gratuitous clause, I guess.”