#life series 4

[shepscapades]

In which maybe the weight of how everyone treats Jimmy is too heavy to separate between worlds, and in which Jimmy carries the weight until he can’t and decides to do something about it.

(And in which someone reminds him that he’s still loved, if only by one person.)

[nerdyenby]

Thinking about how Third Life was about suspense. Something is coming, we don’t know what or when, but it is on the horizon. You build a kingdom on shifting sand, knowing the ground is unstable but praying it will stay. It never does. The world was always going to crumble, we knew that from the start. The end was written before the beginning, we’re just here to watch how it happens.

Last Life was about dread. After seeing everything you built destroyed — with the image of your home on fire fresh in your mind — the world is darker from the start. You make bonds knowing they will break. You build kingdoms knowing they will fall. You create knowing destruction awaits. There is no peace, only the ever-building burden of the knowledge that this time won’t end any differently.

Double life was about fate. The illusion of choice is gone: you are bound to another human being, you have no control whether you live or die. You can try to protect them in order to protect yourself, or you can push them away - after all, what real duty do you have to each other anyway? Still you know that when it ends, it ends together. You cannot escape them, but somehow you still end up dying alone.

Limited Life is about inevitability. No matter what happens, no matter what you do right or wrong, you have an expiration date. No one is making it out alive. We’re here, watching the timer tick down, knowing this only ends one way. We’ve done this song and dance before, it’s only a question of what happens before the timer hits zero.

[owtenen]

something about joel going completely insane after Jimmy permadies. something about how joel refuses to accept that he’s dying and fights till the end. something about how maybe. just maybe. he didn’t want to see jimmy in the afterlife without trying to avenge his death

[oh-snapperss]

<Join Game?>

Etho stares at the message on his communicator until his eyes are nearly blurry. No. No. No. No. If he thinks too hard, his very blood is in flames, burning away himself and Joel. If he thinks too hard, Joel’s triumphant scream pierces the air along with the axe buried in his chest. If he thinks too hard, the scars on his arms turn back to the flame they once were, setting his clothing alight as he screams in agony. 

But They want blood, and who is he to deny Them? Who is he to deny protection to those he couldn’t save before? (He knows he’ll betray them to live anyway.) 

<Ethoslab joined the game>

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<Join Game?>

“They want blood… gladly,” Grian’s lips twist up into a sick grin. He’s far beyond caring, and has been since he scrubbed the blood of his lover from his fingernails under the desolate, unforgiving desert sun. 

“Grian?” 

The sick smile disappears as he’s faced with the ghost that has haunted him daily since the beginning. 

“Scar.” 

“One more time?” Scar wears his own tired grin, just as sick as Grian’s, and far more bitter. 

“One more time.” 

(Is this the last time?)

<Grian joined the game

<GoodtimeswithScar joined the game> 

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<Join Game?>

“Wh-now? Are you serious?” Jimmy drops the pile of wood he’d been carrying through the doorway of his empty town. “Right now?” 

There’s no response–there never is, and hasn’t been in months. All that’s left to keep him company are the tumbleweeds, blowing past him, and the mocking, empty vacation houses he’d invited the others to build in the hopes someone would come keep him company.

“Least I won’t be alone, if I go…” Somewhere, there’s laughter, a call from his rancher and respect he’d forgotten he could have. 

That’s all it takes. 

<SolidarityGaming joined the game>

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<Join Game?>

“Oh, for goodness sake!” 

He tries to ignore the message for several hours, although it taunts him with every glance down to the communicator, seeing others log off Hermitcraft. Etho. Grian. Scar. Tango. Cleo. Ren. Impulse. 

No, no, not this time. He doesn’t want to go, not when he’s sure Impulse has a matching scar through his chest where Bdubs’ sword betrayed him twice-albeit, on accident the final time. Etho’s long gone–of course he’d go–and Cleo, for reasons well beyond him. Far more hours pass, before he breaks–

“...fine!” 

(He never really had a choice. He’s not proven himself beyond failing those he swore loyalty to, and he won’t rest until then.) 

<Bdoubleo100 joined the game>

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<Join Game?>

Sharp laughter fills the air, like electricity buzzing, and then-

<SmallishBeans joined the game>

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<Join Game?>

“No thanks, I’m good mate!” Mumbo shakes his head, already turning back to the flooring of his definitely full vault. 

(Although…) 

…

--------------------------------------

<Join Game?> 

“Of course, of course..” Scott chuckles slowly, as if in on some joke that nobody else could ever understand. Like others… he’s far beyond caring, and has been since the lightning arched through the trees to take him despite his supposed victory. But first… he takes his time. Makes himself a drink, watches the sun set orange. After all… the next sunset could be red. 

As the sun dips below the horizon, he turns away. 

<Smajor1995 joined the game> 

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<Join Game?> 

It’s as if the fear and rage she’d felt for weeks before comes back in an instant, electrifying her. She’s typed her answer before she can even think twice about it, half blinded. Why? Why? Why did he do that? 

<PearlescentMoon joined the game>

“Hello, Scott,” she grins up at the rising sun, at the unmarred landscape around her. “Would you like to play a game?” 

[tunastime]

On Life Series Season 4

for those of you who voted for jimmy and tango: this is for you.

also known as: I have very complex thoughts about rancher reunion for season 4 and monolith is a group of known enablers. 

(1545 words)

It’s the end of the world. Or, at least, it feels like it.

The grass is green and the sky is orange and red and Jimmy Solidarity is alone. He’s standing, half-stilted, leaning hard against the weight of the sword in his hands. It’s stone, just like the building. The rough cobbles form a tower. A defense. It’s all he’s got, here, in another death game. He’s got that, and another chance to die for nothing.

He tries to breathe normally, like he’s taught himself to keep level headed. It’s not doing much, considering that Jimmy feels something odd and aching boiling over in his chest. He feels like an unwatched pot, tipping over his lid, and his arms shake with it. It’s a feeling that pools in his wrists and the back of his knees, sharp and prickly. He can taste something vile in the back of his mouth. Words, laughter, bile. He isn’t sure.

It’s darkening. His building is on fire.

“Jimmy!”

It’s a voice he’s memorized. Gravel on the low notes. Whispers in the middle. Footsteps in the dirt. He thinks there might be blood under his nails, but he thinks it might also be soil, because nothing smells like blood and nothing about him stings. The voice that cuts through the dusk is too familiar, too safe. He staggers.

Jimmy’s house isn’t on fire, he is. He feels it coiling in his chest, licking at the inside of his lungs, hot, too hot, or maybe not hot enough. If he breathes out he fears it might be smoke. His hands are shaking. He swallows. He can’t make his lungs inflate.

Part of him thinks he deserves this, to know he’s mocked from the start, because he can remember the words about his house, about the rumors around him, he can remember the anger boiling up to an overflow. His house is burning. He made it out of stone this time. That wouldn’t burn, he thought. But his hands are hot. There were words he said, isn’t there? Things that punched out of him as soon as he saw a familiar face that had to crane to meet his eye again. What was it that he said, when he ran into Scar first? Joel? When they told him good luck both times? Was it something cruel to match the curling in his chest? Was it the brief glee on Joel’s face, knowing he got under his skin, that made him snap back? Who else was there?

There are other words being said to him.

What happened back there? I’ve been looking everywhere for you. Someone said you nearly punched Joel? And Scar? Jimmy—

Feet on the grass. He’s not there though, on that hillside with Joel, not anymore. He’s staring wide-eyed into bright red eyes, arms stretched out, a perspective that forces him to look at only him, at Tango in front of him. 

It’s Tango, terrified. It’s Tango, and Jimmy can swear he can feel Tango’s heart thudding away helplessly in his own chest. It’s Tango, and for a moment he feels like his hands are burning and that the noise is deafening around him. 

Except there is no noise. He fights to get forward, lands himself into Tango’s shoulder, hears the audible thud and oof as he does, as Tango digs his heels into the earth and refuses to be pushed aside. Tango pushes him back, trying to hold him steady.

“Jimmy—that wasn’t—this isn’t you,” Tango says, and his voice borders on confusion, on despair. Jimmy makes a noise somewhere half in his chest in response. “Snap out of it.”

“He’s just—he—he’s—” Jimmy struggles for a moment, squirming against the arm that holds his elbow. He didn’t see Joel like Tango did, scared and alone. He was the sneer over a wall Joel built. He was feeling himself picked up by the scruff, unable to fight back. He was watching a town crumble and it wasn’t even his fault. He was bleeding out on a bridge and someone was laughing. It’s gloating, it’s—someone is laughing and it isn’t Tango and it isn’t him. 

Jimmy struggles. Why is Tango stopping him? Isn’t this what he should be doing? Standing up for himself? Jimmy deflates. Wouldn’t Tango be proud of him? Isn’t this what he wants? Every nerve in his body feels like it’s lit up, hair standing on end. Something watches (it isn’t Tango, and it isn’t him.)

“This isn’t you,” Tango manages. 

Jimmy feels himself pushed back, but the hands are firm on his shoulders as his arms start to ache. His shoulder feels aflame where Tango holds it, warmth spreading from one point of contact through his muscles. He’s looking at Tango now, just for a fraction of a second before looking away, not able to hold his eye. His vision isn’t clear. It goes fuzzy around the edges, unfocused like he might be drifting off into space. He’s seeing bright red eyes under the brim of a hat. He’s seeing blue flames across the way. There’s someone in the pocket of his side and he is safe. 

He takes what feels like the first breath of air in a long minute and his mouth doesn’t taste like smoke. He feels a hand peel from his shoulder, something that slides up to his face. It cradles his jaw in one warm palm, then two, fingers curling around the shell of his ears. He blinks, even has his vision blurs completely. The back of his throat burns. He feels like his nose is pinched shut. He swallows, and it takes everything in him to focus on the warmth of the hands over his cheeks.

“Jimmy, look at me. Look at me,” Tango’s voice tugs at him, firm. He lets his eyes drift back to a face that he knows. Tango’s eyes are wide, eyebrows upturned, lips in a fine line. He’s swaying, maybe not on purpose. He’s shivering, maybe not on purpose. The sky was never burning, it was just red. Jimmy feels his weight start to drop. It’s Tango. It’s Tango.

“It’s me, it’s Tango, your rancher,” he watches the wisp of a smile form on Tango’s face, through the wobble in his voice. He inhales sharply. “Remember?”

Cows! a voice calls from the doorway as Jimmy tries to circumnavigate the small herd chewing at the bundle of hay in his hand, on the sleeve of his shirt. This was many months ago. This was the first instance. There comes a day where Jimmy will sit a little too close and Tango will decide to slot himself in the curve of his arm at night and soon enough one bed was enough space and too much all at once. Hands fitting hands. Arms fitting around shoulders. We’ll rebuild, his voice says, to wipe the look of desolation from his rancher’s face as they stand in the broken husk of a house. It was never the home, anyway, was it? It was the people inside.

Something in Jimmy’s chest twists the strings of his heart in a knot. He sees Tango expression wavers as he shuts his eyes, swaying forward. He only manages a breath before it breaks.

Jimmy collapses into his arms and the smell of burnt matches is like coming home.

Tango sags with him, sinking them to the ground. Jimmy presses his face into the side of his neck, and safe, held close, he cries. It’s a horrible sound, one that pulls from him brokenly as he buries himself in Tango’s arms. He chokes on the sob.

“It’s empty,” he says, and the words are haunting and choked into his shoulder. Tango holds to the back of his neck, to the base of his spine, even as Jimmy’s hands tangle uselessly in his sweater. It’s all Jimmy can manage. He repeats it in the inhale that he takes: It’s empty. I’m alone.

Tumble Town is empty, and he knows it’s his fault.

Or maybe it isn't. Because what else could he have done, except convince them to stay? What could’ve been done that hadn’t been already, that he hadn’t already tried? What could he have done that would’ve made any difference, anyway, besides leaving himself?

Jimmy cries. Tango’s hands run up the base of his spine. They pull Jimmy to him, holding him close, holding him tight. Tango’s voice is a barely audible thing, through the gasps for air, between the calculated inhales and exhales Tango tries to have him copy. He repeats it like a mantra, pressed into the side of his head, into his hairline: “You’re not alone, I’m here.”

I’m here now and I won’t leave. Your home won’t be empty and your hearth won’t be cold. Your arms won’t be empty and your chest won’t be cold. I’m here.

Tango holds him in the grass and the dirt. Even when the sky is no longer pink and orange, even when the stars have started to peek out in the blue that blends with the fringes of sunset.

If only by one person, he is loved. 

Jimmy breathes.

[khaotickiri]

Reblog this and spread it around please!

[quaranmine]

record scratch. guys i was thinking of the implication of time as a thing in the new life series and i was like what about time travel? and the thought struck me.

what if the map is like....previous places of importance. instead of a blank map like always, it's got buildings and locations from 3rd life, last life, double life, etc. like an empty world that's seen so much horror being populated once again by people just trying to survive. can you imagine new sets of alliances taking shelter in the crastle, for example? the holes in the buildings from prior explosions? it's like the map itself would be haunted.

[sheliesshattered]

the entirety of Trafficblr right now:

[crimson-roots]

thank you to joel and jimmy. for going around telling everyone you are the "bad boys of the server" and immediately becoming INFINITELY lamer than whatever the hell was going on last season

[knittedslug]

how did i never notice this in scars first limlife episode

[visual-raven]

Ok I did a hunger games simulation for the members of limited life so "predict" who will win. This is just for fun but here's how it goes:

1) SolidarityGaming dies due to not sharing supplies with his fellow bad boy smallishbeans. Joel ends up killing him for goods (not likely cause bad boys for life and keep inventory is on)

2) Smajor and Littlewood run away from enemies on the tree tops. Both are low on hearts but fall to their death.

3) Scar is poisoned, and someone finishes him off (probably from Scott's pufferfish or someone with a poison splash potion)

4) Pearl and Skizzleman kill impulse (uh. Makes no sense so unlikely)

5) Smallishbeans kills Tango while he is low on hunger (or baits him into a trap of "a promise for endless bread")

6) Etho and Skizzleman make a trap for the nosey neighbors, but this trap horribly failed, and Skizzleman accidentally dies to it.

7) Bdubs, Etho and BigB get into an agruement because Etho betrayed the alliance trying to kill the nosey neighbors. But Etho ended up killing them both. (It's probably more like Bdubs having to protect the nosey neighbors cause Etho is not technically in an alliance with the nosey neighbors)

8) Grian dies of hunger (probably everyone stole the bread of the Bad Boys Bread Bridge and refuse to give him food) (still unlikely tho- there a many ways to get food and Joel is still alive at this time)

9) Pearl caught Etho stealing from her, but Etho ended up killing her first.

10) ZombieCleo tricks Etho by convincing him to team up again and kill Smallishbeans but ended poisoning him (splash potion)

11) Smallishbeans and Zombiecleo have their final battle, but Joel takes the victory after shooting many arrows at Cleo.

[shepscapades]

Me and @tunastime’s Masterpiece and the product of 2 and a half hours in a voice call filled with lunacy and sobbing: a very professionally made Jimmy Solidarity Life Series 4 Bingo Card

(Feel free to use with proper credit!)

[nerdyenby]

Bdubs, about Grian: “He’s gone”

Scar: “Yeah, you’re correct… and he will regret that.”

Me: the desertduo angst writes itself

[owtenen]

so basically...

[enderwalking]

in before life series 4, let's make a prediction!