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the-blog-i-use-when-im-scared · 3 years ago

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So hey!! This is my first time writing in years, so any feedback you have is appreciated!! Other than that, please enjoy!!

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Believe

The builder and the redstoner were sat on a beach.

More specifically, Joel and Mumbo were sat on a beach.

A regular beach at that. A regular beach in a regular world - one only inhabited by Mumbo. Not one of his superflat, creative worlds that redstoners like himself so dearly coveted: but a genuine regular world he had discovered through some random world hopping and had decided to lockdown using some tricks Xisuma had taught him. It was handy to be friends with an admin.

One much question why though: why had Mumbo locked the world down? Well, he had locked it down as a way of escape and a way he could take a break undisturbed. Too many months had he and the rest of the Boatem crew been in the void, and even after emerging (or well, spontaneously forming in the sky and crashing down) into their new ‘Hermitcraft Season Nine’ world, he still felt as if though something wasn’t right. The others said that they felt a bit off, but that the feeling had quickly faded away as they all got back to their normal lives.

Except ‘normal’ couldn’t be used to describe them. Normal could be used to describe Mumbo though.

It was for that reason, he chalked it down to the weirdness of the void messing with his mind and leaving him in a constant state of stress and anxiety: a perfectly logical explanation for why he had decided to go live on his own for a bit.

Although… he wasn’t really on his own - not at the moment anyway. As mentioned earlier: Joel was here.

He was here because, well, Lizzie was out busy with Jimmy and some others and had nothing better to do. Which was somewhat of a lie - one Mumbo had seen right through, because initially, when he had invited Joel to hang out, the builder had suggested Mumbo come join him in their ‘Empires’ world to help him rebuild the Mezalean Matral Palace, or even the ‘Afterlife’ world that way the two could joke about what ‘origin’ Mumbo had ended up with.

Mumbo had refused though. Empires was a story world; one where the world builds false history and geography based upon the inhabitants mind in order to create a, well, story. And honestly? Mumbo had never been to a story world. He didn’t want to either. Whilst everyone was perfectly fine and safe (mostly anyway), he could clearly see how the world had affected everyone. Now none of them had been ‘normal’ per-say beforehand, all of them something that was vaguely not human (not fully anyway), but after their collective time their they had ended up retaining some weird traits from the ‘characters’ they had each played.

He didn’t know what would happen to him though. Mumbo was normal, unlike the rest, and was scared that if he entered the world he wouldn’t be able to leave: that it was simply just the abnormality of the others that allowed them to retain their true selves as well as they did, but without those ‘supernatural’ features what would happen to him? Would he be in the same position as everyone else? Would he simply not get written into the story? Would he lose himself? Forever grasping at memories of the man he used to be, unable to escape as everything he knew was forcibly changed around him: his friends only being able to look on with pity as he slowly became less and less the person they had grown to love…

It wasn’t a nice thought.

Don’t get him started on the Afterlife world either: having who and what you are fundamentally changed against your will everytime you died? No thanks.

So instead, Mumbo had offered to let Joel into his world so that they could spend some time together - coming up with a string of lies about needing some help with a building pallet rather that admitting the fact he was utterly terrified by stepping foot into one of the worlds Joel so dearly lov-

“Uh, you alright there Mumbo?” Joel inquisitively asked, clearly seeing the inner turmoil written across their face.

“Oh- uh yeah, yeah I am. I’m just thinking,”

“Anything good?”

“Just you.” No. No he did not just say that did he? Oh god, oh god out all of the response he could’ve given he went with that one what was he thinking? Aside from his guilt and fear surrounding his lies to Joel, which in all honesty probably would’ve just made the situation a lot more awkward-

“Ah. Well I’m flattered, but you know I’ve got a wife right?” Was the smooth and ironically not awkward response Joel gave.

“Oh no, not like that - I was more just thinking about how I kinda lied to you to get you to come here and Oh. Oh pants. I did not mean to say that…do you reckon I could pay you twelve bamboo to forget that I ever said that?”

“Mumbo.” Joel said, clearly testing the waters “what do you mean you lied to me to get me to come here?”

Welp. This was a rather big pickle he had found himself in now wasn’t it? He had two options really - to kick Joel and never speak to him again, or to be honest with Joel and have the ridiculously short man laugh at him. All in all though, with Grian around he was rather used to the latter and if months of falling in the void had taught him anything it was that honesty was sometimes the best policy.

“Well. I didn’t really need to talk to you about building palettes - I just…was too scared to go to your worlds because of how non-normal they are. So I did want to hang out - don’t get me wrong on that - I just wanted to hang out here, where I wouldn’t be worried about what would happen to me.”

“Well first of all. Rude. You shouldn’t be lying to people - although I am very flattered and I understand why you’d want to spend time with such a charming fellow such as myself!! Second- uh yes you did need someone to talk to you about building palettes: all that time in the void must’ve seriously affected your mind to think building a roof out of melon and quartz was a good idea. But third. Explain. What do you mean ‘non-normal’ and all that stuff about you being worried about yourself?” The Former Blazeborn and King of Mezalea inquired, confusion clear across his face.

“I mean, you know how you guys are all slightly off? Like not fully human I mean? Well I’m not like that - I’m just me; regular old Mumbo Jumbo, with no scales or wings or moss growing out of my skin and no worryingly good skills at making deals. I’m…normal I guess - and I didn’t know what would happen to me In one of your worlds due to how ‘weird’ they get at times and it had me kinda worried about what would hap-“

“MUMBO!” Joel exclaimed, “you’re rambling. So, uh, stop. Doing that I mean. I’m not really sure what my point was there, but you do need to stop worrying. If you were that nervous you should’ve just spoken up and been hone-“

“Well yeah but I didn’t want to offen-“

“Not done talking yet. Cause even if you didn’t want to offend me - which you wouldn’t of you silly man - you could’ve just asked one of the other ‘normals’ if they knew what would happen…Okay. Now you can speak.”

With the others blessing, Mumbo took a few moments to think before quickly letting out “but who would I have asked? Joe is too normal to be normal, and I know he’s always stayed rather vanilla, and whilst TFC may have been a bit more adventurous during his younger days he’s always too much of a recluse to catch for a proper conservation - and they’re the only ‘normal’ people I know so I didn’t really have anyone to ask, believe me the thought crossed my mind.”

“What about me?”

Silence. The two men looking at each other, one waiting for the other to speak and the other analysing what the other had said.

“What do you mean you?” Mumbo questioned, not meaning it to sound so harsh but unable to properly control his genuine shock and confusion.

“I mean, I’m as ‘normal’ as you. Though I generally prefer to just use the term human, as when you start saying ‘normal’ and ‘abnormal’ it starts sounding a bit bad y’know?”

“I guess…but wait- your saying you’re normal- or well, human?”

“Well duh,” the short man responded, as if it was the most oblivious thing in the world “do I need to repeat myself? I’m as human as you are, maybe more so”

“What do you mean?”

“Well what was all that about you becoming what you ate? Not very human if you ask me.”

“EXCUSE ME” Mumbo squawked indignantly “That is a perfectly human saying, ‘You are what you eat’!! It’s not my fault I was too human to take it literally- besides your barely human yourself. I mean your so non-human that, from what Lizzie told me, the demon terrorising your world couldn’t even touch you!!”

“HEY- that’s because there was no demon!! They were all imagining it as part of their story or whatever, it’s not my fault I was too human to not believe in it!!”

“Really, well what about all that corruption stuff that apparently happened? Plus, your in a story world - your meant to be part of the story!! The fact that you ignore that fact time after time is sooooo non-human!!”

“Alright well maybe neither of us are human!!”

“…”

Silence rang across the beach once more. Even the gulls taking their leave and the waves receding, almost as if they were too afraid to disturb the peace and quite between the two creatures sat on the beach.

“Joel?” Mumbo’s voice barely rung out, hardly a whisper yet filling the world with noise as the waves took the his as their queue to once again start.

“Yeah?” His voice equally quite, yet full of so many emotions that seemed impossible to all be conveyed at once.

“What are we?”

“I mean…I’m human”

“Are you?”

A pause. The two no longer staring at each other but rather looking across the ocean before them, watching the sun set. How odd. Neither of them took notice of the time before yet now it was such a prominent thing they could no longer ignore.

“…I want to be…I don’t know what I’d be otherwise…” their was fear in his voice, the usually confident man suddenly uncomfortable with himself. With being himself.

“I feel the same…all around me are such spectacularly unique people and I always looked up to them, thinking I could never be like them…but now that I might be more like them than I thought…it scares me…I suddenly like being the insignificant human…”

“Why can’t we be human then?”

“What on Earth do you mean?”

“I’ve believed I was human this long, and it’s always worked for me. Why can’t we believe for a bit longer?”

“Because that doesn’t make sense Joel!” Mumbo shot back, not meaning to sound as bitter as he did, “we can’t just be human because we believe we’re human…”

“Can’t we? I believed the demon in my world wasn’t real, and suddenly it wasn’t. Not for me anyway. You believed that your shapeshifting or whatever was simply just you taking that old saying too literally - and suddenly that’s what it was.”

“It isn’t anymore though?”

“Do you still believe it is?”

“I guess not…I just kind of pinned it on the Boatem Hole making me unstable or something, and that I just needed to eat something strong enough to stabilise myself - like a human soul: something that would make me human and would be…‘enough’ to stabilise me and stop my body from trying to complete, or well ‘fill’, itself with other things…that’s why I ended up stealing and eating Grians soul”

“Grian isn’t human though.”

Finally, the realisation sunk in. All the weird looks at his logic and hijinks made sense.

“No. He isn’t”

“Still worked though didn’t it?”

“…yes…”

“Because you believed it would.”

“…Y’know Joel, sometimes I hate you and your stupid logic,” Mumbo laughed; a sort of unhinged laugh but If Joel noticed then he didn’t comment.

“So that’s what I’m saying, why don’t we just believe we’re humans for a bit longer? It’s worked this far and we’ll probably have to work out what we are one day but…not today…”

“Would we have to tell any of the others?”

“Oh Jeremy no- this can be our secret.”

“…I like that.”

“Yeah.”

The silence that crept in after this was not awkward, nor was it tense or fearful. It was welcomed, and comfortable and seemed like it would never end. Until one of them spoke up

“I wish we could watch the sunset again.”

“You know what? I believe we can.”

And so the sunset on the beach again, for the second time that day.

But on the beach itself, the builder and the redstoner still sat, and whilst they were neither more or less human; they were more themselves. Whether they believed it or not.

#mumbo jumbo #joel smallishbeans #hermitcraft #empires smp #afterlife smp #alsmp #Boatem #sorry cause some of those are only mentioned #i’m bad at tagging #fanfic #my writing #:)

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