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One might consider the concept of floating or flying to be cool. An example of a hermit would be Impulse, who built an entire minigame around the concept. Cleo however, did not find this cool or interesting or fun or even exciting in the slightest. Saying she hated it would be putting it lightly.
Work on the castle had been put off, as Joe had recovered from a death. Cleo had tried measuring the moon, but it had caused her too much stress no matter the age. It shouldn’t make a huge difference if they didn’t get the statistics rolling in for a few days anyway.
But now, here they were, on a Monday afternoon, building their Castle Hohenzollern. And for all the times for the earth too mess with them, it was now.
“Joe? JOE?! You’re feeling this, right?!” Cleo became light as she floated upward, and her head spun. She struggled to catch a breath as she went up a few more meters, only to crash down, scraping her knees against the stone bricks. It could’ve been worse, but she wasn’t in the moon to be grateful for what was going right.
“Woah woah woah,” Joe said as he fell a few seconds later. “That’s… that’s definitely not normal.”
“You think?” Cleo asked, knowing frustration with Joe now would be useless, but it was the only thing she could respond with to avoid a startled cry.
“Yeah. I think. How about… how about we get some slow falling potions, just in case it happens again.” Joe was one to take incentive. If anything was worrying in the slightest, he’d find some way to prepare for it, sometimes even have something to combat a thing that hadn’t even made itself a threat. (And there was a wonder at how his inventory oftentimes was scattered with randomness. Cleo’s was just that way because she didn’t have the time of day or want to organize her things.)
“So you think this will happen again?”
“Well, the earth’s been shakin’ and it hasn’t stopped, and the moon’s still closing in, so I don’t see why it’d be a bad idea to prepare.” Joe with the logical approach. And Cleo knew if Joe was worried, then it had to be a problem. If it was just Cleo, it’d be a problem, but it could be a small one or a really large one for all they knew.
“You’re right,” she hated to admit as she tried to refocus on working on the castle. It was just some minor work. Fixing up the inside mostly. Interiors needed work, as did some preparation for the cult-like thing she started, which was unknowing to Mumbo, against the Mooners and their nonsense.
The two walked inside, ready to make official plans for the day. All of a sudden, rain started to pore, adding to the list of unhappy occurrences today. Joe closed the doors, shutting out the wind a rain, and suddenly the earth decided to shake again. “Must’ve slammed the doors too hard,” Joe said, making light of the situation.
This time around, the quake wasn’t felt as hard, though it was still just as noisy. “Yeah, your fault. Stop slamming doors,” Cleo said, almost unamused.
She slumped down against the wall as Joe went around moving the menorah so it could reside next to their Christmas tree. Now that the quake was over, she was just left with the sounds of pelting rain, though now she felt as if the ground under her was swaying.
“Joe, am I insane?” she called from her spot on the floor.
“Possibly?” he asked while carrying the copper rods in his arms. “What about?”
“It feels like—it feels like the floor is swaying, Joe.”
“That’s not normal.” He placed down the rods on a wide table.
“Way to state the obvious. I know Joe! I know!” If she didn’t have any dignity, she’d be curled up in a ball right now, sobbing out. But she was strong. She could handle the world falling apart. Totally.
“I’m stressed out about this too!” Now he was back with all the candles. There were so many that he had to hold them against his chest, and if he held any more, he along with the candles might all topple to the floor.
Well, apparently they would, as the earth shook again. “Woah! Woah woah woah! Stop shaking! Not now!” Joe exclaimed as all the candles fell to the floor, some breaking. The earth wouldn’t listen, this time shaking even longer.
If any time was a time for a mental breakdown, now was the time it was acceptable but not convenient. Not that emotions liked convenience.
“Now’s not the time to be freaking out,” Joe said as his voice rose higher in pitch. As the earth finally stopped its shaking—after far too many seconds to be considered even normal (sadly it was becoming normal. ) Joe said, “Well Cleo, you got any more candles? Some of mine broke.” He gave out a huff of annoyance, putting the candles back onto the menorah, and lighting the middle one once again.
Cleo remained unresponsive for the time being, only focused on steadying her breathing before it got uncontrollable.
“You alright there, Cleo?”
“No, Joe, I’m not alright thanks for asking.”
“Just trying to be nice,” he said while fishing through both of their backpacks for more candles.
“Well your niceness isn’t stopping the moon from growing or the earth from shaking or the gravity from going wonk!” Cleo pulled her legs up to her chest and folded her arms around herself as if it could somehow help protect her. “Breath, breath, breath. Cleo’s alright. Joe’s alright. The world’s alright. She’s alive. He’s alive. Everything’s still functioning,” she said under her breath.
“I believe in you,” Joe said as he finally found some more candles after dumping multiple shulkers worth of contents on the floor.
“You say that—though I’m not one you should be believing in.”
Joe didn’t respond, and she wasn’t sure if she was to take it as an insult.
After cramming the items back into their boxes, Joe sat next to Cleo against the wall. “I’ve got an idea on how we can fix the floating,” he said calmly. She wasn’t sure if he was making an effort to being nice or if he was no longer worried, because for him to go quickly from being on edge and frustrated wasn’t typical.
“Go on.”
“We change everyone’s beacons to jump boost. If we change the gravity of our world, then maybe… maybe the moon will be less attracted to us? Though that may be hard. We hermits are pretty attractive.”
Cleo only shook her head at the joke, not ready to full on laugh at it.
“But really, I’m serious. We change the beacon power and maybe we’ll drive the moon away!”
Sure.
She sighed. “Whatever. Do what you want.”
“It’s Monday! It’s the day we help the other hermits!”
He was right. She knew he was.
~~~
With potions of slow falling, and her elytra wings on, Cleo took off to Boatem, the duo’s first stop for changing out beacons. Before she had the chance to fire her rockets, the earth decided to float her for her. “No. Not again, no. Joe, are we sure we want to go over to Boatem? Really?”
“Yes. This may help our case and we won’t know until we try it! The floating thing is a problem that’s reoccurring.”
Yes, captain obvious. No need to remind her.
He noticed her going silent as they stood for a second. She wasn’t going to take off for their portal until Joe had his trident and enderpearls on the ready. “You ok?”
“No, again Joe, no I’m not! And you’re not helping either!” She spiraled into muttering to herself as he kept going about thing in what he called his logical way. While she would be the inconvenience and she was the one who would spiral more than enough for the two of them.
“Now’s really not the time for a panic attack,” Joe said insensitively.
“Not like I can help it,” she snapped, pulling on the ropes tying her elytra in place. The wings puffed out and she took to the skies with rockets in hand.
And if her eyes watered up on the flight, Joe and the rest of the hermits wouldn’t know. At least, not until she touched ground at the portal.
“I’m sorry,” he said, realizing the comment was far from helpful.
“Yes, I know.” She stepped into the portal, before letting her voice or her eyes betray every feeling she was dealing with.
They hardly spoke as they walked through the tunnels, until at last Joe broke the silence, saying, “At least we’re safe from the earthquakes in here?”
“Hell’s safer than earth. Who would’ve guessed,” Cleo said dully.
The rest of their journey was uneventful, and their time in Boatem didn’t include any scary occurrences, other than perfect view of the moon overshadowing PearlescenMoon’s build. No silverfish heads and no earthquakes and no floaty people.
But as they changed the beacon’s power to be jump boost, it didn’t help her growing anxiety. It didn’t feel just like the floating, but with the added slow falling, it sure had a similar effect. And it wasn’t until the two got to Impulse’s place, that she really felt the memory of being taking to the sky against her will, by the shulkers’ bullets.
“JOE! I’M FLOATING AGAINST! THERE’S SOME STUPID SHULKERS IN HERE!”
The slow falling potion wore off as she kept going up. But the bullets only propelled her higher until she reached the top of the building… where she was safe (to an extent). Thankfully from here she could glide to the safety of the ground.
Two hours more of changing out beacons that surrounded Fifi, and the two were headed off to the swamp. Big stressful events were becoming less frequent now, and the little outing to get pulled away from her thoughts was actually helping Cleo.
That was, until a zombie came up with a horde of his friends.
Her health was already down from some rough landings after flight, and she was distracted with changing the beacons power. And given her armor, the zombie shouldn’t have dealt any—
Oh wait, she wasn’t wearing much armor.
Fashion wasn’t possible with armor, so she’d taken off the “unnecessary gear”.
And as all this dawned on her slowly, the monsters took her out, and she was respawned at home as a child.
“Big breaths, big breaths, big breaths,” she said, voice higher both from age and anxiety. “Joe’s there—he’s gathering my stuff. It’s fine. It’s fine.” But even an eight year old couldn’t rationalize all this—let alone do it at her normal age.
She held on to a plush that was placed on the bed in the castle. It was a small, fluffy silverfish with deep eyes. But looking into its beady eyes did nothing to calm her.
“It’s scary,” she whispered to the silverfish. “Really scary. And-and I wanna cry. Really bad.” She buried her face into a pillow and hugged the plush against her chest, stroking its back as if she was making the inanimate object feel better instead of herself. “Is that okay? Joe doesn’t really want me to.” She rubbed at her eyes, trying to rid her face of any tear tracks.
“I’m glad you don’t mind, Silver. It’s—it’s too much to stay strong,” she admitted. It was easier to say it out loud when it was only her small, unjudging friend here. Her quiet friend that would sit unmoving in her arms for hours on end. Her silent pet that curled up against her and soothed her to sleep as she avoided looking at the scary moon and thought about the possibility of maybe there being phantoms.
She hiccupped for quite a few minutes, a sign of repressed cries finally let out softly. She knew she was being dramatic, but Silver could handle it. Silver could even if Joe couldn’t. Even if Cleo couldn’t.
After sleeping (for multiple days in a row) Joe was back, shulker boxes of Cleo’s in hand. “Got your things. You better not go scaring me with anymore of those silverfish heads. You know how many I found when I went to get your stuff?”
Cleo giggled at the thought. “Can I have them back?” Though she knew she’d have to steal them later. She expected Joe’s unacceptance to her getting back the heads.
But whenever she did get those heads back, she’d get him good.
For now though, Joe was going back to change out the effect of Jevin’s beacon while Cleo sat around in one of the buildings outside the castle.
While the earthquakes did get more frequent the next few days, she was getting more used to them, understanding that no buildings were falling in the process. And she was no longer randomly floating. So there was hardly anything to be afraid of.
Silver was also a huge help. Those next few days she talked to it, letting the silverfish take the brute of her concerns and feelings. It was lonely without Joe, but she felt she was handling it better.
She was twelve when he finally came back, ready to have help tracking how near the moon was.
“So you’re here to tell me that you were too scared of the moon’s growth that it hasn’t been marked in multiple days?”
Cleo nodded, too concerned he was going to explode in panic if she tried to defend herself.
“I’m sorry. I’m spiraling again… it’s stressful,” he admitted while holding her up in his arms while taking off with the trident. It was harder to travel with the two of them, but they managed after spending double the time it’d normally take to get there. “It’s not your fault the moon’s growing and it’s not your fault I was unable to take measurements for a few days. And we can’t do anything about it anyway.”
The two walked over to the shack, ready to prepare with signs for their newest findings.
“AHHHH!” Joe screamed as he took note of the silverfish person in front of him. “I thought I got rid of them all!” While he was in complete utter terror, Cleo was laughing her head off. Her mission to scare the other had been a success!
“I thought I told you those scared me!”
“I thought I told you I liked to mess with you!” she retorted in a laugh. It had been so long since the two of them laughed, even if Joe’s was more out of post-panic. He seemed to enjoy the scare, and was genuinely laughing after a few minutes.
Even when they were making measurement and the results looked bleak, the two still wouldn’t let the moon faze them. Though it did seem the moon was continuing to grow slower when taking a look at all the data.
As they were beginning to go home, the floating occurred again. “I’ve got you,” Joe said, tightening a grip as he flung his trident in the air and threw another enderpearl, effectively using their momentary levitation. With the feather falling enchant, the fall down didn’t hurt him, though the sound of the boots hitting the ground did result in a loud thud.
But even as Cleo’s breath was threatened to be taken away, she was pressed tightly against Joe, knowing if they both floated into the air, at least someone was there to stick with her. And if she fell, if she fell thousands of blocks lower, he’d take the weight and the pain, even if that meant both of them would deal with this stupid Child’s Curse and both of them couldn’t take measurements.
That night Joe read stories, stories he’d written about the wacky events about the hermits and other movie characters, the poetry for Cub’s canyon, and even some other bedtime story he’d borrowed from another hermit. A few earthquakes may have trembled in the room, a few silverfish may have poked out their heads, and the moon may have been in full view, yet neither was afraid. This would be okay.
This would be okay, as they were tucked in against each other in bed, steadied asleep if ever woken up by the others steady heartbeat. This would be okay even as the world tried to drive them insane. And this would be okay, even if their mental health and others’ was slowly deteriorating, because they were hermits and they would ban together.
And even if tomorrow they’d yell at each other from the stress, both knew it would never be enough to fully hate each other.