I WENT(Z) THERE, GUYS
ok guys i know that office fic wasn't the greatest thing i've ever written
here i will make up for it though don't worry
this is a work of incredible literary genius. disarm-d gave me a prompt and i complied.
the wisdom of the deep
brendon gen. pg. OH YEAH.
Brendon has his face smooshed up against the glass, making stupid faces at the fish. "Hey, look," he says, not to anyone in particular. "This one likes me." He raises his arm and a gape-mouthed fish follows it up. When he drops it, the fish swims down after his hand. "I'm the fish-master, guys."
"Yeah, but look where that got Aquaman," Jon says. "Living under the ocean, hardly ever getting to do anything."
"He could talk to dolphins," Brendon says. "Dolphins are pretty fucking smart; I bet they could teach us a thing or two. I want to know the wisdom of the dolphins, Jon Walker."
"Oh my god, what is he talking about now?" Ryan says.
"Look, look, Ryan, this fish follows my hand. He's my little buddy. My little fishy slave buddy."
"We should get out of here," Ryan says. "I just had an eight year old propose to me."
"If only Pete was here," Brendon says. "He'd know what to do. It'd probably be illegal, though."
"Shut up," Ryan says.
Brendon says, "Ryan, what are your thoughts on the wisdom of the dolphins?"
"My thoughts are that you should shut up and we should go back to the Wentz' place."
*
Later, they go to Sea World.
There's this big pool with a cement barrier around it. If you lean over, you can -- sometimes, if one's near enough -- touch the dolphins. And feed them, if the little hut 'round back is open and selling fish just then.
It's ten minutes. "Guys, guys, can we wait?"
"You're a vegetarian," Ryan says. "Doesn't that go against your philosophy? Feeding them fish?"
"Nah," Brendon says. "Dolphins can't help it. I forgive them."
"Still," Ryan says. Jon's wandered off somewhere. Spencer's sitting around banging on some steel drums not too far off. There's some little kids joining in, and Brendon's attention is torn between watching him and watching the dolphins. He settles on the dolphins because, if nothing else, he can just listen to the steel drum shenanigans.
"Hey, guys, they're gonna open the shack up in a second. It's motherfuckin' lunchtime, seriously," someone says. Brendon turns around again, and sure enough, there is a little bit of a line forming in front of the shack. The big metal shutters in front of the windows are drawn up.
Brendon buys, like, three of the little paper baskets of fish even though it's tough to hold that many.
"Seriously," Ryan says. "Seriously."
"I don't think I need to tolerate your negativity, Ross," Brendon says. "I'm above that. I've got a positive mental attitude." He grins, and he would latch onto Ryan and maybe punch him in the side or something stupid like that, but he's got all these dead fish to deal with.
"C'mere, dolphins," Brendon says, dangling a fish over the edge of the pool. A dolphin comes to snap at it, and he pulls it just out of reach. "Haha, this is awesome."
"You're a fucking bitch." Brendon frowns, because he's pretty sure Ryan didn't say that. He looks around. No one else did, either. He holds another fish out, yanks it back, then finally tosses it into the pool for a dolphin to gobble down. "Seriously, that is such a bitch move."
"Hey!" Brendon says. "You're a dolphin, shut up. What can you do about it, huh?"
The same dolphin he's teased twice now rolls on its side and stares up at him. Brendon stares back.
Ryan says, "The fuck are you doing?"
"Having a staring contest," Brendon says.
"You're gonna lose," the dolphin says. "For real. Just give up." It rolls back around, flipping its tail to splash Brendon and the hordes of children lining the side of the pool. A little girl starts bawling because her pretty little dress just got wet.
The sad part is, Brendon blinked.
Ryan says, "You were having a staring contest with a dolphin?"
"He was cussing me out, man." He says, "Seriously, what happened to the wisdom of the dolphins?"
He tosses out some more fish to dolphins who swim by, snickering at him before actually eating the fish.
"They're talking about me," Brendon says. "Amongst themselves. They're pretty immature."
One old dolphin, from the other side -- it's letting a little kid basically drop all his fish into its mouth -- says, "You fuck with us and expect wisdom? That's usually not how it works, man, for real." Then it laughs. And swallows another fish.
"So wait, wait, is this why you guys are always smiling, because you're making fun of us?" Brendon says.
"Eh, sometimes," yet another dolphin says. "Whatever, man, we got it pretty easy. It's sweet. Yo, yo, gimme a fish, man, I mean it. Right here. Right here." The dolphin sticks its head out of the water, mouth open expectantly.
Brendon says, "I should throw you a fucking guitar pick."
"Hey, low blow," the dolphin says. "Just because we can't rock out."
Ryan says, "Fuck this, I'm going to go find Jon."
Brendon throws the dolphin a couple fish.
"Thanks, bro."
All this to the soundtrack of Spencer and some little kids banging away on the steel drums.
*
Brendon says, "Guys, we gotta go to Greece."
"We're playing a festival there this summer, Brendon," Ryan says.
"No. No. Like, now. They have dolphins there."
"They have dolphins at fucking Sea World. Shut up."
Spencer says, "Why do you need Greek dolphins? Do they taste better?"
"No! You're horrible people. No. Just, wild dolphins! I bet they have more wisdom. The ones at Sea World were in captivity. They were just stir-crazy, is all. They didn't have the wisdom of the deep."
"Oh, okay," Spencer says.
Ryan says, "Don't make me write a song about this, Brendon, don't make me."
"Greece," Brendon says. He says, "Jon Walker, you're with me, right?"
"No."
Brendon says, hopefully, "Spencer?"
Spencer stares at him.
"Is that a yes?" Brendon says.
"No, really not at all," Spencer says.
"Oh."
*
Brendon doesn't want to go to Greece alone. He manages to come up with a nice little compromise.
*
The boat is skipping over the waves, and Brendon is totally ignoring whatever it is the guide is telling them about whales. All he knows is, someone told him that sometimes dolphins will hang out with whales, and that was enough to get him to try to drag everyone along on a whale-watching tour.
("Sorry," Jon had said. "Me and Cassie had something to do that afternoon."
"Like what?"
"Uh," Jon had said. "Like sex?"
"You have no sense of adventure, Jon Walker."
"Well, we were thinking about using handcuffs," Jon says.)
(Ryan had just laughed at him then said something vague about a hot tub, Keltie, Ashlee Simpson, and Pete Wentz. Brendon didn't bother to ask. He wanted to know even less than he wanted to know about Jon Walker's sex habits.)
So it's just him and Spencer, because Spencer couldn't come up with an excuse fast enough. Also, Brendon's pretty sure he and Ryan have some kind of bet. Whatever. Brendon doesn't mind. He leans over the side of the boat, eyes closed and smiling at the wind and salt spray.
"Hey, don't fall off," Spencer says, hooking a finger through one of the beltloops in the back of his pants. "Ryan'd kill me."
"I'm not gonna," Brendon says. "Even if I did, I would totally be saved by wild dolphins. Wild dolphins save people all the time, you know, and they'd, like, have to save me since I can talk to them."
"Oh, uh-huh," Spencer says.
The boat slows in open water. There's some splashing off in the distance. Brendon closes his eyes and listens.
And he hears -- singing. It's whalesong, yeah, and there's not exactly words to it, but he gets it now. Every now and then there's a bit of chatter from a dolphin breaking the surface somewhere far off; even in the air, their voices carry.
A gray whale surfaces right next to the boat.
"Hi!" Brendon says, waving frantically. Everyone else is snapping pictures and gawking; a few reach out to touch its side. "I'm here to learn the wisdom of the deep!"
"Whoa, whoa," the whale says, staying alongside the boat. "That's some trippy shit. One of the little dudes is talking to me. Man. Man. Guys," and the whale dives for a moment before resurfacing.
"I heard that," Brendon says. "Are you gonna -- is there anything you want in trade for wisdom? I can get you stuff."
"No, man, life's about the journey. It's about being. We don't need anything, man, we got the ocean," the whale says. "Seriously, man."
Brendon says, "Spencer, Spencer, whales are such stoners."
Spencer's taking pictures. "What?"
"I was gonna like, see if they wanted anything in exchange for the wisdom of the deep but then he started being all wise at me anyway. Whales don't need anything!"
"Except krill," the gray whale says, contemplatively. "Food's always good. I'm kinda hungry right now, dude, I got the munchies. I'll see if anybody else wants to hang. Man, whoa, little dude was talking to me, that's so weird." The whale keeps mumbling to itself as it dives deep. A few more whales surface not far off, turning a curious eye to the boat.
"Yo, little dude, Mr Fishticuffs says you were talkin' or something? Can you understand me?" The whale slows down its speech. "Do. You. Know. How. To talk? Little. Dude? Nod. If. You. Do."
"Why would I nod?" Brendon shouts. "Wouldn't saying yes prove it better?"
"Yeah, okay, say yes if you can talk," the whale says.
Brendon says, "Spencer. Spencer. This is not all I had hoped and dreamed for."
"Well, I think the secret of the universe was kind of a tall order, since they're just animals," Spencer says. "Really smart ones, but still."
"Hey," Brendon says. "I wasn't looking for the secrets of the universe! Just some wisdom. The wisdom of the deep."
"Wisdom of the deep is, unless you're one of those crazy Moby Dick types, stay away from the squid, they will mess you up," yet another whale says from the opposite side of the boat. The boat tilts as everyone races over to that side to photograph it and gawk. "That's our number one lesson, little dude. Listen well. You're way too small, a giant squid would totally mess you up, like, seriously, total mission fail. It'd suck pretty hard."
"Oh," Brendon says.
Then the whales start having a deep philosophical discussion with each other about the nature of life and death and krill, and Brendon stops paying attention before too long because it's kind of confusing and he likes the squid thing.
It's very concise.
"Yeah," Spencer says. "I think that's some good wisdom. It's very concise."
"Exactly," Brendon says, properly vindicated.
Spencer says, "So are you done looking for dolphins now, or what?"
"No," Brendon says.
"Keep fighting the good fight, then, Urie." Spencer rolls his eyes, but Brendon decides to take his words as encouragement anyway.
*
As it turns out, Brendon can understand mollusks, too. He figures, they may not have spines, but maybe they have some more wisdom of the deep.
Every squid he meets -- and he keeps going to aquariums -- he makes sure it's not a giant squid, and he makes sure not to fight them or anything, because he trusts the whales. It's the octopi that are really smart, though, and they tend to talk about really deep shit that Brendon doesn't quite understand.
Spencer doesn't get it either, so Brendon doesn't feel as bad about not getting it.
Brendon parrots some of what the octopi were saying back at Ryan, who replies like he knows what he's talking about. Brendon tries to get an explanation out of him, but that's when Ryan's clever ruse falls apart and he ends up admitting that he's just really good at making shit up.
Brendon's pretty smug about this one.
*
Sea lions are pretty awesome, as it turns out, but he can't convince any to run away from wherever they live and be his pet. Not the sea lions at the zoo, not the wild sea lions, not any of them.
Brendon's been hoping he could have a pet to have shenanigans with, just like in all those movies he watched as a kid.
He ends up getting a snail, because he can talk to marine snails, too, even if they're not that interesting.
The fatal flaw in his plan is that he just grabs a garden snail, and for some reason he can only talk to aquatic mollusks. He's pretty disappointed.
He takes care of Hubert anyway. It's not Hubert's fault that he was born in the wrong place at the wrong time.
here i will make up for it though don't worry
this is a work of incredible literary genius. disarm-d gave me a prompt and i complied.
the wisdom of the deep
brendon gen. pg. OH YEAH.
Brendon has his face smooshed up against the glass, making stupid faces at the fish. "Hey, look," he says, not to anyone in particular. "This one likes me." He raises his arm and a gape-mouthed fish follows it up. When he drops it, the fish swims down after his hand. "I'm the fish-master, guys."
"Yeah, but look where that got Aquaman," Jon says. "Living under the ocean, hardly ever getting to do anything."
"He could talk to dolphins," Brendon says. "Dolphins are pretty fucking smart; I bet they could teach us a thing or two. I want to know the wisdom of the dolphins, Jon Walker."
"Oh my god, what is he talking about now?" Ryan says.
"Look, look, Ryan, this fish follows my hand. He's my little buddy. My little fishy slave buddy."
"We should get out of here," Ryan says. "I just had an eight year old propose to me."
"If only Pete was here," Brendon says. "He'd know what to do. It'd probably be illegal, though."
"Shut up," Ryan says.
Brendon says, "Ryan, what are your thoughts on the wisdom of the dolphins?"
"My thoughts are that you should shut up and we should go back to the Wentz' place."
*
Later, they go to Sea World.
There's this big pool with a cement barrier around it. If you lean over, you can -- sometimes, if one's near enough -- touch the dolphins. And feed them, if the little hut 'round back is open and selling fish just then.
It's ten minutes. "Guys, guys, can we wait?"
"You're a vegetarian," Ryan says. "Doesn't that go against your philosophy? Feeding them fish?"
"Nah," Brendon says. "Dolphins can't help it. I forgive them."
"Still," Ryan says. Jon's wandered off somewhere. Spencer's sitting around banging on some steel drums not too far off. There's some little kids joining in, and Brendon's attention is torn between watching him and watching the dolphins. He settles on the dolphins because, if nothing else, he can just listen to the steel drum shenanigans.
"Hey, guys, they're gonna open the shack up in a second. It's motherfuckin' lunchtime, seriously," someone says. Brendon turns around again, and sure enough, there is a little bit of a line forming in front of the shack. The big metal shutters in front of the windows are drawn up.
Brendon buys, like, three of the little paper baskets of fish even though it's tough to hold that many.
"Seriously," Ryan says. "Seriously."
"I don't think I need to tolerate your negativity, Ross," Brendon says. "I'm above that. I've got a positive mental attitude." He grins, and he would latch onto Ryan and maybe punch him in the side or something stupid like that, but he's got all these dead fish to deal with.
"C'mere, dolphins," Brendon says, dangling a fish over the edge of the pool. A dolphin comes to snap at it, and he pulls it just out of reach. "Haha, this is awesome."
"You're a fucking bitch." Brendon frowns, because he's pretty sure Ryan didn't say that. He looks around. No one else did, either. He holds another fish out, yanks it back, then finally tosses it into the pool for a dolphin to gobble down. "Seriously, that is such a bitch move."
"Hey!" Brendon says. "You're a dolphin, shut up. What can you do about it, huh?"
The same dolphin he's teased twice now rolls on its side and stares up at him. Brendon stares back.
Ryan says, "The fuck are you doing?"
"Having a staring contest," Brendon says.
"You're gonna lose," the dolphin says. "For real. Just give up." It rolls back around, flipping its tail to splash Brendon and the hordes of children lining the side of the pool. A little girl starts bawling because her pretty little dress just got wet.
The sad part is, Brendon blinked.
Ryan says, "You were having a staring contest with a dolphin?"
"He was cussing me out, man." He says, "Seriously, what happened to the wisdom of the dolphins?"
He tosses out some more fish to dolphins who swim by, snickering at him before actually eating the fish.
"They're talking about me," Brendon says. "Amongst themselves. They're pretty immature."
One old dolphin, from the other side -- it's letting a little kid basically drop all his fish into its mouth -- says, "You fuck with us and expect wisdom? That's usually not how it works, man, for real." Then it laughs. And swallows another fish.
"So wait, wait, is this why you guys are always smiling, because you're making fun of us?" Brendon says.
"Eh, sometimes," yet another dolphin says. "Whatever, man, we got it pretty easy. It's sweet. Yo, yo, gimme a fish, man, I mean it. Right here. Right here." The dolphin sticks its head out of the water, mouth open expectantly.
Brendon says, "I should throw you a fucking guitar pick."
"Hey, low blow," the dolphin says. "Just because we can't rock out."
Ryan says, "Fuck this, I'm going to go find Jon."
Brendon throws the dolphin a couple fish.
"Thanks, bro."
All this to the soundtrack of Spencer and some little kids banging away on the steel drums.
*
Brendon says, "Guys, we gotta go to Greece."
"We're playing a festival there this summer, Brendon," Ryan says.
"No. No. Like, now. They have dolphins there."
"They have dolphins at fucking Sea World. Shut up."
Spencer says, "Why do you need Greek dolphins? Do they taste better?"
"No! You're horrible people. No. Just, wild dolphins! I bet they have more wisdom. The ones at Sea World were in captivity. They were just stir-crazy, is all. They didn't have the wisdom of the deep."
"Oh, okay," Spencer says.
Ryan says, "Don't make me write a song about this, Brendon, don't make me."
"Greece," Brendon says. He says, "Jon Walker, you're with me, right?"
"No."
Brendon says, hopefully, "Spencer?"
Spencer stares at him.
"Is that a yes?" Brendon says.
"No, really not at all," Spencer says.
"Oh."
*
Brendon doesn't want to go to Greece alone. He manages to come up with a nice little compromise.
*
The boat is skipping over the waves, and Brendon is totally ignoring whatever it is the guide is telling them about whales. All he knows is, someone told him that sometimes dolphins will hang out with whales, and that was enough to get him to try to drag everyone along on a whale-watching tour.
("Sorry," Jon had said. "Me and Cassie had something to do that afternoon."
"Like what?"
"Uh," Jon had said. "Like sex?"
"You have no sense of adventure, Jon Walker."
"Well, we were thinking about using handcuffs," Jon says.)
(Ryan had just laughed at him then said something vague about a hot tub, Keltie, Ashlee Simpson, and Pete Wentz. Brendon didn't bother to ask. He wanted to know even less than he wanted to know about Jon Walker's sex habits.)
So it's just him and Spencer, because Spencer couldn't come up with an excuse fast enough. Also, Brendon's pretty sure he and Ryan have some kind of bet. Whatever. Brendon doesn't mind. He leans over the side of the boat, eyes closed and smiling at the wind and salt spray.
"Hey, don't fall off," Spencer says, hooking a finger through one of the beltloops in the back of his pants. "Ryan'd kill me."
"I'm not gonna," Brendon says. "Even if I did, I would totally be saved by wild dolphins. Wild dolphins save people all the time, you know, and they'd, like, have to save me since I can talk to them."
"Oh, uh-huh," Spencer says.
The boat slows in open water. There's some splashing off in the distance. Brendon closes his eyes and listens.
And he hears -- singing. It's whalesong, yeah, and there's not exactly words to it, but he gets it now. Every now and then there's a bit of chatter from a dolphin breaking the surface somewhere far off; even in the air, their voices carry.
A gray whale surfaces right next to the boat.
"Hi!" Brendon says, waving frantically. Everyone else is snapping pictures and gawking; a few reach out to touch its side. "I'm here to learn the wisdom of the deep!"
"Whoa, whoa," the whale says, staying alongside the boat. "That's some trippy shit. One of the little dudes is talking to me. Man. Man. Guys," and the whale dives for a moment before resurfacing.
"I heard that," Brendon says. "Are you gonna -- is there anything you want in trade for wisdom? I can get you stuff."
"No, man, life's about the journey. It's about being. We don't need anything, man, we got the ocean," the whale says. "Seriously, man."
Brendon says, "Spencer, Spencer, whales are such stoners."
Spencer's taking pictures. "What?"
"I was gonna like, see if they wanted anything in exchange for the wisdom of the deep but then he started being all wise at me anyway. Whales don't need anything!"
"Except krill," the gray whale says, contemplatively. "Food's always good. I'm kinda hungry right now, dude, I got the munchies. I'll see if anybody else wants to hang. Man, whoa, little dude was talking to me, that's so weird." The whale keeps mumbling to itself as it dives deep. A few more whales surface not far off, turning a curious eye to the boat.
"Yo, little dude, Mr Fishticuffs says you were talkin' or something? Can you understand me?" The whale slows down its speech. "Do. You. Know. How. To talk? Little. Dude? Nod. If. You. Do."
"Why would I nod?" Brendon shouts. "Wouldn't saying yes prove it better?"
"Yeah, okay, say yes if you can talk," the whale says.
Brendon says, "Spencer. Spencer. This is not all I had hoped and dreamed for."
"Well, I think the secret of the universe was kind of a tall order, since they're just animals," Spencer says. "Really smart ones, but still."
"Hey," Brendon says. "I wasn't looking for the secrets of the universe! Just some wisdom. The wisdom of the deep."
"Wisdom of the deep is, unless you're one of those crazy Moby Dick types, stay away from the squid, they will mess you up," yet another whale says from the opposite side of the boat. The boat tilts as everyone races over to that side to photograph it and gawk. "That's our number one lesson, little dude. Listen well. You're way too small, a giant squid would totally mess you up, like, seriously, total mission fail. It'd suck pretty hard."
"Oh," Brendon says.
Then the whales start having a deep philosophical discussion with each other about the nature of life and death and krill, and Brendon stops paying attention before too long because it's kind of confusing and he likes the squid thing.
It's very concise.
"Yeah," Spencer says. "I think that's some good wisdom. It's very concise."
"Exactly," Brendon says, properly vindicated.
Spencer says, "So are you done looking for dolphins now, or what?"
"No," Brendon says.
"Keep fighting the good fight, then, Urie." Spencer rolls his eyes, but Brendon decides to take his words as encouragement anyway.
*
As it turns out, Brendon can understand mollusks, too. He figures, they may not have spines, but maybe they have some more wisdom of the deep.
Every squid he meets -- and he keeps going to aquariums -- he makes sure it's not a giant squid, and he makes sure not to fight them or anything, because he trusts the whales. It's the octopi that are really smart, though, and they tend to talk about really deep shit that Brendon doesn't quite understand.
Spencer doesn't get it either, so Brendon doesn't feel as bad about not getting it.
Brendon parrots some of what the octopi were saying back at Ryan, who replies like he knows what he's talking about. Brendon tries to get an explanation out of him, but that's when Ryan's clever ruse falls apart and he ends up admitting that he's just really good at making shit up.
Brendon's pretty smug about this one.
*
Sea lions are pretty awesome, as it turns out, but he can't convince any to run away from wherever they live and be his pet. Not the sea lions at the zoo, not the wild sea lions, not any of them.
Brendon's been hoping he could have a pet to have shenanigans with, just like in all those movies he watched as a kid.
He ends up getting a snail, because he can talk to marine snails, too, even if they're not that interesting.
The fatal flaw in his plan is that he just grabs a garden snail, and for some reason he can only talk to aquatic mollusks. He's pretty disappointed.
He takes care of Hubert anyway. It's not Hubert's fault that he was born in the wrong place at the wrong time.