Work Text:
A strike of pain, unwarranted pain, struck Impulse as he was in the middle of building. It felt stuck in his chest, completely unsettled, like he'd eaten something gone bad. It felt similar to a sickness, yet... not.
A wave of nerves overcame him as he struggled to catch a breath, hindering him from making progress on this frog light farm. Perhaps it were for the better that he took a break anyway.
What were the chances he was just overheated and his hard work was taking its tole?
With careful movement, Impulse made it to the nearest portal, and made the trek home. Plenty of water and rest should help, in theory, for something he was halfway sure didn't even exist.
What were the chances he was just making up pain?
A feeling of nervousness crept up in his stomach as he continued on, building until it stopped at a lurch. For a split second he was sure he couldn't breathe.
"What's going on?"
His hands shook a little and adrenaline pumped through him as he slid down one of the walls in his megabase. At least he made it this far before collapsing.
As he sat there, the world seemed to spin around a bit and he struggled for deep breaths again. His vision blurred and dimmed and all he could think was
Dark.
Very dark.
He fought back the feeling, the worry, the confusion. If it overtook him now, then he'd be left dependent on someone (without someone to depend on). "Just got to breathe, right? That's how it goes... find stuff that's grounding. Something about five objects or... something..."
He couldn't remember what it was he usually told hermits who were mid-panic attack to do, but this vaguely felt like that, and was the closest experience he had to relate to the feeling. And it was a tad annoying that after never fearing anything greatly, and never getting worked up over nothing, that he felt this way with nothing to connect it to.
"I'm okay. It's okay. Nothing's wrong. Just going about my day with some weird blindness effect."
Did he drink some soup to do that? It was pulsing a bit too much to be anything but warden-related though.
He knew there was no warden in his base, given he hadn't heard it and he hadn't trapped one himself. There were no sensors or shriekers or sonic blasts. Yet another thing that didn't make sense.
“Okay. So if it's not that, then why?”
He took steadying breaths, focusing a bit on what he could still feel (given all sense of sight was still off for the moment).
"I felt fine before. Nothing leading this on. Little to no stress..."
He felt a minor headache coming on and he felt his heart lurch again in fear over something.
It didn't feel like his own though.
“If this doesn’t go away, I’ll just call someone. But it should be… it’ll be fine, right?”
Carefully he got up, finding his footing and aiding his balance with the structures jutting out the walls. He still felt weak, legs trembling and stomach still feeling weak, though there was nothing he could do about it.
And when he thought he'd settled out, again that word came back.
Dark.
It’s. Dark.
The blindness had mostly, if not all gone away. Hardly dark.
Even then, he felt himself freeze up. It forced the breath out of him, and instead replaced all normal feelings with general discomfort and unsettledness.
It’s not safe. We need help. We need help.
Against his will, against his own train of thought, Impulse felt a tug of war between peace and fear. Against his own fears, there was a worry of danger in the world, one which he never thought twice about before.
He knew he was safe, though an internal monologue wanted to deny all of that.
We need safety. This isn’t enough!
More light! More light!
His heart started pumping and suddenly his field of vision took a dramatic tumble as the temporary pulsing blindness fell over him again.
Can’t see. Can’t see.
Not safe.
Need light.
Can’t see anything.
Going to die.
Words flurried, disorienting Impulse.
Words that did not make sense.
Physical sensations that were not his own.
They were not his own.
“Bdubs,” he whispered out, his heart dropping at the realization. “I’m coming for you, buddy.”
He pulled out his comm, hands shaking as he checked to see if maybe Bdubs had tried to message him recently.
There were no new messages.
If Impulse's suspicions were right, and Bdubs was in the Deep Dark, calls wouldn't be for the best given they'd alert any nearby sensors. But he had to know Bdubs was safe in this moment. And he had to know his location. And he had to know that Bdubs had someone to ground him because both of them were not grounded right now.
So he called, not knowing exactly what the repercussions would be.
“I–Impulse?” Bdubs asked, his voice cutting in and out.
“Where are you?”
“The—the deep— deep dark.”
With no stop for a long conversation, Impulse asked in the most even voice he could, “Can you send me your coords?”
“I– I’ll try to in a second.” Bdubs sounded horrible, even if the receiver didn't cut him out constantly.
“Alright. I’ll be there as soon as I can, okay?”
Bdubs hummed in response, obviously fighting crying. Impulse started to feel a sense of guilt bubble up, guilt of his own and Bdubs' layering nicely on top of one another.
Why couldn't he have realized something was up sooner?
“Are you going to be okay if I let you go for a minute or do I need to keep talking?” Impulse continued to breathe deep, still struggling to handle both his own emotions and stress and Bdubs'.
“Just— just get here as fast as you can. I’ll— I’ll try to… to be fine.” When Impulse didn't response right away, Bdubs filled the silence with a quiet “…I’m sorry.”
“Oh buddy, you don’t have to be sorry. Don’t worry. We’ll get out of this mess.” Out of instinct, Impulse spoke to him like to a child, that protector in him coming out. “Just make sure you send over your location and find somewhere safe to hide in if you haven’t already. Okay?”
Bdubs replied in a small "okay". Impulse let him go and instead focused on energy on flight in the correct direction, making sure to waste no time to save Bdubs both from a warden and from his own mind.
~ ~ ~
Rumbles shook the floor from beyond. Bdubs managed to get out of the warden's range of smell and sound, thought darkness still shrouded him.
Mobs can’t spawn here. One part reasoned.
It’s dark! It’s dark! Wardens live in dark and they attack in dark and they find you in dark!
All that he could see in the darkness was a small flicker of light from a candle. It did nothing, aside from creating casting shadows which were debatably worse than full blindness. Even a trail of torches couldn't make him feel safe.
It’s dark! And it’s not safe! Darkness is NOT SAFE.
We need LIGHT.
Bdubs tried to breathe. He did. He did.
He tried to send his coords to Impulse. He did. He did send them after a few tries of stumbling across the keys with trembling fingers.
"Deep breaths," he tried to tell himself. "You can handle yourself. And then Impulse won't have to come down here."
Yes, he tried to function like a normal person because he was bothering Impulse with this stupid glareness and now Impulse saw how silly he was for feeling scared and how stupid he was for walking into a deep dark when Bdubs knew the darkness and glares didn't go together well.
And he was angry and he was scared and he was sad and it was
too much.
And any light, any safety in this room was
never enough.
It’s dark, it’s dark, it’s dark.
And it’s dumb, it’s dumb, it’s dumb.
And it’s dangerous. We need light! We need protection!
The thoughts did more than their usual nagging, now undoubtedly felt by Impulse too, physically painful.
And he was a bother.
And he couldn’t take care of himself.
And his fears were irrational, but he’d never be able to handle them.
And after this Impulse would fully, one hundred percent, hate being his soulmate and would trade Bdubs for anyone.
It’s dark.
It’s really dark.
The once pulsing in and out light became a full blindness again. The warden started to sniff.
Likely able to smell his fear, feel his trembling.
And the heartbeat got louder.
And the world got all the more trapping.
And Bdubs was frozen in place.
And he could hear the creature groaning and moaning and about to scream and blast out all angry energy.
“RUN BDUBS!” Impulse called from behind the warden, placing down redstone pieces, pistons and repeaters in clock formation. “I’ll distract him, you get out of range! Deep breaths and whatever you do, don’t scream!”
Impulse screamed his lungs out in getting Bdubs to hear. The irony of his command. But they held so much firmness, so much command.
But Bdubs couldn't move.
He was stuck here. He was stuck in darkness and Impulse came all this way and Bdubs would get them both killed anyway.
“I believe in you Bdubs. You can push through. You don’t have to be trapped by the darkness!”
And all he had to do was keep moving backwards and he'd be able to see.
But instead he stayed frozen while the warden kept waddling along, still gravitated towards Bdubs.
With the little sense Bdubs still had, he could clearly hear the creature's deep breathing, heavy stomps, erratic heartbeat.
But then it all stopped.
It was absolutely silent.
And then it raged. Raged wildly in the other direction. At Impulse.
“COME’MERE YOU BIG JERK.” Impulse lodged an arrow at its side, and the warden reacted accordingly to the new danger.
But Impulse remained completely unafraid. Instead he placed blocks of wool in front of him, and sped-walked across them as to not be heard. When safe, he started throwing objects towards a noise machine he built, and took action to trap the warden.
Completely unafraid, completely calm, completely and perfectly accomplished.
The warden was now blocked off by all sorts of wool, rendering it useless.
And it was still dark and Bdubs saw none of it, but he heard Impulse exclaim of his victory.
“Bdubs! I can’t really see anything, but I need you to trust me on this, stay where you are, and I’ll find you and we’ll get out from here!”
Bdubs tried calling back to give Impusle a sense of direction to work with, but he couldn't find his voice no matter how hard he tried.
“‘dubs? You okay?” Impulse called out, his voice echoing throughout the ruins.
At that call, a small cry escaped him, though loud enough to give direction.
Loud enough to make obvious how weak and small he really was.
Stupid darkness. Stupid darkness being too much and stupid him not knowing how to handle too much.
“Bdubs?” Impulse’s voice was closer. Now within a few blocks closer.
“‘m right here,” he said, barely loud enough to be of use.
It managed to be enough, and in seconds Impulse had him in a firm, very in control kind of hug. One that he melted into within seconds, forcing Impulse to support both of their weight. In a second, they had to sit down just because of how weak Bdubs was getting.
The deepslate tile was freezing, but Bdubs hardly noticed it as he clung onto Impulse, probably stealing all of his warmth.
“I’ve got you. It’s okay. It’s okay. Warden’s taken care of and we’re not in danger.”
Bdubs let out a sob, hating the grating sound. Hating it madly but unable to stop once it started coming.
It was just so dark.
And he was safe. And Impulse did come.
But it wouldn’t be safe. And Impulse wouldn’t come back. This was the last straw and Impulse would move on.
He wasn't safe. And he would be alone.
“Hey, hey, listen. I’m not going anywhere. Okay? Right here.”
But that wasn’t true.
“It’s not too much. It’s not. You can push through this; I know you can. And it’s not too much for me to carry either.”
Easy for him to say.
“We’re going to leave here, okay? We’ve got to take it slow, sneak around the place and such. One set of the alarm and we’ve got another on our tail,” Impulse said, managing to not be frightened at the thought. Oh so much stronger than Bdubs.
“Here. Grab onto my hand and we won’t go any further or faster than you can handle.”
The area around them wasn't completely dark, what with the blindness fading out and the candles brightening up their path just a little bit. But there was still that blanket of eerie black, casting shadows and leaving behind mystery.
It wasn’t—
“Deep breaths. I’ll do it with you,” Impulse said, still holding tightly to Bdubs’ hand as he guided him along through the place.
“We’re almost there, and then we can rest up for at least a day.” Impulse kept speaking encouragements, keeping Bdubs awake and aware while also calm and grounded.
It wasn't long before they broke free of the cave, finding the outside world as Bdubs had left it when he first went on this adventure. It was still light out, bright enough that they should be able to make it home before nightfall.
“We did it, Bdubs. You did it.” Impulse smiled at him, right after, pulling him into another hug.
Bdubs didn’t fully reciprocate it this time though, tensing up at the closeness instead.
“Hey, don’t blame yourself for any of that,” Impulse told him.
Bdubs looked Impulse in the eyes, which hurt incredibly so in vulnerability, but they were a team, so Bdubs should be able to tell him what hurt. “I knew it was called the deep dark and I knew the warden created blindness and I know how I get… but…” Bdubs took a shaky breath before continuing. “I should be able to walk into a biome in its full darkness. I should and it shouldn’t bother me.”
Impulse frowned at him, giving a look of sensitivity. “You can’t help that.”
“I thought I could be better. I thought it wouldn't end up the same this time.” Bdubs looked down at his feet, feeling shame bubble up. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I did all of that and bothered you and that you felt any of it too.”
But Impulse shook his head, not accepting the apology at all. “It wasn’t a problem for me to drop what I was doing to come help you. It’s fine that you wanted to explore, that you wanted to prove yourself. But it’s also fine that you need help sometimes when it gets to being too much.”
Bdubs nodded, though not really agreeing in full.
“Come on. We’re getting home and we’re sleeping for hours. No more wardens or darkness effects now, you hear?”
Bdubs nodded again, letting Impulse lead the way.
They stopped at Impulse's megabase, where it was mostly complete. The build was spectacularly large and grand. The colors were cool in nature, though highlighted in oranges and yellows in some areas.
Though built with deepslate and blackstone, it was approachable. It felt like Impulse's place.
It felt safe.
It felt evermore safe, as Impulse welcomed him in warmly, and gave a small tour. Only a few minutes later he reminded Bubs that all that transpired was not a problem and that there was no room here to feel guilt. Again pressing into that safeness.
Pressing into that thought that Bdubs wasn't alone, no matter how loud the glare got.