#like zedaph WOULD know about being in a hole in the ground and not talking to anyone else wouldn’t he

[theminecraftbee]

you know absolutely the funniest thing about the fact zedaph is the guy most consistently managing to interact with tango while he’s in Decked Out Two Hell Grind is. that’s what tango used to do in previous seasons to zedaph. zedaph would go into introvert inside his hole in a mountain mode and tango would be the only guy who consistently interacted with him. they’ve. they’ve traded places. they’re EACH OTHER’S “guy who lures the other one out of a hole in the ground to do a bit, and then return to the hole in the ground”. incredible,

[dmwrites]

It wasn’t like Zedaph to ever pay attention ever. He lived in a hole in the ground, did totally ethical science, and only left his home to find a resource he didn’t already have. Needless to say, it took a man literally crashing into him full force to figure out that something weird had happened on the Hermitcraft server.

“ZED! Holy s- crap!”

Zed turned around just in time to be knocked over by some blue and black thing.

“Ah! Please don’t hurt me, I’m only here for greenery!” Zed said. “Oh, wait, hello xBcrafted!”

xB was kneeling beside him on the ground, eyes wild. “Oh my gosh, Zed, you have no idea how good it is to see you!” xB helped him to his feet and put a hand to Zed’s face, eyes still wide but now with an almost desperate look in them.

“Are we about to kiss?” Zed asked.

xB took his hand away and laughed, eyes crinkling up. “My god, Zed, you sure are something else, I feel like I’m talking to Keralis.”

Zed chuckled. “I’ll take that as a compliment. So, why are you so excited to see me, of all people? And how have you been- oh! You should come in my hole, we can do a Zedvancement together!”

xB gave him a funny look. “Well, I’ve mostly been worried about where everyone else could have gone to in that rift.”

“Rift? What rift?” Zed frowned, racking his brain. “Oh, that rift thing in Grian’s basement? What, did it do something?”

xB raised his eyebrows. “You’re kidding, right?”

“What?”

“Zed, where are we right now?”

“The shopping district.”

“And does anything seem… different here?”

Zedaph hummed, looking around. He always liked a puzzle. “Well, it is awfully quiet. Where is everyone, anyway?”

xB stared at him expectantly.

“Wait…” Zed turned on the spot in Cub’s shop, where they could see almost the entire shopping district. “Didn’t there used to be giant signs blocking some of the buildings here?”

xB put his head in his hands. “Zed.”

Zed huffed. “Don’t worry, xBcrafted, I will solve your riddle!”

“Everyone’s gone, Zed!” xB exclaimed. “It’s quiet because everyone’s gone! They all went through the rift- didn’t you get a compass?”

“You know, I did get a compass. It had coordinates on it, right?” Zed said slowly.

“Yeah!” xB replied.

“Oh, well, i thought it was a gift from someone, and put it in my hall of all, since I didn’t have one yet.” Zed laughed. “I guess the numbers being coordinates makes a little more sense!”

“Zed. I thought I was alone on this forsaken server. Started talking to… myself and everything. You’re the first person I’ve seen in like a week, dude!” xB said. “And you’re… you! The rift, I saw the hermits, like a whole bunch of them, going into the rift! We have to figure out where it goes!” xB took Zedaph by the shoulders. “I can’t be alone anymore, Zed. Please stay with me?”

Zed looked into xB’s eyes, saw the pleading and perhaps a bit of fear, too.

“Sure, xB. I love science, after all.” Zed said. “I can even get us lab coats.”

So, they set up at Grian’s base. The rift had changed since Zed had been in the basement to spy on Grian. It was darker now, weird and glitchy. xB and Zed spent the next few days just studying, testing, theorizing. Zed slept in a small room he’d found in one of the floating boulders. xB slept in the boulder covered in skulk, saying it almost felt familiar to him.

It was odd, to work so closely with someone else. Both he and xB were more of the independent types, but they got on quite well together. xB had a wealth of information about the rift, mostly from the security cameras that Zed did not ask about. They often worked late into the night, Zed usually turning in first, leaving xB still staring at the broken rift.

Perhaps it shouldn’t have surprised him that xB went in. xB was more… involved then Zedaph was. He was the one who would always mutter about finding a way in, the one up late and early just staring at the thing. And yet, it was surprise that Zedaph felt when he woke up one morning and went down to the rift, only to find a note on the loadstone in front of it that read “went in. sorry.”.

Zedaph consulted his notes worriedly. The rift still looked the same, still glitched and dark. It wasn’t fixed by any means, and they’d agreed that going in could be dangerous. Maybe it would lead to the other hermits, maybe. But nothing was known for sure. And it was then that Zedaph, for perhaps the first time, really and truly felt alone. He’d been alone before, but always on his terms. Now he knew there was no one. Well, assumed there was no one. But it wasn’t a long elytra flight to prove it.

Days passed, and Zed wondered if he was living the same timeline as xB had. How much longer until he started talking to himself? How much longer until he went in the rift himself out of desperation? It seemed impossible that everyone had gone, impossible that he was the only one left. He kept looking, thinking he’d find them all giggling in some tiny hole in the ground, watching him suffer.

It’s always the last place you check where you find what you’re looking for. And as soon as the whoosh of Beef’s nether portal cleared Zed’s ears, he heard what he had been straining to find for days. Someone humming to themselves.

“Oh, hey Zedaph! Nice to see you!”

Zed stared in shock at VintageBeef himself, who was sorting through some cards, completely at ease, in his own world out on the ocean.

“You’re here!” Zed gasped.

“Well, yeah, where else would I go.” Beef joked.

“I forgot you were here.” Zed whispered, horrified.

“Ah, well, you know how it is. Everyone forgets about good ol’ Beefers. I am kind of out in the middle of nowhere.” Beef chuckled.

“Well, now you’re the most important person in my life, Beef, because it’s just us here.” Zed said.

Beef frowned at him. “What does that even mean, Zedaph?”

“There’s- okay, do you know about Grian’s rift? That huge portal thing in his basement?”

“Hm, you know, I think I saw it once, yeah.” Beef nodded.

“The hermits all went into it. I don’t know what called them to walk into it, but I just lost xB to it too. And I thought I was all alone here. Beef, I need your help. We have to find them or get them out or something.”

Beef looked down at the paper in his hand and then back up at Zed. “Well, if there aren’t any other hermits around, my game won’t get played. So of course I’ll help you.” Beef chuckled, but stopped when he saw Zedaph not doing the same. “Are you alright, Zed?” He held out his arms, and Zed rushed into them.

“I just am glad I’m not alone.” Zedaph said quietly. “Im glad you’re here.”

[redorich]

to those who carried on

A fic for @petrichormeraki​ and their Hermit!Tommy AU.

-------

The hermits know Tommy as a quiet young man who is very sad and contemplative. The more time they spend with him (against his will, but they know he needs the company) the more they learn of the little details. His favorite block is cobblestone, he likes building towers, and apparently his favorite woman is the Queen. They don’t ask why he wears a smiley mask even though he never seems happy. They don’t ask why he hides important things in his ender chest. They don’t ask why he wears a shattered compass on a chain about his neck.

(Once, he died in lava and lost his absolute mind. He was so upset about the compass that he didn’t even mention the stack and a half of diamond ore he had on him. Xisuma ended up manually rolling back the server just so Tommy could have it back.)

As time goes on, the tremors in Tommy's hands grow lesser. His dull blond hair seems a bit brighter, his bruises fade quicker, he doesn’t look quite so skinny-- he spends his time serenely building, resource gathering instead of running and fighting. He has a sense of humor under all that trauma, which the hermits unfortunately find out after another massive-scale prank war thought to be instigated by Grian actually turns out to be Tommy's fault.

Tommy starts swearing more. Doc gets the stink eye from Stress for this, but Doc insists he’s never once sworn around the young man. (That’s an absolute lie, but it wasn’t anything Tommy hadn’t heard before. Tommy thinks Doc is remarkably unoriginal in his cursing. He does take note of the German ones, though.)

Inviting Tommy to PvP minigames can be touchy, they learn. He likes to fight, but he fights like an animal with nothing to lose. Grian once chanted, “It stays in the pit!” and everyone present had to spend the next five minutes wrangling Tommy’s soul back into his body from wherever it’d floated off to.

Tommy likes to glide with his elytra. He claims he’s never had one before, but he flies like such a natural that a few people have their doubts. On a dark desert night, with dark blue eyes watching the night sky, he confides to Cub that it reminds him of the way his dad used to fly. He hates rockets, though. He does not confide to Cub that it reminds him of what his brother did to his best friend. He says enough that Cub can guess, though.

Scar gets fed up with Tommy’s creeper holes and makes Tommy help him fix them. At first, Tommy has no clue why Scar is breaking out things like coarse dirt and birch leaves and making the ground all fancy, but he’s not afraid of a little hard work and Scar makes it fun. He learns a lot about terraforming that day, and awkwardly comes back a few days later asking if Scar needs any more help terraforming. Tommy still hasn’t built a real base, not by Hermitcraft standards, but the small hill he’s built his dirt hut near now has a very beautiful, if amateurish, waterfall. He doesn’t tell Scar about this, but Scar finds out anyway. Tommy wakes up one morning to find that someone has left a shulker box in his house. Instead of iron-gripped paranoia, he just feels wonder that someone would give him a gift-- to the hermits, a single shulker box is nothing. To Tommy, it’s everything.

The shulker box contains coarse dirt, birch leaves, and a silk touch shovel.

Tommy helps Xisuma mine a giant hole in the ground near bedrock, because he realizes that he’s never thanked the admin for getting him his compass back. Well, that and the fact that instamining with a haste two beacon and an efficiency five pickaxe is a novelty. Xisuma lets him keep the cobble, since everyone knows it’s Tommy’s favorite block, but also insists he keep some of the other blocks like andesite and diorite. He pats Tommy on the head and tells him to talk to Bdubs about building a house some time. Tommy nods. He's taken aback by how tall Xisuma is, completely contrasting his mild nature. He reminds Tommy of Wilbur, on one of his good days before... Before. Not Ghostbur, though-- the admin is much too alive.

Tommy waits too long, so eventually Bdubs comes to him. The man is silly and outrageous, playing everything for laughs and unexpectedly tender. Bdubs plays up how beautiful he thinks Tommy’s hideous dirt shack is, then offers to help him build a house that’s better. For Tommy, building a house means settling down, accepting that this is his home now. Bdubs doesn’t know this. Tommy builds cobblestone dicks while Bdubs tries to lecture him about depth and block variation. Nothing gets done and Bdubs feels like he might have failed, but come next week Bdubs is flying over the area and sees the dicks are gone; so is the dirt house. In its place is a spruce-and-cobble cottage nestled near the tiny waterfall. Off to the side, he’s made a cozy doghouse for his fox, Theo. Bdubs doesn’t know how close that fox came to being named Fundy.

He spars with False, and she very pointedly does not mention how his stances are uniquely suited to a piglin. There’s only one renowned fighter who’s a piglin, after all. It's Tommy’s story to tell, if he ever does, why he’s seen enough of the legendary Technoblade’s fights to pick up on his stances, yet he’s not experienced enough to know that they don’t suit him. Instead, False gives him different stances suited more for tall, skinny people like the two of them. She’s got blond hair and blue eyes just like him. (Not that she’d know. She’s never seen his eyes, hidden behind his mask as they are.) Every now and then, he imagines her as an older sister, and the one time he says so, she smiles. When Tommy’s at home, looking at his own distorted reflection in his waterfall (he’s improved it since he built it), he muses that their eyes aren’t the same, their hair colors are subtly off. It’s close enough, he thinks.

Stress dies from fall damage and Tommy goes out of his way to pick up her stuff, because the hermits do these things out of the kindness of their hearts. The thought never even crosses their minds to steal. It crosses his mind. He doesn’t do it. Stealing from Stress would be like stealing from Niki.

He shows up at Cleo’s base unannounced and demands to see the “cool shit”. He is appropriately enthused by the giant armor-stand-bugs. She tries teaching him her armor stand magic, but it doesn’t really sink in. It’s okay, she assures him, most people don’t have the knack for it. He does, however, learn that buttons make excellent decorations. He also learns how to braid hair, bribed by ice cream. He is terrible at it, to the point where Joe has to come by to help the two untangle her hair so Tommy can start again. Watching the two bicker over capitalism and six million armor stands and a whole host of other inside jokes he doesn’t get, he thinks he’s starting to understand what friendship is supposed to be like. Joe and Cleo don’t see him clutching his compass. He and Tubbo weren’t too far off from this, given their circumstances. Maybe...

Maybe Tubbo can be forgiven.

Tommy makes minigames of his own, ones that don’t just kill you and steal your stuff. He builds things that are pretty instead of just functional, brews potions with Stress and only calls them drugs once (again, upsetting her is like upsetting Niki. Best not done), and sets up chicken bombs above people’s bases instead of just lavacasting them. (As Grian saw the hundreds of chickens slowly raining down upon his mansion, he got such a peculiar look on his face that Tommy feared he’d fucked up. The shorter, stronger (much stronger oh god why is he so strong despite being so small) man nearly crushed Tommy’s lungs in a hug, proclaiming how proud he was of Tommy. Tommy was proud of himself for not accidentally murdering Grian out of reflex. Was this what healing was like?)

Yes. It is what healing is like. Tommy knows this because that wound gets ripped open again. Tango shows him how to build the most obnoxious redstone-powered noise machine the two can think of. Tango digs a small pit, and asks Tommy to throw down his axe. Suddenly, Tommy’s in Logstedshire again; it’s not Tango asking, it’s Dream. His hands don’t shake when he tosses his axe into the pit, followed by his sword and his armor. It isn't until he’s placed the TNT down that Tango grabs his wrist and asks him what he’s doing. Tommy’s eyes clear enough that he can see past the blond hair and freckles. Tango isn’t green, he’s red. He's shorter than Dream, and his worried eyes are unhidden. Tommy shudders, then tells Tango everything.

Tango has no pity for Tommy, just understanding and sympathy. He doesn’t push Tommy to talk about it, but when Tommy’s done telling his story, Impulse and Zedaph show up. They all pretend that Tommy’s voice isn’t hoarse, that they all didn’t conveniently happen to look away when Tommy took off his mask just long enough to wipe his eyes. The men bake a cake together, fool around with honey blocks, and don’t talk about it.

Tommy knows very little about redstone, considers himself more of a builder and a fighter than an engineer. Still, Mumbo’s living base is inspiring, and Tommy often hangs around the man’s industrial district just to watch Mumbo work. Mumbo knows that Tommy hasn’t purchased a day pass, but it’s nice having someone around to talk to while he works. It’s not like Tommy is stealing anything. (Tommy totally steals from Mumbo’s industrial district storage system. The man’s farms are so efficient that he doesn’t even notice, so Tommy assumes it’s fine. What Mumbo doesn’t know won’t hurt him.)

Lava still isn’t his favorite thing in the world. He stays far away from it, instead of imagining what it would be like to hurtle towards it. Ren doesn’t really notice this, but he does notice that Tommy doesn’t seem to like his mustafarian base. On a spur-of-the-moment whim, Ren whips up some absurd plotline in which he is a lone weary traveller seeking refuge at Tommy’s base from strange alien overlords. The two have fun together, and the young man cracks more absurd jokes about it than the hermits have ever seen him do. When Ren leaves a week later to return to his own base, Tommy keeps being absurd, if a bit more subdued without someone to play off of. He builds a shrine to the “prime log”, which grows more elaborate each day. Beef and xB pretend to be his acolytes, despite having no clue what a “twitch prime” is.

They can’t see his face, but the smile in his voice is a far cry from the despondency he once wore like a heavy cloak. He is so much more animated and alive, full of motivation. He builds an entire island in three days, and hand-delivers an invitation to each and every hermit for his beach party. Everyone shows up, even those with packed schedules (Iskall) and those with introverted tendencies (Etho). Tommy is nearly moved to tears when they show up in groups of twos and threes, as though he hadn’t expected anyone to come. There aren’t enough chairs for everyone, but there is more than enough cake to go around. Tango brings drinks, Impulse brings meat to barbecue, and Zedaph makes an elaborate jump-powered grill. Keralis brings way too much confetti and several handfuls of cheap, obnoxious party noisemakers. Stress brings Tommy a crown made out of alliums. It shines far less than his brother’s gold crown, and it’ll die in a few days, but he wears it all night and keeps it in his ender chest until it withers away.

He spends five days teaching himself to make flower crowns. Even his best attempt is awful, nowhere near as pretty as the crowns Stress makes, but when he gives it to her, she takes off the one she was wearing and wears his until it falls apart.

He dies fighting a creeper on Grian’s behalf, and doesn’t even panic, because he trusts that however many times he dies, no matter how stupid or ignominious or revolutionary or important, Xisuma will always let him respawn.

He spends a grand total of nine diamonds to buy a single plot of land in the shopping district. He builds a cute little bench facing the sunset, with warmly glowing street lights on either side and a small garden. At the end of the bench he places a jukebox, and buys every single disc that Beef’s music shop sells, including Pigstep. He sits on the bench while Mellohi plays and watches the tiny silhouettes of his friends flying in the evening sky. Tommy looks alone on that bench, even if he seems happy, so sometimes other people stop by to sit with him. Scar declares the bench area a public park, since everyone likes it so much, and refunds Tommy his nine diamonds straight from the throne.

[archetypal-archivist]

Tommyinnit and Hermitcraft- Heartstone

So this builds off of the whole "Tommy has somehow found himself on Hermitcraft after the exile arc" thing that got really popular with @redorich and @petrichormeraki on tumblr. Basically it's an excuse to give Tommy therapy and 20+ parent figures. One thing that's a common thread in those stories is that Tommy is shocked that Hermitcraft has infinite respawns and all of the hermits are quick to reassure him that he really won't perma-die in their world. And I had the thought- well, what if he wasn't in their world anymore? And thus came forth 1500+ words of angst~

It begins like this. Evil X is stuck in the void, alone and with no one to talk to. He misses daylight, he misses touch, he misses hearing voices other than his own. One day, he sees something get shot through the void as if by slingshot, leaving a trail of code in its wake, tethering the whatever it is back the way it came. This is Tommy, and while he begins to get adjusted to Hermitcraft and company, Evil X watches as the string of code begins to imprint itself into the void, and eventually learns that he can interact with it, albeit only on the most superficial of levels. On Tommy's end, he slowly begins to heal from his time spent in the war zone that is the Dream SMP, making fast friends with Grian and several of the other hermits in the process. He goes pranking with his newest, winged older brother figure, laughs at the antics of Impulse, Tango, and Zedaph, builds a cobblestone tower with BDubs, etc. But for all that he's healing, such a process isn't linear. No one on the server can truly understand just what sort of stuff he has been through, and so he often finds himself alone, trying to deal with his wildest emotions by talking to himself.

One day, however, a little voice in his head starts talking back. It's rough and gravelly and not very nice at first, but it's faint enough that he chalks it up to his imagination and moves on with his life. He follows Stress around like a duckling for a day, plays squire for Welsknight, and has a roaring panic attack after an unfortunate spar with False leads to him getting flashbacks to the Pit with Technoblade. He retreats back to his tower for a good cry, and in the midst of his tears, he hears the voice again. This time it's a bit nicer, sounding unsure and a bit panicky as it tries to encourage him to stop crying, god this is awkward, kid, it'll be fine. Wait, are you a kid? You seem tall for a munchkin.

This time, Tommy knows that it isn't his imagination, but half of his old server seemed to have voices in their heads so he really isn't all that alarmed that he seemed to have developed one of his own too. And he does something that no one else does when Evil X reaches out- he starts talking back. It's rough going, at first, especially since both of them have abrasive personalities, but eventually they settle into a rough estimation of friendship that means more to them then they are willing to say. From Evil X's perspective, this is the first time someone has actually listened to him and hasn't been turned away by his violent streak, his bad manners, and lack of proper social skills. For Tommy, this is a chance to vent to someone who seems to understand his pain. It helps that neither of them are inclined to ask too many questions. Tommy, on his part, has no clue that Evil X is an actual person and not a voice in his head, while Evil X can't bring himself to ask why Tommy has left a trail of code in the void and why it's all so glitched. He especially fears asking about the perma-death clause that seems to naturally have occurred in his code.

He will come to regret this choice.

The day is like any other, at first. He begins his day with a slice of sweet melon and then flies off to whatever hermits are awake at the time to "share a meal with them." Really, it started as an excuse to make sure that Tommy was eating at least one meal day, even in his most dissociative of states, but has since turned into an opportunity to eat weird things in front of people to see their reactions. (Etho is his favorite. He's always up early and half the time, asks to try a bite of whatever Tommy is having. They both agree that spider eyes taste a lot like sour boba.) From there it's off to the shopping district to restock his dirt shop and claim his share of the profits from the hole-digging service he runs with Grian. After that, there's just enough time to complete an order or two and collect more cobble and dirt before he has to meet up with Grian to go on their biweekly End Busting session. The two usually have a lot of fun as they go about it, Tommy jokingly shoving Grian off the platform only for his adopted brother to catch himself and fly up to join him on the narrow platform spanning the emptiness once again. Every once in a while, Grian mock-threatens to do the same in return, but he knows better than to actually attempt it after he did it once and had had to catch Tommy when he started screaming and even after they had gotten back to solid ground, he wouldn't stop for the better part of half an hour.

On habits die hard, after all. Tommy may have been told time and time again by everyone on the server that infinite respawns are a thing, yes really, but he still has a hard time believing it. He actually has a rather insane number of levels racked up- even more than Xisuma, which is impressive- because in all the months that he has been on Hermitcraft, he hasn't died once. It's a combination of survival skills taught to him by Philza and his own paranoia which has kept him alive for so long, and most of the hermits agree that it is rather impressive, if not entirely healthy for him to be so scared of dying. (Doc once offered to kill him as evidence that yes, it really is safe here and you will respawn, but for all that death by crazy redstone machine might of been cool, Tommy took a hard pass on that. Grian low key took exception to Doc offering to kill his adopted little brother, really man? Not cool.)

Anyway, Grian and Tommy meet up in the End and start off bridging with the insane amount of cobble that Tommy has stored up. Usually Tommy is in front, placing the stones, and Grian is in back, watching out for any sign of a slip up, but this time they decide to switch it up a bit, head in a new direction, play around with who's doing what this time. It ends... poorly. They bridge out into the black, on and on and on, farther into the void than they ever have before. Slowly, the islands of floating white stone stop appearing with such frequency, but they become larger in size and stranger in shape. Every once in a while Grian will see what he swears to be a glowing white mountain of Endstone in the distance, although Tommy calls bullshit each and every time. They chalk it all up to bad luck and going nuts from boredom, but really, neither one of them knows how to quit while they're ahead. As the islands disappear altogether and all that remains to orient themselves is the tenuous lifeline of cobblestone beneath their feet, the unthinkable happens.

Grian slips. And Tommy, taught compassion by the very world that will now kill him, reaches out to save him.

For one, brief moment, the two brothers clasp hands- and then Grian's weight pulls Tommy right over the edge and down, down, down into the void below.

Grian fell out of the world.

Tommy fell out of the world... and into a new one.

----

Xisuma wakes up late that day. He's been doing that a lot, if he's honest, given how late he's staying up most nights finishing up builds and the like. Those hours of sleep have to come from somewhere, after all, and he's far from an early bird. He gives into the impulse to relax a bit, drinking some tea sweetened with just enough honey to rot his teeth, and then heads off to his computer room to start up his duties as admin for the day. It's the red lights that alert him to something being wrong, and at first, he thinks it's just one of hermits' cam accounts being buggy again. Perhaps it got shut off while the hermit was bridging through the void and the hermit in question simply hadn't retrieved it yet? But who would name their cam account Tommyinnit? The looming dread sits cold in his gut as he flicks his fingers to open up his admin panel... Best to check, just in case.

The death messages are clear enough- Keralis had just perished to a ravager yesterday, likely Tango's from Decked Out if he had to guess. Zedaph had been slain by a piglin twenty minutes ago. And Grian and Tommy had fallen into the void. But if that were the case... why had only one of them respawned?

On Grian's part, he comes to with a lingering chill deep in his bones and an awful headache. The bed underneath him is warm and the sheets are a soft rosy color, likely one of the ones in Scar's magical village if the persistent smell of spruce is anything to go by. He winces against the light filtering through the window and turns to the side, squinting at where Tommy had placed his blue bed right next to his, apology on his lips for his stupid mistake. The sheets are undisturbed. Huh. That's weird, he could have sworn that he and Tommy had set their respawn points at the same time. Maybe Tommy had just forgotten and he was back in his base or at spawn? Grian rises to his feet slowly, giving his body time to adjust to the colors and sounds of the Overworld, then flaps his wings and takes off to go looking for his Tommy.

He doesn't find him.

---

The reactions to Tommy's "death" are many and varied, although for the most part, the hermits are split into two camps- those that think Tommy is gone for good, and those that think he may still be out there somewhere. For the first few days of Tommy's disappearance, most everyone is in the latter camp. Xisuma spends hours upon hours scanning the code, becoming increasingly more frazzled and terrified as his lack of sleep gets to him. Tango and Doc join him in the endeavor, although none of them have any luck or are able to spot the piece of code that caused the problem. No additions, no changes to the text, nothing. Grian leads the other team, those who set out on foot and one wing and with pick in hand to scour the world for their youngest charge, taken from them too soon. They begin in a grid pattern, setting out in ones and twos to search the whole world, but as the distance increases, the neat, orderly flyovers turn into frenzied boosting as panic starts to get the better of them. Some of them hold onto their composure better than others, but Grian ends up flying over the same patch of forest three times because he can't see for his tears. False, Impulse, Welsknight, and Beef cross the Nether, fighting their way into Bastion after Bastion and leaving Nether portals in their wake. In their tracks comes the fliers- Grian, Ren, Iskall, and BDubs. Each one takes a portal and does a sweep through the corresponding patch of Overworld before picking a direction to continue the search. Cubfan, iJevin, and Scar take to the seas, Mumbo, Stress, xB, and Zedaph to the End, Etho down into the depths of the caves below. Strangely enough, there are a few hermits who don't join the search- Keralis, who got the unlucky task of taking care of Xisuma and the others searching through the code, Tinfoilchef, who doesn't provide a reason but everyone gives him a pass because of his age, and Joe Hills and Zombie Cleo, who refuse to explain themselves.

Eventually, the searches dry up. Eventually, some of the hermits admit defeat. Hundreds of thousands of blocks out from spawn, down to the bedrock below, beneath sea and sky and every place that lacks the sun. How far is too far? For Xisuma, enough is enough. Tommy is dead. The search is over.

He stops looking. And soon, others do the same.

And the tone of the server... shifts.

For the first time that any of them can remember, a person has perma-died. Sure, they've all heard the rumors, of servers where infinite respawns is not the norm, of servers where the world glitched and a creeper is supercharged enough to damage a player down to their code. But they'd never thought that one of their own would be on the receiving end of such a curse. And to the hermits, the possibility of dying themselves suddenly becomes all too real. The constant flying is the first to go, and for those that insist on it anyway (outside of Grian, who has wings), checking the elytras' durability becomes more than just a habit. Eating spider eyes and other junk is out of the question, now it's golden apples or nothing. The Nether is all but abandoned, as is the End, and everyone on the server either groups up so that they are never alone, or retreats into their bases, becoming true hermits befitting of their server's name.

The joy that had once been so characteristic of the server is gone, and in the hearts of all, there lingers the dread that any one of them might be next- although, there are still those that hold on to hope that Tommy may not be as gone as he seems.

---

The hermits who think Tommy is dead for good and have stopped searching: Doc, Etho, Xisuma, Welsknight, Grian, BDubs, Cubfan, TinfoilChef, Stress, False, Iskall.

The hermits who think Tommy is still out there, alive if still missing, and that the search should continue: Keralis, Mumbo, Tango, Vintage Beef, Impulse, Zedaph, Joe Hills, Zombie Cleo, Scar, Rendog, xB.

Doc and Etho are old. They don't like to admit it, but they've been around since the beginning, back when players were first learning how to jump servers and communicator technology was undergoing its first upgrade. They've seen a lot and know well by now that dead is dead. Tommy is dead. All that is left to do is mourn and move on, and they have shed their tears already. Call them cold for it, but in the face of a kind of drive that can keep a man going after his entire server has burnt down around his ears (Mindcrack will be missed), they know they need to keep moving forward. There are enough broken messes on the server these days, and it is through their efforts that shops remain stocked and the torches don't burn out. They hold onto normalcy with an iron grip and hope that some day, the rest of the hermits will join them in rationality.

Stress too has a comparatively healthy approach to all of this. She doesn't want it to be true, god no, but so far everything is pointing in the direction of Tommy being dead for good. She eats a couple dozen bowls of ice cream, has a some good cries, doesn't leave her base for a week, and even afterwards she can't bring herself to wear pink for a while. But she's mourning. She's accepted things. She lets her heart break, and as time passes, she lets herself heal. And that's enough for her.

Scar is of the opinion that Tommy is still out there, and while he clings to that hope with all his might, it's fragile and Cub just knows that his best friend is going to be cut to pieces when that hope inevitably breaks. So he takes Scar aside for a quiet conversation, to break his heart before the world can break it for him. Afterwards, Scar stops talking about Tommy as if he's coming back, but his smile is never as bright as it was before. And Cub's heart breaks too.

Team ZIT swings the exact opposite way as the rest and are firmly of the belief that permadeath is impossible and thus Tommy must be alive. The three of them aren’t known for their impulse control at the best of times, and with so many hermits having given up, the trio is rightfully vicious about the fact that the others, in their eyes, have abandoned their friend. Zedaph, Impulse, and Tango all kind of feed into one another and start doing lots of dangerous stunts, as if daring the universe to permakill them and prove them wrong. If one of them does something, the other two join in and escalate things, which gets impossibly dangerous very, very fast. Tango is furious, Impulse is bitter, and Zedaph is straight up heartbroken that his other friends would give up on another of their number. They do things like fly incredibly high, go cliff jumping in the Nether only to catch themselves at the last minute, and sprint across the End bridges. If they have doubts, they never voice them. Even when Tango feels like he’s burning up from the inside and wonders at his newfound hate. Even when Impulse is utterly terrified but goes along with things anyway because Tango is doing it and he can’t bear to leave a friend alone. Even when Zedaph looks at his friends and can’t help but feel scared of and for these strangers wearing the faces he knows so well. Even then.

Team ZIT often gets dragged into and starts lots of screaming fights with the other hermits who believe Tommy is dead, especially Doc, BDubs, xB, and False. False especially gets vicious, as while pvp is no longer permitted on the server, her tongue is as sharp as any blade. She believes firmly that the others are trampling on Tommy’s memory by insisting that he isn’t dead and she is determined to make them stop. And if they refuse to give up their foolishness? Well, all she might have left is her words but with them she will make them bleed.

xB and Vintage Beef are as close to neutral as you are going to get from those that get into regular arguments. xB thinks Tommy is dead until proven otherwise, while Beef thinks the exact reverse. As some of the more chill hermits, they often get dragged in to play negotiator so that the fights don’t turn physical. And some days, when someone says something particularly hurtful, they’ll close themselves up in one of xB’s bunkers and drink until they can no longer remember why they ought to be enemies. It’s hardly healthy, but they both agree that it’s better this way. Better to forget than to hurt, after all.

Grian is… somewhat the same. Sort of. He was traumatized by Tommy, the boy he adopted as his little brother, dying before his eyes, and he can’t help but blame himself. That is, when he can remember that Tommy is dead at all. After the fall, Grian’s mind was badly broken and he couldn’t accept that his little brother was dead for the longest time. He fell into two weeks of deep depression, barely eating or drinking, and eventually Iskall came and took care of him when he realized that he hadn’t seen his buddy in ages. Iskall nursed Grian back to health, only to feel his heart shatter in his breast when Grian turned to him, eyes feverishly bright and tone childlike, asking where Tommy was. The winged man’s mind couldn’t cope with the loss so it had shut down entirely, making him forget the tragedy that had occured. Iskall had deflected then, frantically trying to figure out what to say, but after a few days of Grian wandering about in a dreamlike state, his memory came back to him and he collapsed in on himself once more. The winged hermit is now locked in a loop of this, while poor Iskall is stuck trying to keep his friend alive and relatively sane.

Iskall, for his part, thinks Tommy is well and truly dead. In part because of his own certainty, in part because anything else would be even crueler for Grian. He doesn’t resent his friend for his break downs, just quietly bundles him up and clutches him close, coaxing him to eat and bathe, to put down the guilt and realize that it’ll be okay, the world won’t end with Tommy gone. He gently tries to nudge Grian down that path of acceptance of Tommy’s fate, and though he faces many setbacks, he tackles each one with a special kind of patience born of platonic love. They’re bros, despite everything. It’s only right.

Mumbo is, weirdly enough, on the side of Tommy being alive. Iskall doesn’t exactly approve and while he and Mumbo sometimes get into whispered arguments over it, they try to keep their little disagreements from Grian. Both of them only want to see their friend happy again, and will do just about anything to make it happen. For Mumbo, this means putting together crazy redstone contraptions to try and find Tommy again, as he’s certain that Grian’s little brother is still out there somewhere- and he has a piece that might prove it. Iskall comes over one day, face drawn and haggard from a night of soothing Grian through another set of screaming nightmares, only to find Mumbo waist high in redstone wiring, all hooked up to a strange portal design that looks too much like Doc’s infinity portal from season 6 for comfort. At the top of the arch is Tommy’s compass, needle whirling about like a hurricane, and while the portal isn’t lit, it does give off a faint blue-black glow. Iskall is frightened that Mumbo is tampering with something that could get him killed and Mumbo rushes to reassure him that no, the compass was specifically linked to Tommy so if Tommy was really dead, it would have been reset, right? He’s merely borrowing that tie to try and figure out where the two ends lead. Iskall is less than sure about this, especially since Mumbo is just as drawn and pale as he is, if a bit more covered in redstone, but they agree that fighting is pointless. They care about each other and about Grian too much to put any of them through that sort of pain- and besides, there’s more than enough fighting on the server already.

Ren too thinks that Tommy is alive and he is one of the ones who gets into regular fights. He’s a lover, not a fighter, but something about this whole situation just burns him up. When the pressure gets too much, he goes flying, tracing over those old familiar trails they searched so long ago, trying to see if there is anything they missed. There never is.

Welsknight has made his peace with Tomy’s death, though the server tends to forget that he and Tommy were closer than most. He alone knew that Tommy was once upon a time a boy called Theseus (a name given to him shyly when Tommy had asked him if there were any great heroes with that name that didn’t die). He alone knew Tommy’s love for horses, or that he would spend hours whispering horror stories to them when he thought no one would hear. Tommy was his squire, and although he had accepted the tragedy, he still wept for the hurt it brought him. He alone knew of the little grave he had dug under the willow tree in his castle courtyard and the headstone he had placed there, engraved with Tommy’s true name, death date, and supposed date of birth. He couldn’t have been more than 17, and perhaps that was what hurt the most. Every morning at dawn, Welsknight brings a bouquet of flowers to that little grave and says a prayer before disappearing into the morning fog. The flowers are always the same- forget me nots, for remembrance, violets, for devotion, and clover. (Think of me).

Tinfoilchef stays out of it- always has and always will. He’s too old to rush about searching or to feel as wildly as the others do. He feels, of course, but more so as the mountain does, steady and strong despite the winds that tear at its surface. Tommy is dead, but then, so are many of the people he has known in his life. It’s best to just keep plodding along.

BDubs is a mess. He had never spoken of it, but long before he had come to hermitcraft, he had had a daughter- a beautiful baby girl whose heart was too big for her chest, and she had died for that difference. He had grieved for years, but eventually the peace of the hermitcraft server had left him soothed, if a bit different than before. Tommy had been another chance at fatherhood, not that he could ever bear to call the teen that, even in the privacy of his own mind. Instead, he had taught the kid to build cobblestone towers that weren’t entirely offensive (if shaped a bit oddly) and had been the first to volunteer any time Grian was out and Tommy needed a place to spend the night when the nightmares were particularly fierce. They had so many fun sleepovers like that, and staring at those awful cobble towers in the distance, BDubs can’t help but bawl his eyes out at the memories. He waffles between taking the towers down or leaving them up- they really are ugly, and the feelings in his chest that they inspire are even more so, but somehow, he can’t bear to see them gone. Instead, he dries his eyes, flies off to grab a shulker of cobble, and sets about adding a few more to their number. A final remembrance for the boy he would have gladly claimed as his own, if only he hadn’t been too late. (He ends up building a lot more than a few).

Joe and Cleo are somehow the only ones who are actually neutral in the whole mess. Whenever they are asked their opinion on if Tommy is truly dead or not, the pair simply smile mysteriously and refuse to comment. Joe always seems to know more than he lets on and Cleo is his closest confidant, after all. Despite the anger and tears directed their way for refusing to commit to either side, the two keep their silence. (They know the truth of the matter, after all. Everything will be okay in time).

Xisuma has given up. Tommy is dead, and there is nothing he can do but spend days and days going over the code with a fine tooth comb, trying to find the glitch that cut the life of their youngest member short. Keralis takes it upon himself to take care of his long time friend, but it’s not an easy task, not when the other is so determined to make sure that such an incident never happens again. And Keralis can’t find it in himself to complain, especially since he is laboring under the impression that Xisuma agrees that Tommy is still out there and is trying to find him. It is only when Keralis mentions it in an aside, thanking the admin for his dedication, that Xisuma breaks the illusion and explains. Tommy isn’t just dead, he says tiredly, his very presence is well and truly wiped from the world’s code. All that is left of him is the faint impression his code had left behind, and trying to read it and understand what went wrong is a bit like trying to read small letters that have been drawn out in dry sand. Even for a voidwalker like himself such a task is near impossible, and Xisuma can only do so much. The needs of the many above the needs of the few- best to secure those he can now than worry over those that are gone beyond his reach. And Keralis can’t help but look at his friend with new eyes, a fleeting sense of betrayal in his heart. He had thought better of his Shishwammy, and he says as much. 

He cries while Xisuma watches on in solemn, mournful silence.

---

TBC  :)

[theres-an-impulstor-among-us]

Writting request!

Hels!Impulse taking regular impulses place n stuffing him in like a closet or somethin-

N someone who's sus of him (maybe iskall?) Finds the real impulse.

Now to unmask the fake.

okay so a few quick things:

1) this ended up a LOT longer than i expected lol so i apologise for that, it’s over 2k words

2) i also didn’t entirely stick to every detail in the prompt because i had an idea i rly liked and i wanted to roll with it, so i’m rly sorry if it’s not as good as you were expecting

3) anyway i hope it’s good! it was a lot of fun to work on

...

  Impulse is working on the redstone of his pumpkin and melon farm in his base when he spots a shadow moving around right at the corner of his vision. Frowning, he leaves his task and heads out into the main part of the base, looking around. “Hello?” he calls cautiously. “Grian, if this is you again…”

  He gets no response. 

  Just as he starts to turn back, thinking he just imagined it, something slams into him and knocks him into the wall, stunning him. He looks sharply up to find…

  ...himself. 

  Impulse’s eyes widen. “Wh-Who are you?!”

  The new Impulse has his arms crossed and a malicious grin on his face. “My name is Impulstor. I’m your Hels counterpart. And I’m going to take over your life as my own.”

  “W-Wait, what?!” 

  Before Impulse can move, Impulstor seizes his lapels and drags him across the base. Impulse struggles as hard as he can but he’s still winded from being hit against the wall. 

  Impulstor takes him to one of the support pillars at the very edge of the base, which has a two by one block hole in it, left over from Grian’s secret base shenanigans a few weeks ago. Weakened, he’s unable to stop Impulstor from shoving him roughly through the gap. 

  Since the floor is a block lower than the bottom of the hole, Impulse’s foot slips and he falls heavily against the wall, hitting his head and stunning him even more. The space inside the pillar is only one block by one block, with two or three more blocks of space above his head, so as Impulse collapses, he’s forced into an uncomfortable sitting position. 

  Blinking back tears of pain and fear, Impulse tries sluggishly to escape but Impulstor bashes him on the head with his own pickaxe. 

  The last thing Impulse sees before he passes out is Impulstor blocking the gap with white concrete, trapping him in this prison.

…

  Zedaph flies over the shopping district and lands a little way off from Impulse and Tango, who are sitting on one of the benches outside town hall, chatting. As he approaches, the two look up and spot him. “Hey, Zed!” Tango calls, beaming. “Wanna join me and Impy hanging out?”

  “Yeah, sure! What do you have in mind?”

  “Well, I thought we might go give Decked Out a group run,” Tango says. “I’d have to fix things up a little bit but that shouldn’t take more than ten minutes. I think it’d be epic to go in as a team.”

  “Ooh, yeah!” Impulse grins. “I always loved that game. It terrifies me, but I loved it. Those ravagers, man. I’m always on the lookout for them and it’s terrifying with the heartbeat and everything.” 

  “That was the idea,” snickers Tango.

  “I know, I know. Doesn’t make it any less terrifying, though.” Impulse grins. “Going in as a group would be great! I’d really like to do that.”

  Zedaph involuntarily takes a step back. He doesn’t know what, but there’s something off about Impulse today. There’s something different, something he can’t quite put his finger on. He’s known Impulse a long time, but not as long as Tango, who doesn’t seem to share his doubts. Is he misreading the situation?

  “Yeah, me too!” Tango enthuses. “You up for it, Zed?”

  “Um, actually…” Zedaph forces a convincing cough and rubs his stomach. “I feel kinda sick all of a sudden. I think the flight over here churned my insides.”

  “Oh.” Tango frowns sympathetically. “You’d better rest, then.”

  “Yeah, sorry. I need to go home.”

  “No problem, man. Hope you feel better.”

  Zedaph slowly walks away, keeping up his charade in case the others are watching. Over his shoulder, he hears Impulse say something about his ice farm, then a few seconds later, the sound of rockets are heard as the two take off with their elytras. 

  He keeps going for about a minute longer, just in case, before deeming it safe and taking off with his rockets. His heart pounding, he shoots over to Impulse’s base and after crashing through the water curtain, lands neatly on the ground inside. “Impulse?” Zedaph calls, starting to rush through the pyramid base. “Impulse, are you here?”

  Zedaph’s voice awakens Impulse. Blinking against the throbbing in his head, he bashes his fist against the wall of the pillar as hard as he can. “Ze-Zedaph! ZED!”

  Following the sound of Impulse’s voice, Zedaph locates the pillar and slices a hole in it with his pickaxe. 

  To his horror, he finds Impulse squeezed inside the narrow gap, blood still dripping from the wound in his head. 

  “Oh my god…!”

  Zedaph drags Impulse out of the pillar and lets him lie flat on the ground for a moment while he tends to his wound. Impulse doesn’t even have the strength to wince at the stinging of antiseptic. 

  “Are you okay?” asks Zedaph quietly. “How long have you been stuck in there?”

  “A-A few hours at most, I don’t really know. What’s going on?”

  “Well, fake you is cosying up to Tango. I don’t think Tango suspects anything.”

  Impulse swallows back a pang of hurt. “Oh… I-I thought he knew me better than that…”

  “To be fair, whoever’s masquerading as you is really, really good,” says Zedaph slowly. “I hate to say this, but even I barely noticed.”

  “Really? What made you catch on?”

  Zedaph hesitates. “It was more of a gut feeling than solid evidence. I dunno, there was just something about the way he talked that seemed off. It didn’t seem like you. I thought either there was something wrong with you or it wasn’t you at all.”

  “And you came to the conclusion that an imposter posing as me was more likely than me having an off day?” chuckles Impulse weakly. 

  Zedaph matches his chuckle as he starts to wind a bandage around Impulse’s head. “Again, it was just a gut feeling.”

  “Well, your gut feeling was right. Now what do we do about Impulstor?”

  Zedaph immediately bursts out a laugh. “Impulstor!” 

  Impulse gives him a look.

  Zedaph clears his throat awkwardly. “S-Sorry. Anyway, we should go and save Tango from, uh… Impulstor.”

  “Shouldn’t that be easy?” remarks Impulse. “I mean, I’M me. He’s not.”

  “Man, you didn’t see the way he was with Tango. He has to be some kind of clone of you or something; there’s no way he’s just a guy who’s studied the way you behave. It’s not about us not knowing you well enough; it’s him knowing every mannerism, every quirk, every facial tick. If it wasn’t for my random gut feeling, I doubt we’d have noticed for a really long time.”

  Impulse’s worry increases. If Tango, someone he’s known for over a decade, couldn’t even tell the difference between him and the imposter, his clone could have the whole server fooled within hours. 

  “We have to get to him away from the other hermits,” Impulse says. “The longer this goes on, the harder it’ll be to convince them I’m the real Impulse. What were him and Tango doing when you left?”

  “I think they were taking a look at your ice farm,” responds Zedaph. 

  Impulse shoots bolt upright. “Oh no! I spent ages getting that farm the exact way I wanted; he better not ruin anything!”

  Zedaph grips him by the shoulders. “Hey, easy, man. You might have a concussion.”

  “I don’t care! Tango is in real danger and so is everything I’ve ever built! I’m going over to my ice farm right now and you can’t stop me.”

  Zedaph hesitates. He knows his friend well enough to know that he really can’t stop him. “Okay, then. I’ll come with you.”

…

  “-really like this pattern,” Tango is saying, looking down at the floor underneath the ice farm. “How’d you think of it?”

  “Oh, it just came to me,” says Impulstor. “Took me a while to turn all the powder to concrete.”

  “I bet. Nice farm, dude!”

  “Thanks!” 

  Impulstor watches Tango move over to the side of the farm and look down. Tango clearly suspects nothing; if he has any doubts, he’s doing an amazing job hiding them. But Impulstor isn’t worried. From his (no, not his. Impulse’s) memories of Tango, he should be fairly easy to take down if the need arises. 

  But what he doesn’t anticipate is his ruse falling apart so soon.

  “TANGO!”

  Tango jerks and snaps his head upwards to find two figures flying towards him. He blinks in shock; one of them is clearly Zedaph but the other… It can’t be…

  Impulstor lets out a very quiet growl, before rearranging his face into an expression of shock. “Wait a sec…”

  Impulse nearly falls over in his haste as he lands, him and Zedaph getting between Tango and Impulstor. 

  “What the hell is going on?!” Tango demands. “Why are there two Impulses?!”

  “He’s an imposter,” declares Impulse, jabbing a finger at Impulstor. “He’s a fake Impulse.”

  “No, HE’s the fake!” Impulstor snaps back. “I don’t know what’s going on here but I’m the real Impulse!”

  “Oh god, this is my worst nightmare,” Tango groans. “How are we supposed to know who the real one is?”

  “Look, ask me anything,” says Impulse. “I’ll answer any question you ask.”

  “What was your first build when you joined Hermitcraft?” Zedaph asks.

  “The witch huts in season three,” say both Impulse and Impulstor at the same time, causing the former to stare at the latter in shock. 

  “Who did you team up with to do the pirate ship prank in season six?” Tango asks slowly.

  “Ren and Doc,” both Impulses say, again at the same time. 

  “What did you call your season five base?” Zedaph says.

  Again, the answer comes simultaneously from both Impulse and Impulstor: “Atlantis.” 

  “Okay, stop, stop.” Tango waves his hands. “This is going nowhere. I don’t know HOW you two have the exact same memory but clearly, we’re not gonna make any progress this way.” 

  “Hey, Impulse.” Zedaph turns pointedly to the real Impulse. “How did you get that scar on your thigh?”

  “From an arrow wound during the season six civil war,” Impulse and Impulstor reply.

  A split second later, Impulse realises what his friend is doing. He lifts his shorts leg just enough for the small scar to become visible. “This one.”

  The other three turn to Impulstor, who realises he’s in trouble here. He may have Impulse’s memories but they don’t share a body. Impulstor remembers the exact moment Impulse got that injury but he wasn’t actually there. He didn’t live it; Impulse did. 

  “Impulse, if you’re the real one, show us the scar,” Tango says sternly. 

  Impulstor hesitates, his slightly narrowed eyes flickering from Tango to Impulse. 

  Suddenly, Impulstor takes off running, deliberately slamming into Tango as he does. Tango tumbles to the ground and slides right over the edge of the farm with a terrified yell. 

  Luckily, Zedaph reacts quickly and grabs his friend’s wrist. This stops Tango from falling long enough for Impulse to take hold of his friend’s other hand, and the two pull Tango back to safety. 

  “Oh my gosh, are you okay?!” gasps Impulse. “You almost went over!” 

  Breathing heavily, Tango starts to speak but cuts himself off as he finally registers the bandage around Impulse’s head. “I-Impulse, did he hurt you?”

  “What?” Impulse frowns, before remembering his head injury, which is already mostly healed. “Oh, yeah. He ambushed me in my base and knocked me out and stuffed me in the hollow space in one of my pillars for like five hours or so.”

  “Oh my god...” Tango squeezes his eyes shut. “I-I’m so sorry…”

  “Wh-What?” Impulse stares at him. What for?”

  “For not realising he wasn’t you. I should have seen it; I can’t believe I was so blind.”

  Impulse blinks. “Oh, Tango, no. Please, please don’t feel guilty. It’s not your fault at all.”

  “But…” Tango’s eyes glisten with tears. “I… I’ve known you for at least ten years. Surely I…”

  “No,” says Impulse firmly. “Don’t blame yourself, Tango. Impulstor is… He’s me. Essentially.”

  “What do you mean, Impusle?” asks Zedaph quietly. 

  Impulse hesitates. “Impulstor is my Hels counterpart. He looks like me, talks like me, he has all my memories. Tango, nobody can really blame you for not noticing. Dude, I know I’m the real Impulse and even I did a double take. You know I’m not observant at all but that was taking it to a whole new level.”

  Tango gives a quiet laugh. “Yeah, you’re really not super observant. But still…”

  “And hey, at least we now have a fairly easy way to tell us apart,” Impulse adds. “He won’t be able to fool you two again. But the rest of the server needs to be warned and briefed on how to tell us apart. Will you help me do that, both of you?”

  “Of course I will,” says Zedaph immediately, putting his arm over Impulse’s shoulders. “We’re a team.”

  Tango meets Impulse’s gaze.

  Finally, he says, “I always knew you’d have an evil twin but I didn’t expect him to be LESS annoying than you.” 

  “Hey,” complains Impulse mildly. “Give me some credit for not trying to murder you.”

  Tango laughs and grabs his friend in a hug. “Don’t worry, you’re still my favourite Impulse.”

  Impulse hugs him back. “Good. Now, let’s find Xisuma and warn him about Impulstor.”

  Tango pulls sharply away from Impulse and stares at him. “Wait… Is that his NAME? Impulse plus imposter?”

  “Uh huh. Trust me, I didn’t choose it.”

  His friend bursts out laughing. “That’s GREAT! Oh my god. That sounds like something Zed would come up with.”

  “I know, right!” Zedaph laughs. 

  Impulse can’t help a laugh too. The tension and fear that’s been controlling him for the last few hours has mostly melted away now that his best friends are safe. Impulstor might still be out there but with a little luck, he won’t be able to fool the rest of the server the way he fooled Tango. He’s sure he’ll see Impulstor again, though. 

  But the real question is: how soon?

[votederpycausemufins]

Alright, we’re reaching the end. let’s at least see if I can reach 100k words!

@petrichormeraki 

and also @helleborusangel I’m worried about you. You haven’t touched your tumblr in about 2 and a half weeks. if anyone has heard from them, please let me know, I am worried aaaaaaaaaa.

An explosion shook the room, making Grifter use his wings as cover for both himself and Sense. A moment later he flapped his wings to clear the air and see what had caused the explosion. He growled upon seeing a group of people at the door, recognizing that most of them were hermits. Standing there were both Xisuma and Xannes, Joe, Zedaph, Scar and Cub. There were also two non-hermits, one of which being Techno since he had brought the other hermits. The last was someone Grifter recognized all too well. Kristen. And she was also holding onto both Grifect and Sefter.

Grifter tried not to look angry or yell and attack, even using a wing to keep Sense back. “Oh thank goodness you all came! This is going to help so much!” Grifter couldn’t say more before a trident was thrown at his head, him barely dodging it. “What are you doing, I’m the good guy here?”

“I have a hard time believing that.” Xannes huffed, but Grifter gestured to where Nightmare lay dazed on the floor.

“No, you don’t understand. He’s the bad guy in this situation. He was after both Theseus and Tommy. I was told I had to deal with him. I didn’t have any choice!”

Xannes scoffed. “A likely story.” And weapons were pointed at Grifter. The avian’s eyes continued to go between Nightmare as well as Kristen as she held his kids, but he held his arms up in surrender.

From behind the group, Xisuma made his way over to Tommy. Grifter paid no attention to him, But Sense did, pulling out a weapon. Techno was the first to move to stop the attack, but Grifter beat him to the punch, using his wing to hit the weapon out of Sense’s hand. “As I said. Good guys here. Unless of course you are here to hurt Tommy, then things change.”

“You destroyed half of the server.” Techno said.

“I made sure to take precautions. None of this is permanent. Everything is backed up and I made sure everyone could respawn. Meanwhile you’re got Grian running around with one of his sons, not even worried about the bug in his system.”

“What-” Someone started to say, Grifter wasn’t sure who, when Nightmare moved. Grifter moved out of the way, having been watching the admin. Nightmare’s attack missed, but he quickly adjusted, his axe aiming for Xisuma’s neck. Sense pulled out another weapon and pointed it at Nightmare, firing it. The blast hit Nightmare’s wrist, making him lose his weapon, but in order to take the shot, it also went through part of Grifter’s wing.

“There…” Grifter said, holding his wing. “Believe us now?”

Weapons slowly moved from pointing at Grifter to pointing at Nightmare. A quick glance around the room let him know that Xannes seemed to be the only one left with his guard up, but that was fine, he wasn’t the most dangerous one here. Cub and Scar both had vex magic, but only both of them working together had been enough to break Grifter’s barrier, so while they could potentially be dangerous, they also weren’t the biggest threat. Techno was probably the least threatening of the bunch, Xisuma as a close second. He may be admin, but this wasn’t his server, so for now he was essentially powerless.

But the last three were much more dangerous. Kristen had the same aura around her that his dad did, meaning she would have to be death here. But it also didn’t help that she wasn’t the only one with that energy. And then of course ‘Joe Hills’. He was arguably the most dangerous, but he also had an easy weakness right now. 

“Do any of you know someone named Eret?” Grifter spoke up, glad to see Joe look up and over at him.

“I do. Why’re ya askin’?”

“We couldn’t quite get down there, but there seemed to be some prison cells and someone with that name was there. I was pretty sure the name was familiar, but of course, since this is another dimension, I figured I’d ask you guys.” Grifter explained, then hissing slightly as Sense tried to help with his wound.

Joe briefly looked over at Xisuma, who nodded. After taking one last look around the room, the man left the room. One down, two to go. Kristen was off the table with the boys in her arms, but if push came to shove, they could take care of themselves. Grifter used a bit of magic to heal himself, noticing that the world setting had been changed, letting people naturally heal and respawn again. He quickly changed that back and readied his magic for an attack.

Both of the Convex noticed something was up and they started to say something, but Grifter was faster. He flew into the air just enough to get a height advantage before attacking Zedaph with such a powerful attack, he broke through the floor. At the same time, Sense pulled Xisuma away from Tommy, messing with his helmet and breaking the filters on it. 

Xannes tried to grab Grifter, but the Listener was prepared and he drew a swirl symbol in the air, and a moment later Xannes was gone. Grifter was left panting and he couldn’t do much more after using so much magic. Sense was busy taking care of the Convex, so he couldn’t help much more. Grifter barely managed to get out of the way of Techno attacking him, but it just moved him closer to Kristen. 

“What did you do with Phil?” She asked, just making Grifter chuckle.

“Nothing bad. And even if it was, I doubt it would affect Dad.” He laughed again. “So, why are you here? I would have thought you’d stay away.”

Kristen didn’t answer as Sefter’s hand changed into a sword and he stabbed her in the side. Her shock made her drop both him and Grifect, who quickly ran to Grifter’s side. “Awe uwu okay dad? Uwu wook tiwed. I'm sowwy I messed up.”

“Aww, it’s okay pumpkin. You did just fine.” Grifter patted Grifect’s head and Sefter faced Techno, ready to fight him. “Now now everyone. I’m sure we can all stand down at this point.”

“You were the one to attack first.” Techno huffed, making Grifter pout.

“You all barged in here ready to attack me with my children as hostages. Now they are free and everyone is fine.”

“Xisuma is suffocating!” Cub yelled, and Grifter rolled his eyes and used a bit of magic to fix the helmet.

“There, is that any better?” Grifter huffed, still panting a bit. “You’re all ready to work with Xannes but I try to help and suddenly I’m the worst thing in the world.”

“Even he hates you.”

“And he also hates his brother, but you guys are fine with him. But sure, make that the defining answer.” Grifter grumbling, trying to ignore the nudge in his side from Sense. “Now how about we just all calm down, I deal with my job, and we all go home safe and sound.”

“How do we know you’re telling the truth?” Scar asked, and Grifter nodded his head in Kristen’s direction, as well as Zedaph’s as he was just pulling himself out of the hole he had been stuck in.

“What are we talking about?” Zed asked, looking around, not having any context.

Kristen gestured to Grifter. “He’s got a request from Death that he needs to finish.”

“What? I never gave him anything like that. Was that you?”

“No, I assume it came from one of those in his world.”

“Oh yeah, that would do it. Oh by the way, look who I found!” And Zedaph helped Grian, Ranboo and Grumbot out of the hole. 

“Oh for fucks sake!” Grifter growled. “I just managed to salvage this two fucking times. Why aren’t you all dead?”

As soon as he had said that, everyone turned on Grifter once more, though this time he wasn’t trying to wriggle his way out of it. “Perhaps we should-” Sense started to say before the Listener slapped him. “Shut up! I don’t care how it happens, I am getting rid of that son of a whore admin! Now stay alive long enough to come back.” And three portals opened up next to Sense, Sefter and Grifect, pulling them in. 

“Fine. Gloves are off now.” Grifter said, staring directly at Grian, who knew exactly what that meant. Grian moved to pull Grumbot closer to himself while Kristen was the first to move and attempt to attack Grifter.

Before she could cause any harm, Grifter placed down some TNT which immediately exploded. The explosion blocked her view just long enough for him to move elsewhere and get the upper hand, shoving her to the floor. “Oh please, Dad’s already terrified I’ll kill him and become the next death or something. And seeing as how my uncle never shows his fucking face, I’m guessing he keeps shaking in his little pink lined boots.”

Xisuma was the next to attack, but Grifter kicked at the man, boots starting to tear at the seams. “And your brother is too much of a cocksucking ditz to cause any sort of trouble for me. Hacking skills or not. I had to deal with plenty in Deevo. And that’s when I was still learning everything!”

Grifter was whacked in the back, causing loose feathers to go flying. He turned to see that Techno had attacked with an axe, blood now dripping down the avain’s back. “You’re an improvement over the original at least. Euro’s one of the biggest cowards I’ve seen. I can hear when he kills himself from a mile away. It’s too bad he keeps getting to respawn, but when death doesn’t want you dead, it doesn’t happen.” One of Grifter’s wings hit Techno, the feathers stiff and sharp, opening wounds all over the piglin hybrid.

Next, vex magic attacked the Listener from both sides, leaving him cornered. “You two. Hah, now this is a challenge. Sort of. But I don’t give a fuck right now!” And Grifter pulled out a shovel, not having a better weapon readily available. He walked towards Cub, not caring as the magic started to burn away his clothes, revealing the discolored skin beneath. Cub did his best to increase his power and move away, and for a few moments it worked, pushing Grifter back, but then the shovel connected with his skull, knocking him to the ground. A few more whacks followed from Grifter for good measure, staining the metal red.

“Now, who’s up next?!” The Listener asked with a laugh, turning to face everyone. His outfit was a mess; torn and bloody, hanging limply on his body while his boots lay shredded to the side, talons having replaced his feet. His eyes were glossy, cataracts covering them leaving him essentially blind, but his ears had shifted, changing into something few had seen, the ears of a warden.

“What the heck?” Ranboo asked, having stuck by Grian’s side. “What is that?”

“Listener.” Grian responded, horrified. “When Watchers, and I guess also Listeners, use too much magic, their body shifts to better use it. I’ve apparently gone off the deep end once or twice and ended up something like that. Basically, if he was dangerous before… it’s worse now.”

True to what Grian had just said, Grifter moved swiftly, at Zedaph’s side the moment after he took a step. He was thrown against a wall, winding him before a metal clamp covered his mouth, making it so he couldn’t speak. As he pulled at it while also catching his breath, Grifter yanked out a handful of his feathers, blood pouring from the freshly plucked wing and the Listener’s own hand. He threw the feathers at Xisuma, them acting as throwing knives sent at the admin. A good number of them missed, but a few hit and sliced into his armor, fortunately also missing his helmet.

Kristen attacked Grifter next, getting an upper hand and using some of his own stray feathers as weapons. The Listener just stared at her, smiling as the edge of the blade like feathers pressed into his skin, drawing blood. “You aren’t going to kill me. Are you? You can’t. That’s how it works~ You’re the one who can’t interfere~ That’s your brother’s job. And oh, sounds like he can’t do that right now, can he?”

Kristen was going to do it. In this situation, she wasn’t bound by the laws of death. Grifter wasn’t from this dimension, so she had free reign. But the Listener’s words got to her, and for a split second, she looked away. Suddenly, Grifter’s wings moved and a number of his feathers were embedded in her chest, him laughing evilly. “Now don’t die~ I wouldn’t like that happening. Especially since he’s busy.”

Techno tried attacking Grifter again, but he was just swatted to the side. Scar was at Cub’s side, having pulled out some crystals to heal him. Zedaph was busy trying to free himself and Kristen was dealing with her own wounds. Grifter stepped closer to Xisuma before picking him up and breaking one of his helmet’s filters with his hand. Though it wouldn’t kill the admin, it would certainly cause him plenty of pain. 

Tossing Xisuma aside, Grifter finally made it to Nightmare. “Now, I should have been finished with you ages ago!” The Listener spoke, his voice filled with stifled laughter. “But this ends now. Dream? He’s easy. Everything’s already in a console because he was a little bitch who used children for his own benefit. I may not have many lines to draw, but I still have some.”

Nightmare started screaming as green magic surrounded him. For a moment, a figure of a second person stood next to him before it dissolved, disappearing completely. “Next, we need to get rid of those silly little admin powers you have because Dad wanted you dethroned.”

As Nightmare started to scream again, Grifter was attacked from the side. Out of all the people he expected, this was the last. Tommy stood, balanced mostly on his uninjured leg, holding a sword he had gotten from Xisuma. Grifter tisked a few times at Tommy, crossing his arms. “Theseus, Theseus, Theseus. What are you doing? Trying to get your revenge? That’s the same fucking mistake that put us in this situation in the first place. Why’d Dad even let you out?”

“Wrong person.” Tommy said weakly. He was light headed from blood loss as well as standing there, but he still swung his sword in an attempt to hit Grifter.

“Right, right. Well, I’m not called a Listener for no reason.” And then a wing swiped across the ground, hitting Tommy’s feet out from under him. “Stay out of this before you make it so much worse.”

Grifter turned back to Nightmare, continuing to use magic on the admin. No one had enough energy left to do anything as they listened to his screams. Slowly, they grew strained before it was finally quiet again. Grifter frowned and kicked Nightmare, the limp body giving no resistance. “Aww, it’s broken. Hmm, I guess I can have a little more fun with it.”

He started stomping on the body, making absolutely sure Nightmare was truly dead, damaging the body beyond recognition. The whole time, Grifter was smiling and having fun. Around him, everyone was slowly tending to each other’s wounds, the Listener not caring. Kristen checked on Grian who was helping her with the feathers still stuck in her. Zedaph assisted Xisuma with his helmet, managing to not make it more complicated than it needed to be. At the same time, he helped Tommy out a bit as the two were right near each other. Scar was still helping Cub, and for lack of anyone else to help out, Techno stayed near Ranboo and Grumbot.

Finally, Grifter stepped away from Nightmare, hands on his hips as he ‘looked’ at his work proudly. “Well, that could have gone better, but it was still nice! Now, since you all caused so many problems, who do I get to have fun with next?” When no one answered, Grifter pouted before turning to Tommy. “Hmm, let’s see-”

Before he could say anything else, Kristen was in front of Tommy and Grian was attacking Grifter from the back. Grifter growled, using plenty of magic to attack them back, nearly killing Grian in the process. But just as it looked like Grifter was going to win, he was suddenly thrown against the throne with enough force to break it. “Now why’d you go and start without me?”

Joe had entered the room, followed by Eret. “I’m sure we could have found a much more non-violent approach, left everyone in much better shape.” He stopped over at Zedaph, helping get the metal covering his mouth off. “I’m guessing he’s dead?” Joe gestured to Dream’s body.

“Eh, that’s Krist’s side of things, not mine. I’m busy keeping an eye on her husband.” Zedaph replied, jabbing his thumb off in the general direction of Phil. “That’s part of the reason she’s here is because I filled her in.”

Joe nodded and walked over to Kristen, who was sitting on the ground next to Tommy. “Zed said to check in with you. How’s he looking?” Joe gestured to Dream’s body again.

“It’s a bit complicated with the fact that a hels person got mixed up with things, but for all intents and purposes, they’re both dead.”

Joe nods. “And how’s Tommy doing? Not too hurt?”

“No, he’s doing fine. I’m… more concerned about Grian.”

Joe looked over his shoulder to look at Grian. In attacking Grifter with Kristen, he was using magic he really couldn’t easily use, leaving him in a similar situation to Grifter. At that moment in time, Grian had plopped himself down on the ground and was summoning plenty of wheat. “Oh yeah, he’s fine. I’d say you should get him to stop using magic right now, but it’s nothing dangerous and he could use a break. Maybe stick around a bit.”

“I’m not sure. With my job-”

“Zed takes breaks all the time. You can let yourself have a few too. I mean, you must’ve taken a few to have a family, take some more to spend time with them. I know that’s what I’m planning to do.” And Joe half gestured to Eret, who was currently looking over the damaged room.

Kristen wanted to say more, but then Grian came over and started dragging Tommy away, Kristen quickly following behind. Grian had used the wheat to make plenty of hay bales which were spread out in the approximation of a nest. Tommy had been placed down within it in a rather cushy area, glad for something other than the hard ground.

Grian doted on Tommy for a bit more before hopping away, leaving Tommy chuckling. “Pfft, bird brain.” He then leaned back, putting his hands behind his head and looking over to Kristen. “So, seeing you is different.”

“Hi Tommy.”

[thelionbyname]

“The Pole, The American, And The Four Brits”Prequel part two

(It needs a better name... any suggestions? Anyway, enjoy! )

Those with heightened senses could begin to decipher what was going on. Impulse, with ears more sensitive than those of a bat, took out the earplugs he had to wear when playing music, and listened carefully. Alongside the screams, he could hear the faint snik of the Hermits blinking as they tried to let their eyes adjust to the sudden darkness. But they soon noticed that their eyes weren’t adjusting, and they were all rendered blind for the time being. It seemed as though all the light had been sucked away, every last shimmer.

Only one seemed to be able to see. When previously her blonde hair had been bouncing around her face, it now hung still, framing her angelic face. From underneath thick, dark lashes gazed two shining eyes of light summer blue. These eyes had no trouble seeing in the pitch black, and easily studied the scene. They swept across the confused faces of everyone in the room, picking up every detail. 

Almost everyone present had the hairs on the backs of their necks standing upright, and goosebumps on their arms. The screams had chilled them all to the bone. The maroon wolf had made a reappearance; Ren’s reflexes had prepared him for battle. Fangs bared, a menacing growl escaped from his muzzle. None of the hermits were alarmed by this, as they knew Ren’s growl only too well. 

“Falsie, can you see?” Impulse suddenly asked the blonde woman, turning in her general direction.

“Yes, I see everything, but nothing peculiar,” her soft british voice responded.

Ren’s furry ears pricked up then, and Impulse’s head turned to face up. Their powerful hearing picked up something that False couldn’t.

“What is it? What do you hear?” she inquired urgently. But the answer presented itself. Though Impulse and Ren had picked up on the sound before the others could, it became louder and louder, until everyone present was listening to the sucking noise, like a vortex was about to consume the world.

“I think we should go outside, see what’s going on,” Impulse suggested.

“Only the three of us are able to navigate in this darkness, Impulse, and based on those screams, whatever’s out there will require more than that to hold our own.”

“I can navigate, I know echolocation,” a new voice suddenly contributed. His voice was slightly raspy, and very clearly German. False looked at the source, and studied a half creeper, half cyborg man in amazement.

“You do?” She asked him, impressed but honestly not surprised. She looked around the room and saw her admiring expression mirrored in the faces of the rest of the hermits.

“Yes, now we should get outside”.

Tango suddenly had an amazing idea. Impulse could tell by the way his heart sped up. And sure enough, a few seconds later Tango’s fully developed plan made its way from his brain to his mouth. “Wait! What if Cleo and I link our minds to everyone else’s, and we can all see through Falsie’s eyes? It would take some getting used to, we would need to move as one, but it would allow us all to see.”

Murmurs of assent rippled through the crowd.

“It’s better than nothing. Besides, I’ve always wanted to have a look in your mind,” Zedaph said to Tango.

“I think the best way to do it is that Tango and I each connect to half of you, and then connect to each other,” Cleo decided. “Permission to enter your minds?”

Everyone nodded. Not that Cleo could see that, but she saw their surface thoughts even before she fully embraced their minds with hers. Within a second, Cleo and Tango’s minds had wrapped around each other, woven together until they thought as one, and there was no telling which thought was whose. There was no need to debate whose mind would link to which hermits’; as soon as one of them thought it, so did the other. They expanded their minds to engulf those of twelve hermits each.

It was a rather bizarre feeling. From one moment to the next, everyone had super hearing, they could all see in incredible detail, and a strange scent suddenly seemed to fill their nostrils.

“Ugh, Ren, is this what humans smell like to you?” Grian asked, pinching his nose. But that didn’t help, of course, because the smell came from his mind.

A strange rumbling came from the wolf, and it sounded like he was laughing.

The panic outside was almost entirely forgotten as the hermits adjusted to their new senses and eased into their webbed connection. But then a particularly loud scream broke through those the hermits had managed to tune out. This brought them all back to the issue at hand.

“Right. We have more important things to deal with it sounds like. We weren't given these powers to mess around,” Xisuma said, taking charge. It was unnecessary to talk anymore, as everyone hears his every thought, but he did it out of habit.

Everyone moved simultaneously. It was a sight to behold, as twenty four men and women all made their way across the large room to the front doors, taking their steps at exactly the same time. Left, right, stumble. 

“This gives a whole new meaning to the phrase ‘Together we are one’,” the man with the moustache grinned.

But the more they practiced, the more independent, but still linked, their minds became. Before they’d made it out of the building, most of them were able to individually avoid obstacles. In less time than any of them would have estimated, they were outside. As soon as they got there, they found themselves clutching onto one another, as something tried to suck them away from the face of the earth. The reason for the screams quickly became apparent; about a dozen people also had the misfortune to be outside at that moment, and a small black hole was sucking them in. It seemed to be just strong enough to pull in anything not attached to the ground, and judging by the way some people sobbed, it had already claimed its first victims.

The hermits tried their best to get back inside; it would do nobody any good if they got sucked through, and they could work out a plan from in there. But the black hole had other plans. As if it knew the hermits had appeared, as if it knew they were vulnerable, it started getting stronger. It tried to pull them into its deadly embrace, tearing at their fancy clothes and whipping their hair about.

“I’m slipping! Guys, help!” a voice, who the Hermits all knew belonged to Keralis, shouted in panic. He could barely hold on to the streetlantern he had managed to grasp. One by one, his fingers slid off. A split second before he let go, Xisuma launched himself at him, trying to weigh him down. “Sashwammy, no! Let go!” Keralis tried to warn him, but it was too late. Together, they hurled into the void.

                                            *          *          *

[star-captain]

So Much Better

Angst? Yes please! I’ve had the honor to give Red’s au life, to create a story around his amazing artwork. And I can’t help but latch onto the dramatic scene of Edolas Mumbo meeting his Hermit self. 

The Edolas team has found themselves in the Hermit world, and are meeting people with the same face, but different personality. Edolas Mumbo’s insecurities rise and boil over when he comes face to face with a better version of himself.

Edolas AU belongs to @theguardiansofredland

Warning: Alcoholism, Violence, drug mention

It’s been some time since the hermits have been open to visitors from other worlds. A new world can be stressful, and it’s best just to keep to themselves while they sort it all out. Better to deal with their own chaos before adding in someone else’s. But eventually, trouble finds them. 

From the Edolas world, it was just natural to explore what’s beyond. Xisuma makes it impossible not to be curious about what’s on the other side of his crazy portals he macgyvers together. And when Scar ultimately pushes Mumbo in, Grian has to jump after. Everyone else follows in after, with Impulse being dragged in last by an overzealous Zedaph. Black ground bursts out from the portal, massive stone pillars capturing the energy of floating crystals between the tongs. Purple mist swirls beneath the glass at their feet, every so often lightning snapping across the cloudy air. 

“Oh, that definitely didn’t take long.” Scar chuckles, peering over the nether portal. “Though I definitely was expecting visitors of the more...pig variety.” 

“Scar?” Edolas Grian coos, tilting his head and looking at the man above the crowd. He has the exact same face, the same voice as Scar, but he acts completely different. He’s...well, he’s cheery, friendly. 

“That’s not me man.” Edolas Scar growls, looking at the dopey version of himself before him. 

“Aha! I knew it! Alternate Universes! Worlds with the same people, experiencing different choices!” Edolas Xisuma scrabbles up the smooth obsidian monument, practically hopping onto Scar and scaring the daylights out of him. “They are obviously nothing like us! I mean, this Scar here is in his underwear!” 

“Hey, it’s not my fault the infinity portal forgot my pants!” Scar whines. He looks across the group, pushing the feral scientist off his perch. They all look like his friends, and yet nothing like the other hermits. It’s creepy. It’s cool. It’s magical. “You should definitely check out the other hermits, then. They’re a pretty awesome bunch, if I do say so myself.” 

“If they’re anything like you, they’re bound to be strange.” Mumbo grumbles, keeping close to Grian. He’d rather just go back to his world. He doesn’t want to meet with whatever there is out in this world. And he definitely doesn’t want to see what his alternate self is like. If he’s nothing like Mumbo, then he’s obviously not cool. He’s obviously a dork, a baby. He’s probably...Mumbo shakes the thoughts away from his head. He’s not letting those thoughts give themselves credence. If only he had some vodka on him, there’s no faster way to get rid of such thoughts. 

So of course the first person Scar offers for them to see is this world’s Mumbo. “I think him and the other Architechs are doing some sort of get together. I know Iskall and Mumbo are partners, but I don’t know what Grian has to offer. Cactus maybe?” 

“Why would this place’s Iskall want to partner with Mumbo? I can hardly stand this jackass.” Edolas Iskall sneers, glaring at Mumbo. Mumbo flips the bird back, hiding it from Grian. He knows Grian doesn’t like getting into arguments, but Mumbo thrives off conflict. He tries to keep it hidden from his friend. To keep him from getting anxiety from the tension. 

“Mumbo is a really cool dude. Trust me, his work is amazin. “ Scar cheers, guiding the crew into the depths of the jungle, heading westward. “He’s super smart, he makes these machines that just blow my mind with all kinds of redstone.” 

“Definitely the opposite of our Mumbo. I don’t think he can count to ten...unless it’s ten shots.” Edolas Scar hisses, stepping way too close to Mumbo’s personal space for his liking. Mumbo shoves him away, muscles tightening as he listens to Scar talk. Both Scars are beyond annoying, for different reasons. The Scar Mumbo knows is annoying because he’s a prick, a jackass who can’t shut his mouth unless it’s broken for him. This ‘hermit’ Scar is annoying because he won’t be quiet about things. He won’t stop talking about all the amazing achievements that his Mumbo has done. An entire company with automated delivery, walking houses and hands-free machines. 

The more Scar talks about Hermit Mumbo, the more Edolas Mumbo hates him. He’s smart, and popular. Even this Scar likes him. Mumbo, on the other hand, struggles to even keep Grian around. Why would Grian want to stay around him? He’s not smart, or popular. He’s not jubilant or silly like this one seems to be. No, Edolas Mumbo is a piece of shit with nothing good to his name. The only thing he’s smart on is the best kind of drinks and drugs, he’s only popular when it comes to seducing people. 

The group arrives at the quiet river, the potatoes growing before the circular hovel nestled in the hillside. Across the river, a series of machines are running at lightning pace. Xisuma can’t help being drawn to the inventions, optimized to give the best products in the shortest amount of time. Iron farms working nonstop, sugarcane growing as fast as possible, and a smelter cooking without a single coal wasted. 

“Hey Mumbo! I have some friends that would love to meet you!” Scar yells, poking his head through where a door should be. It seems Scar isn’t the only one to fall victim of the Jungle Bandit. 

“I wouldn’t say ‘love’.” Mumbo hisses. He winces as Grian slaps his shoulder lightly. 

“Be kind, Mumbo. We’re guests, and you shouldn’t judge a book by it’s cover.” Grian whispers. 

Three familiar faces peer out the massive glass window. All three are easy to identify, though some more than others. Iskall still has his emerald eye, but rather than an eternal frown on his face, his cheeks are creased with dimples. Grian has an evil glint in his eye, practically rushing down the ladder to meet the strangers at the doorstep. 

The two Mumbo’s simply stare at one another. The same face, same black hair and smooth mustache, on completely different people. Hermit Mumbo’s hair is slicked back, neat and tidy. His mustache is well trimmed, and he wears a well tailored suit. Edolas Mumbo’s hair sticks out in every direction, like he just woke up from a drunken stupor. Probably because he did. Piercings litter his face, cool metal brushing against his frazzled mustache and hair. Mumbo looks at his clothes, dirty and stained with alcohol and...well, other things. He just grabbed whatever was the least dirty, wore it out to party last night then fell asleep in it. 

Hermit Grian flies up, locking in on his counterpart. Edolas Grian squeaks, hiding behind Mumbo. “Whoa, I look good in every world.” 

Grian tugs on his bowtie, gulping as he dares to look closer at himself. Hermit Grian can barely keep still, bouncing from foot to foot and even fluttering the elytra wings on his back. Mumbo steps back between the two, seeing the mischievous glitter in Hermit Grian’s eyes. He’s seen that kind of trouble before. This one is a little shit. A gremlin. Nothing like the ball of anxiety behind him. Edolas Grian couldn’t even knock over a punching bag without apologizing. 

Hermit Grian looks up, surprised by the angry face. He’s not sure if he’s ever seen Mumbo make that kind of a stare. Daggers cutting through him, like some terrifying biker or punk rocker. “I don’t know if I like Mumbo with ear piercings however.” 

“Tough, because they’re staying.” If anything, now he wants to get more. Just to spite the gremlin in front of him. 

“You’re me?” Mumbo questions, appearing from his hobbit hole. “Wow...I look...I look…” Mumbo is at a loss of words, glancing over his Edolas counterpart. He looks badass, like some guy who knows how to find trouble and win. He’d make a better mole than Hermit Mumbo. 

But under the gaze of Hermit Mumbo, Edolas Mumbo can feel every part of him being scrutinized. His sloppy dress, the alcohol on his breath. Every insecurity, every vice and weakness is under a microscope. 

“This is the man of the hour, let me just say. I mean, look at this awesome iron farm he just built!” Scar waves the group over to Mumbo’s work. “How many iron ingots does it make?” 

Hermit Mumbo scuffles his feet, blushing. “Oh, something like 3,000 ingots and hour. It’s not the fastest, but it’s more than enough for me.” 

Mumbo rolls his eyes as the others gasp in awe. What a waste of energy. Who even needs 3,000 ingots? Mumbo can think of a thousand better things to waste his time on than making such ridiculous contraptions. Hermit Mumbo is just lazy. Smart, smarter than Edolas Mumbo, but surely he’s lazy. 

At least, until he starts to show his current project. Edolas Grian gravitates towards Hermit Mumbo, enjoying the calm and funny personality. And that infuriates Mumbo. Even his best friend things this useless brainiac is better than him? Grian points at the half-finished machine, in awe with wide eyes. Wrapped into the conversation. “What does this do, Mumbo?” 

Hermit Mumbo goes into some long winded explanation, and the second Mumbo hears his own voice, he tunes out. But he can’t help but watch as his own friends are rapt with Mumbo’s words. Xisuma is taking notes at a feverish pace, and even Scar is listening to the suited version of Mumbo. 

No one is better than me. Mumbo reminds himself. He may not be as smart, or as popular, or as funny, or as kind as Hermit Mumbo. But he’s cooler. He’s sly, he’s independent, he’s the life of the fucking party. This guy… this guy can’t stop talking about t-flops or whatever. 

Edolas Mumbo sneers as Edolas Scar looms close, resting his arm on Mumbo’s jacket. “Would you look at that. Even your best friend prefers this version to you.” 

“Shut the fuck up.” Mumbo steps back, letting Scar fall flat on his face. But Mumbo looks at Grian, both Grians listening intently to Mumbo show off his spectacular knowledge. The machine starts to fire, turning the farm on and beginning it’s collection. 

Even he is better than me. Mumbo can’t build incredible designs, machines that make life easier, that astonish and astound. Machines that Mumbo could never even begin to imagine, much less build himself. He can hardly even get the key of his own apartment into the lock most days. Mumbo can’t make friends, even the people he hangs out with most would rather eat fermented spider eye than call him an ally. He’s not funny unless he’s got a cocktail of drugs mixing up his mind and body. And the last thing anyone, even Grian, would call Mumbo is kind. He’s an asshole, a bastard. A rubbish friend and an even more rubbish person. A waste of space. A waste of time, a waste of effort.

Mumbo rolls his eyes, but he hears Edolas Grian’s bright voice over the amazement of the others. “You’re so cool, Mumbo! You can make all this incredible stuff, and you’re smart enough to explain it all. And kind enough to show us it all, I can’t imagine thinking of all this. This has to be why so many people ask you for help!” 

Edolas Mumbo can hear something snap, like a bone breaking in his own mind. His own heart. Grian never called him smart, or kind. No one has ever called him anything except a bastard, or a fucker, or an asshole. He hardly feels his fists clench, looking at his own face. How long has Mumbo wanted to punch himself, to beat himself up? To give him what he deserves? How often has he looked in the mirror, drunk and high, and just wanted to knock himself out? 

“Oh, it’s nothing really, mate. I’m honestly not that good, you should see something like Impulse.” Hermit Mumbo overs a shy smile, eyes closed as he smooths back his hair. His awkward chuckle is cut short as a rough grip wraps around his neck. Hermit Mumbo’s legs kick out as the raging grip raises him from the grass. He forces his eyes open, hand grabbing at the tattooed arm- of himself. 

“Stop being better than me!” Edolas Mumbo shouts, fists shaking and a prick of tears burning at the corners of his eyes. Mumbo looks down the arm holding him up, head tipped high but eyes glancing down to see his own face. He gasps for air, holding onto the arm suspending him in the air. And despite being physically in peril, he can see that he’s not the one suffering as much as Edolas Mumbo. In shared grey eyes, he can see the pain, the fear. 

Edolas Mumbo is terrified. Everyone thinks this Mumbo is so much better- because they’re right. He is a thousand times better than him. Scar prefers him, Xisuma prefers him. Even his best friend, Grian, prefers this Mumbo to him. They’ll ditch Mumbo in no time, in lieu of so much better a version. He’s nothing compared to the amazing, perfect person he has grasped in his hand. He’s just a bastard, someone that everyone hates. Someone that everyone wants gone. 

“Mumbo! Stop it, what are you thinking?” Both Mumbos look over, seeing Edolas Grian with tears streaking down his face. Torn between wanting to tell his friend off for being so aggressive, and wanting to calm him down. But for Edolas Mumbo, seeing his best friend crying because of him lets him know that he’s done it again. He’s fucked it all up again, because he can’t handle his own emotions. He can’t control himself, he can’t be anything except a piece of shit and a walking disaster. 

Mumbo let’s go of his own neck, lightly setting Hermit Mumbo onto his feet. The tiny tears have grown to full floods, guilt and regret and hatred all boiling over. Despite the soft landing, Mumbo still falls to his knees, trying to regain control of his heartbeat and body. He looks up, wanting to ask himself what the problem was. Why he was more afraid than Hermit Mumbo. 

But he’s gone, a cavity bored through the crowd that surrounded him. Hermit Grian steps in, looking at Mumbo’s neck. It’s red, but not bruised. Despite the anger in Edolas Mumbo’s grip, he couldn’t bring himself to actually hurt another person for no reason other than wanting to bring pain to himself. Grian looks at the shaking Grian. “I think he needs some help.” 

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

“Mumbo?” Grian whispers, peeking his head into the empty bar. It’s midday, but he knew that if Mumbo was going to go anywhere, it was here. This is his favorite haunt, where he can get the cheapest prices on drinks, find the best new addictions, and hit up the next morning’s mistake. 

There’s only two people in the dark, smoky bar. The bartender, who nods to the end of the line of stools. The darkest corner. Mumbo is surrounded by an assortment of bottles, shots, and whiskey glasses. Mumbo’s head is against the glistening and sticky counter, hand still clutching the current bottle. Grian creeps closer, clambering onto the stool next to Mumbo. 

“I thought you’d rather be with that perfect version of me.” Mumbo growls, turning his gaze away from his friend. “And why wouldn’t you, huh?” 

“Mumbo, I-” Grian flinches back as Mumbo snaps at him, cutting him off. He can smell the alcohol on his breath. This may not be the first time Grian has had to help Mumbo through a bout of alcohol poisoning. Hopefully he won’t need the hospital this time. 

“Just leave me, get something better than this piece of shit. Someone smarter than me, kinder than me. Someone who can actually do something useful with their life. Who’s good at so many things. Redstone, being nice, being funny and friendly and smart and such a great person!” Mumbo grasps the bottle in his hand until the glass shatters, shards digging into his skin. Grian has never seen his best friend so low. He’s afraid, not for his own safety. For Mumbo’s. “And what am I good at? Nothing. Nothing except overdosing in an alley outside a bar.” 

Mumbo’s head snaps to the side, cheek stinging and burning red. His eyesight is set straight, free from the drunken stupor for just a moment. Just enough to look back, and see Grian. With his hand still up, and his face creased with sorrow and tears. Deep valleys as he holds back his own cries. Not because he’s sad for himself. But sad for Mumbo. “How could you say such a thing? How could you honestly think that any of us would want you any different than who you are?” 

“Because he’s-” 

“Because he’s you? He’s not you, Mumbo. He’s got a different world, a different life. A different place that he grew up in. A different set of vices and worries than you.” Grian scoots the stool closer, forcing Mumbo to listen. “He’s smart, and kind. But that doesn’t make us ever want to get rid of you! You are wild, and clever, and there’s not another person in this world that would step into a fight for any one of us. Even for Scar, if it came down to it.” 

“Great, so I’m just you guys’s bodyguard.” Mumbo hisses, looking at the glass buried in his fingers. 

“No, Mumbo! Just...for once listen to me, for fuck’s sake!” The sharp curse that crosses over Grian’s lips is enough to snap Mumbo back to his words. Grian never swears, he’s too much of a goody-two-shoes for that. “We are your friends because we want to be! We hang out with you because we enjoy it! Just because one person is different than you doesn’t mean you’re any better or worse!” 

Mumbo’s voice is gone from his lips, and all he can do is breathe in and out. He can’t think of any retort for Grian’s words. Just one thing. “I messed up, Grian.” 

“We all mess up. But the important thing is learning from it. Learning from our mistakes, and being better from it. Maybe...one day we can go back and smooth things over with Hermit Mumbo. But...for now, let’s get you some help.”

[prismarine-parrots]

Tree of Life Pt. 1

Originally posted: 25 Feb. 2019

Ahahahahhaha

This five part-story earned me the title Thanos of Hermitcraft and created the first fanart and meme of any of my content. Send help for us all.

Part 2

Part 3

Part 3.5

Part 4

Part 5 (1)

Part 5 (2)

No one had seen Grian in three weeks.

Normally, it wouldn't be too surprising for people to be quiet for a while. Everyone working on their own projects and maybe not in the right area to see the person in question.

But something was different with this case. The player list said that Grian was online, not AFK, so not outside the server in the community hub or working on a different project on his channel. In this case, SOMEONE would normally at least see him restocking his traveling-cart-that-never-travels, or flying around his base wasting rockets, or at the very least bothering Mumbo Jumbo, his closest neighbor.

Mumbo himself had not been too worried at first. When it had been a couple days since Grian has visited he had sent a letter though their mail system to make sure that 1. The mail system might actually be used and 2. Make sure Grian was alright. Not twenty minutes later Grian had responded that he was fine, just busy at his base.

The next red flag was when Zedaph realized that the only reason his Quartz, Warts, and Shorts shop was making sales was because Grian's cheaper traveling cart next door hadn't been restocked in weeks. While at first he was a little miffed at this fact, this started to get him worried. Grian was normally fairly good about restocking his cart, sometimes with his own supplies instead of getting extra, even if not shown on camera he still made sales. With the mining desert and gravel pit nearly out of both materials, people had started regularly going to Grian's shop, hoping for more of those grindy blocks in which he specialized.

When Iskall had private messaged Grian asking if he wanted to help prank DocM for the heck of it, Grian had declined, saying that he had been grinding blaze powder in the Nether. This has confused Iskall. Why did Grian need blaze powder? The only thing it was good for was eyes of Ender and potions. They had already beat the dragon and turned the End into a farm for shulkers and elytra, so needing eyes of Enders was off the list. But why did Grian need potions? Iskall has assumed a prank and asked if Grian wanted help with other potion ingredients, but he had declined in a rather cold "no," saying that the strawberry blonde didn't need any more stress right now.

It wasn't until someone not even on the Hermitcraft server, PearlescentMoon, messaged someone she knew was in the server to check on Grian, as he hadn't posted anything online in nearly three weeks, and hadn't given any explanation to where he may have gone.

When Iskall finally heard that he had called Mumbo, Xisuma, and False, hoping that maybe one of them could help.

"Heeeeyy Iskall!" X greeted as he swooped I'm in front of Grian's cart, where Iskall has thought to ironically meet because it was in the middle of the shopping district and an easy place to meet, not actually because they were here to talk about Grian.

"What's up?" False asked, using an ender pearl to warp into the side of the cart and bouncing off casually.

"Show off," Iskall muttered, recognizing the subtle PVP tactics. False grinned but before she could retort, Mumbo landed with a little stumble, grumbling about lag and elytra not working properly still.

"Hey Mumbo!" Iskall greeted cheerfully. Mumbo nodded silently as the others waved.

"Why have you called us, Iskall?" X asked curiously.

"Right, right," the Swede started, glancing around the small group, "now that we're all here, I'm going to get straight to the point. Has anyone seen Grian recently?"

Everyone shook their heads.

"I've been by his base a couple of times, but he's never there. He's replied to my texts at least, but hasn't shown up around my base in a while," Mumbo immediately recalled with a frown.

Xisuma was on his phone, a tool that everyone had for chat, inventory, surfing the web outside the server, everything. "It says he's online," he noted, turning the screen the other way and showing the online player list.

"He's been online for weeks," False informed, "Every time I've looked he's been on anyway."

"And yet no one has seen him? I was hoping that maybe you had seen him on another part of the server, like your fantasy district, False." Iskall sighed. The blonde girl shook her head.

"I think we should check on him. This usually isn't like him," X decided, prepping a rocket.

"I was wondering if there might be a glitch somewhere, and that's why he's been so weird. That's why I called you, X," Iskall explained as he took out a stack of rockets from his backpack.

"And I'm here because I'm closest to him I'm assuming, not because of my redstone or that I'm a spoon," Mumbo sighed jokingly. Everyone got a quick laugh out of that before Iskall patted Mumbo's back rather hard, making him stumble, before they all took off over the shoulder of the Statue of Hermity.

Within minutes the group was circling the massive tower in the middle of the ocean, an insane project for the newest member of Hermitcraft.

"See anything?" False called to anyone nearby.

"Nothing! Looks empty to me!" X replied.

Iskall blasted out of the bottom floor entrances. "The towers are mob traps, don't go in there!" he screeched, sounding thoroughly spooked.

"What about the basement? Or the upper floors?" Mumbo asked.

"He has a basement?" False questioned.

Iskall nodded. "I'll check there. False, want to come with? Mumbo and X, you go check upstairs. Sound good?"

With a quick confirmation from everyone, the pairs split to search the futuristic wedding cake.

Iskall had been down to the basement a few times before, if only in the first few weeks of Hermitcraft Season 6 when Grian actually USED his basement. There were chests down there that were collecting dust, and some poor cows trapped in a nano farm the NHO apparently never discovered.

"Oh my gosh, Iskall! Look at this!" False called from somewhere ahead.

"Coming!" Iskall replied and tried to find where False had gone off to.

He skidded to a halt when he found her on the edge of an opening in the shoddy basement, facing a massive opening in the rock.

"Woah," Iskall breathed. The cave was huge and clearly manmade, and the Swede wondered how long it must have taken for Grian to dig and terraform and decorate the cavern.

No to mention the large egg-shaped build floating in the air in the center of the cave.

"I think we found Poultry Man," False smirked.

"So calling G our on it when we find him," Iskall laughed. Then both his and False's phone buzzed.

<xisumavoid> come to the top of of the tower

"Let's go then!" False cheered.

They shot out of the bubble columns through the body of water underneath Grian's base and launched through the holes in the middle of each layer to the top.

"Too far guys!" Mumbo's voice called as they flew through the top layer.

"Oops!" Iskall chuckled.

"Coming right back down!" False called and they two glided into the smallest layer.

Xisuma and Mumbo were inside a vibrant garden that was in the top layer. There were vines growing up the sides of the cyan glass and parrots that squawked warily from a distance.

But the most eye-catching thing was the tree that grew to the side.

"What in the world?" False breathed when she landed.

"Don't know, but it doesn't look great," Xisuma said shortly, already on his phone and tapping at controls and Admin commands.

Iskall landed beside Mumbo, who was examining the tree intently with a concerned frown and creased eyebrows.

Every hermit on the server's life force was tied to a special tree. It was something new that they were trying, to prevent less deaths and item losses by being more careful and to fix a few issues that had happened on the technical side from previous seasons. A lot of the trees were unique to look like each Hermit, such as DocM's being rather sharply split between green and grey or Scar's currently being a palm tree. Most of the time they were no big deal. Each time a hermit died, the tree would take some damage in some way, such as a leaf dropping to the ground. Unless it was several deaths in a row, you couldn't even notice the difference in the tree. And even if you did die a lot, if you played it safe for a couple days your tree would be back to normal again in no time.

But this was different.

Grian's tree here in his aviary looked half-dead. It was normally a fairly simple oak tree, but with autumn red leaves instead of green. But half the leaves were fallen, dry on the ground, and the ones still on the tree were either brown or purple. A limb had even fallen, splintered and leaning against the trunk of the tree itself.

"Grian..." Mumbo murmured. He couldn't imagine what had happened for this to be the cause, or how Grian must be feeling if his tree was like this.

"What happened?” Iskall wondered, he started to approach the tree, but Xisuma called him back.

"It doesn't look like the tree has been healing over time properly," X muttered under his breath, his expression serious as he analyzed the details coming up on the server monitoring screen of his phone.

"We all know Grian dies a lot, could that be the cause?" False suggested nervously. X shook his head.

"This is over a long span of time, probably since the start of the season even."

"And Grian hasn't died since he's gone silent. It's not hard to miss a death message in the chat," Mumbo recalled, also pulling up the server chat on his own phone, "It's been three weeks, that should be plenty of time for the tree to have healed without any interruptions."

The sound of a firework going off and a rush of air as elytra closed up. The four hermits jumped as a newcomer stumbled into the garden, losing his balance and catching the broken branch to hold himself up as he landed.

"Guys?" A very pale- and sick-looking Grian breathed, before coughing into his arm and sliding to the ground.

"I think something's wrong..."

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

Word Count: 1830

[thelionbyname]

Together We Are One (prequel part 5)

(This has kind of evolved from a fanfiction into its own story, but eh, enjoy!)

“Hey Impulse! What’s going on? Little Tango called and said you wanted me to come.” A friendly voice drifted through the house, preceding its owner: another old man, but one who still had streaks of blond hair visible between the grey strands. This man walked in slightly bent over, not because of age, but because a very small girl was clinging onto his index finger. Together, they walked over to the center of the room, where a gathering of sorts seemed to be taking place. Four toddlers were sitting on the ground, facing the old man with the dirty shirt: Impulse.

Impulse looked up at the newcomers and replied, “Zed! Yeah, well... I think it’s time to tell them, and I thought it would be easier for both of us if we did it together.”

Whatever Zed had been expecting, this wasn’t it. It seemed Impulse had uncovered some memories he had tried to suppress. His eyes were suddenly filled with pain, pain that had not been there the first time, that now crashed back like a boomerang; only temporarily disposed of. He dove head first into the rabbit hole of memories that, despite having been in a hidden corner of his mind for thirty years, were clear as day, made fresh through the pain that stained them.

“Gwampa, what’s wong?” The innocent voice of the small child pulled him out of his whirlwind of thoughts, and Zed was suddenly aware of the girl gently tugging his finger.

“I’m okay, Tekkie. Go sit down.” And to Impulse, he said, “Yeah… I guess it is.”

The little girl, Tekkie, her grandpa’s troubles already forgotten, ran over to sit next to Tango and held his hand. Her soft fingers, which had not yet lost their baby fat, easily wove through his, and were clearly very comfortable doing so. He grinned at her, and she flashed a dimpled smile back. Then they turned their heads to face their grandpas.

Zed had taken a seat in the chair normally occupied by Impulse’s wife. He automatically reached for his friend’s hand in comfort, but he didn’t know if he was comforting Impulse or himself.

And in this position, hand in hand, they started.

Though there was still pain, it was a relief to talk about it, together. It was mostly Impulse talking, because he had spent his entire life dwelling on this, analysing every mistake, remembering every thought. Every time he paused for breath, however, Zedaph continued, contributing his own perspective.

The five toddlers listened intently to the most epic tale they had ever heard. They were very good listeners, gasping at the right time, whimpering when a character died, never interrupting. Only the oldest, Tango, was aware that this was all real, not just some story.

When their grandpas got to the part where little Tango’s namesake disappeared, they could not continue. Zedaph let out a sob.

Little Tango didn’t make them continue; for a five-year-old, he was very emotion-sensitive and seemed to know exactly when it was too much. Instead, he asked them, “Did they ever come back?” though he already knew the answer.

Impulse fought to hold back tears, and choked out, “No… they never came back.”

At the same time, in another world...

“Screwdriver.”

“This one? Here you go.”

“Wrench.”

“You could ask politely.”

With the sound of metal rolling over concrete, a man emerged from beneath a complicated-looking machine. He lay on a skateboard he was using as a car creeper, and his face was smeared with oil and what looked like rust. The man blew his moustache away from his mouth with a sigh of exasperation. “For efficiency reasons I find it easier to name what I need, rather than go ‘Tango, could you hand me that drill over there?’ every time.”

“At least say please?” Tango replied.

Mumbo rolled his eyes and disappeared under the machine again. For a moment there was no sound except the steady tap, tap, tap, of a hammer, but then Mumbo spoke again. “Bolt, please.”

Grinning, Tango handed one to him and replied “That’s more like it.” He heard a sigh come out from under the machine, but he could tell Mumbo was smiling. Tango turned when he heard footsteps approaching them. Suddenly, he stood face to face with Xisuma. “Gah! You startled me, X!”

X chuckled and looked down to where Mumbo’s hair was visible. “Nearly done, Mumbo? I have something to tell you guys”

“Almost.” Mumbo sounded like he had his tongue between his teeth in concentration. There was the low buzzing of a drill, and then Mumbo rolled out from beneath the machine again. “There! It’s finished! Phew… I’ve been working on that for weeks!”

“Amazing! So now all Tango has to do is program it.”

“Yes. That’ll be done within a few minutes. But you said you had to tell us something, X?” Tango reminded him.

“Yeah. Could you follow me to the meeting room? Falsie, Grian, and Keralis are waiting for us.”

The three of them walked into the next room, where indeed there were three other people sitting around a table, playing cards. False, Grian and Keralis looked up as they entered. They looked expectantly at Mumbo, who answered the question in their minds. “It’s done,” he said, with a hint of pride in his voice. They cheered, and Grian gave Mumbo a high-five. Sort of, because since he was sitting and Mumbo was super tall, Mumbo had to give a low five to Grian’s high five.

Xisuma walks carefully past a wall covered in weapons and over to a mobile whiteboard. He turned to face the rest, who had all sat down and were patiently waiting.

“I have some rather depressing news. Every day, I walk out of my apartment and meet my neighbor, who leaves at the same time. When I first moved in three years ago and met her for the first time, she was cradling a baby of perhaps four months old. Last week, when I saw her, she was holding that same baby. Then I realised, over the course of three years, that baby had not aged at all. I see them every single morning, yet I had not registered this until last week.

“So naturally, I decided to get to the bottom of it. I found pictures of us from when we had just arrived in this dimension, and saw that none of us have changed at all either. Of course, that doesn’t say much, because adults simply don’t change much over a mere three years, which is probably why we didn’t notice before.” He paused for breath, and Grian spoke.

“So, we don’t age. Is that really such a bad thing?” He grinned.

Xisuma didn’t smile. He looked at Grian sadly, and Grian’s smile vanished. “I wasn’t done. While I was trying to find out exactly what was going on, I found some other information. I asked Tango to hack into NASA for me-”

“So that’s what that was for!” Tango interrupted. Then, catching Xisuma’s eye, “Sorry.”

“NASA managed to do quite a bit of research on the time machine before we stole it. It is a miracle that Mumbo was able to fix it, when some of the best scientists in this world couldn’t. But the point is, I found some things. We previously thought that the black hole sent us to another dimension. We were wrong. We are on the same earth, but in a different timeline.”

This revelation was followed by shocked and comprehending gasps from those listening. 

Xisuma nodded absent mindedly, and continued. “Black holes warp time. This explains why we don’t age. Time flows differently here. We didn’t go through the black hole, we are inside it. It doesn’t just freeze all organic matter into one state, it slows time as we experience it. For us it feels like we have been here for three years, but back home in the other timeline, it has been ten times as long. So for the other hermits, we have been gone for three decades. They probably think we’re all dead.”

This time there were pained gasps. Remorse transformed each of their features as they realised how their friends must feel.

“But it’s not all bad. Our original plan to get back was to use the time machine to travel across dimensions, but now that we know that doesn’t apply, I made some adjustments. We need to travel through time. We know the risks of messing with the past, but it is the only way to get back. You see,” He paused and started drawing on the whiteboard. He drew a straight line from left to right, and then split the line at the end so it resulted in a rotated Y of sorts. “This is what the timeline would look like, were it possible to visualise it. This,” he gestured to the bottom of the Y, “ is when we were all still back home. And here,” he pointed at the intersection, where all the lines came together, “is where we went into the black hole. We went to one timeline, while the other Hermits continued on the other. So the only way to go back to them is to take the time machine back to before we went into the black hole, because any time after that, we would still be in this timeline.” Xisuma looked around to see if they understood. It looked like some were still processing all the information, but there was only as much confusion as what was to be expected.

False spoke up. “That means that when we go back and change the past, we erase all the suffering we caused them, and their entire timeline,” she stood up and walked to the board, “will vanish.” she wiped away one of the split-off lines.

“Exactly,” Xisuma nodded. “We need to stay hidden until our past selves have gone into the black hole, because otherwise we could seriously mess up the past. This means that we have to stay far away, because past Tango or past Cleo could sense our presence.”

At this, Tango’s eyes widened. “That’s right! I used to have telepathy! I had entirely forgotten about that…” His eyes glazed over for a second, clearly seeing things the rest could not. Xisuma’s smooth British voice brought him back to the present.

“Right, yeah. I found information about that during my deep dive into NASA’s archive, too. NASA has two theories; the first being that the black hole runs on a different frequency, one that is not compatible with magic. The magic is still in the air somewhere, but humans can’t access it. The second theory is that magic is entirely dead here, because the vortex is too powerful, and magic simply can’t survive.”

They all sat and stared blankly, remembering a better time, when they were above the regular laws of humanity. They never knew why their powers had ceased to exist when they regained consciousness after being thrown around the void, until now. At least, a theory as to why. As they thought back to when they were more than human, the homesickness was suddenly overwhelming. From one moment to the next, they were all desperate to go home. It had always remained their home, all three years they had spent elsewhere. It had never felt truly theirs here.

Tango cleared his throat, which suddenly had a lump in it, and said, “I say we leave as soon as possible. I’m going to go program the time machine so it’s ready to go.”

Everyone nodded in agreement, some wiping the silent tears from their cheeks. Tango speed walked into the room with the time machine; he couldn’t get there fast enough.

Once he disappeared past the door frame, Keralis spoke for the first time that evening. “I agree with Tango. Let’s go home. Today. Anyone have things in their apartments they want to bring to the past?” He looked around, studying each face individually. He realised he hadn’t really seen them since coming here, to this new world. He knew he would only see the ghost of his past life. 

“Nah, but I do want to keep these cool suits,” Mumbo said, gesturing to the six spy outfits on display in glass cases along the wall behind him.

“I second that. I just want to go home,” Grian concurs.

Within a few minutes, as Tango had promised, the time machine was ready for departure. Somehow they all managed to squeeze into the machine designed to transport one person.

With effort, Xisuma got enough oxygen to say, “Tango, you did program this properly, right? You were in quite a rush.”

“Yes, X. Have some faith in my abilities, please.” Tango rolled his eyes. “Ready? Here we go!” he pulled a large lever- with difficulty- and they vanished in a bright flash.

                                            *          *          *