Wake Up - A Skephalo AU (see desc)

Chapter One - Ink Smudges

Darryl knew that he needed to get to bed for the sake of his soulmate, but he wanted to finish his video before he went to bed, since he knew his subscriber count was rising and he didn't want to disappoint any of them by taking forever to upload.

He went to start up another pot of coffee, but he ran out of the last of his supply with his last pot. Taking this as a sign to get to bed instead of half heartedly editing, Darryl went to save his progress on the video he was working on and wrote a note to himself to get more coffee.  

Out of habit, Darryl swiped his hand across the wet sharpie, as if swiping away eraser dust. "Muffin! They'll see..." whispered Darryl under his breath, as he noticed that the writing was faintly distinguishable on his hand under the heavy ink smudge. "Whatever, they're probably as sleep deprived as me and won't notice..." thought Darryl, as a wave of guilt about still being awake washed over him. 

Darryl grabbed a glass of water and an extra-strength sleep supplement, washed down the pill, and went to bed, not bothering to change out of his editing outfit (his pajamas). It was almost 1AM, and his soulmate was waiting for him to fall asleep.

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

Zak woke up, feeling refreshed but slightly groggy, and looked at the clock. Doing a bit of mental math, he realized he had been asleep for 16 hours. Thankfully, it was the weekend. and waking up well after lunch wasn't too much of a problem. 

As he went to eat something, Zak saw a smudge on his left hand. Rubbing his eyes in disbelief that he actually got something from his soulmate, even if it was probably a mistake. "No... to sel... get cof? No to sel get cof?" Zak decided to decipher the message after getting himself some food.

After eating a bowl of Reese's Puffs, Zak stared at the large black smudge on the side of his left hand. "Note to self get cof? What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Suddenly, he saw the message slowly smudge away. His soulmate was wiping away the message. "DAMN IT!" yelled Zak.

"What are you doing in your pajamas eating Reese's Puffs at noon, and why are you yelling?" said Mara, a cousin that was crashing at his place for a family reunion. Zak didn't mind, since Mara was always nice and was like another sister to Zak. Mara had already found her soulmate, and Zak was constantly asking her about advice about soulmates. 

"So you know how my soulmate has the sleep schedule of a med student? And how he never writes back?" Asked Zak. Mara nodded. "Well, they smudged their hand on some sharpie note they wrote to themself, and I was trying to figure out what it said. Then, their annoying ass decided to wipe it off as I was in the middle of trying to figure out what it said."

"First of all, language. But really, don't overthink it. If you really care so much, go on a walk and do something else and then try to come back to what you remember with a clean slate," advised Mara. Zak decided to take her advice and take a walk and edit a bit before coming back to the message. 

On his walk, Zak passed the small artisan coffee shop and a waft of matcha coffee blew into his face. "Wait... Note to self: get cof... get coffee! That's why they never go to sleep, they just survive off coffee!" Zak thought to himself.

Zak ran to the nearest CVS and bought a pen to write to his soulmate. They might not respond back, but at least they'll see it. Without thinking, Zak wrote on his arm:

STOP DRINKING COFFEE BEFORE BED I NEED SLEEP TOO

"That should be good enough." Zak tucked the pen into his hoodie pocket and started walking home to tell Mara the news. 

Word Count: 686

Feel free to give me suggestions/criticism about the story so far, this is my first fanfic. thank you for taking time to read my story! <3