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Mumbo was the first person that Grian ever perched upon, and Mumbo had absolutely no idea he was there until he dug his talons in just a bit too far, earning a shocked yelp from the moustached man. Mumbo looked back over his shoulder to see Grian looking slightly guilty, but mostly content practically draped over him. Shooting a disgruntled yet fond look at the parrot hybrid, he turned back to his redstone, working on finishing up the section that he had been working on so he could move on to something else for the day so he wouldn’t disturb Grian too badly with his movement.
By the time he had finished up his redstone for the day, the sun was beginning to set, finishing that section up had taken a significantly longer period of time than Mumbo had originally expected, and Grian was sound asleep, still perched on Mumbo’s back, so, taking great care to not dislodge or wake up Grian, Mumbo moved to his platform in the tree to very carefully place Grian on his bed so he could get back to work on his base despite the fact that it would be dark extraordinarily soon and he would probably have some phantoms after him.
***
Grian had a habit of perching on Mumbo, his flockmate was quite tall and made a great perch, but today, Mumbo was AFK in his underground base, and Grian was gathering more dark prismarine with Xisuma, the Admin having recently earned a place in Grian’s flock, and the armour that X wore looked like it would make for a great material to perch upon and Xisuma is also very tall, not as tall as Mumbo, but close.
They were having a break, now back on the platform that X had made above the monument. Xisuma was looking down at the monument, trying to figure out where they had already been and where they had yet to find while exploring, when he asked Grian for a second opinion to see if the other could tell where they had already been. He hadn’t been expecting the sudden weight, however light it was, to appear on his shoulder, and, once he looked up, he really hadn’t been expecting to see Grian perched there, his wings splayed out to help balance him as he looked over at the monument.
Xisuma, deciding not to question why Grian was perching on him, pretty confident that it was an avian thing, was actually quite content with Grian perched on him. He wasn’t causing him any harm, and he could tell that Grian was quite content where he was. He was also answering the question that X had asked, so X turned his focus back on what Grian was saying, and soon enough the pair were back in the water, heading to the monument for some more dark prismarine, plus any sponges that they came across.
***
Doc hadn’t been expecting Grian to perch on him while they were trying to figure out who the Jangler was, but Grian was currently settled upon his metal arm, looking over the giant floating cookie to see if he could find any clues. He was a bit confused as to why Grian had decided to perch upon him rather than use his wings to gain the height advantage, but Doc knew better than to question hybrid instincts, having a few instincts of his own that confused the other Hermits as well.
Grian appeared to be quite content where he was, Doc was one of, if not the, tallest Hermit, so it wasn’t too much of a shock that Grian would have eventually perched on him, but Doc hadn’t been expecting it to happen quite so soon, especially after the chaos that was the Prank War.
Doc could easily tell that Ren was trying his hardest not to laugh at the pair, so Doc just shot him the most scathing glare that he could without Grian noticing. It didn’t appear to do what he wanted it to though, as Ren had to try harder to not laugh. It appeared that his glare was not as effective with Grian settled on his shoulder. He wasn’t about to try to get Grian off of his shoulder though, not after having several of his lab coats mysteriously disappeared; he knew where they had gone, plus it was nice that Grian was comfortable enough around him to perch on him.
Deciding to ignore Ren for the time being, he turned his attention to Grian, asking if he had found any clues to the mysterious Jangler.
***
Scar was used to additional weight on his shoulders, Jellie liked to settle herself over his shoulder like a scarf, so the addition of weight on his shoulder didn’t even cause him any problems. It only took him a second to adjust his stance to make up for the sudden addition of weight, but that was about it. He decided to continue with his terraforming, only this time he would be able to ask Grian what he thought about the work he had done and use his constructive criticism and praise to make changes; he always got happy chirps and trills in response, though, causing him to smile even if it wasn't as helpful as he would have wished for.
The pair kept this system going until night fell and mobs began to spawn around them, Scar having forgotten to light the area up once again. Grian jumped off of his shoulders, his sword materialising in his hand in an instant and slashing through a zombie that had gotten too close for comfort, and the pair made quick work of heading back to Scar’s base once the zombie had fallen.
Scar chuckled sheepishly at the glare that Grian shot him once they were safe inside Scar's, thankfully, lit up base, very disgruntled at having to leave his perch when he didn’t want to as he had been very content perched upon Scar.
“Sorry Gri. Forgot to light the area up it seems.” He said, only gaining a more scathing look from the parrot hybrid.
“You can stay here for the night?” He offered, getting a huff from Grian, but he seemed to accept the offer, deciding to follow Scar to his bedroom and curling up on one side of the bed, despite preferring his nest, waiting for Scar to join him, and then curling his wings around the elf and settling down to sleep.
***
Pearl was no stranger to Grian perching on her, having lived on Evo with him and Jimmy, so it was no surprise that shortly after she joined Hermitcraft that she felt the familiar weight of an avian perched on her shoulders. She didn’t even bat an eye at the additional weight, shocking Impulse, who had almost fallen to the ground the first time Grian had unexpectedly perched on him, a story that never failed to make Grian laugh while retelling it, having not been expecting the sudden shocking weight, and just carried on with the conversation.
Impulse tried to keep going, but the shock that Pearl hadn’t even blinked when Grian suddenly landed on her shoulders at practically full speed was a bit too much for him to overlook. Pearl, realising this after a long moment of waiting for a response from Impulse, huffed fondly before explaining.
“We were on a server together before Grian joined Hermitcraft. He and another avian that was on the server with us had a habit of perching on anyone who was standing still for too long, or if they were having a conversation with someone. It was always amusing to see them perching on one another though and watching them stumble if they weren’t expecting it.” She explained.
Grian huffed at her explanation, muttering a “not true” which was promptly ignored by both Impulse and Pearl who went back to their conversation.
Grian, deciding to ignore the conversation, made himself comfortable on Pearl’s shoulder, not that difficult to do when perching on her felt like second nature, and settled down for a nap, having been working on perfecting the design of his mountain for hours on end, so he had decided to take a nap, and what better place to take it that on one of his friend’s shoulders.
***
While the sudden addition of weight on his shoulder initially threw Grian off balance for a second, his wings were quick to help balance him, and he returned back to the conversation he was having with Joel after just a second's hesitation. Joel gaped at him for a moment, not entirely sure how to react to Jimmy perching on Grian’s shoulder and Grian just continuing on as if nothing had happened, but decided to just go with it, continuing to help Grian plan to take down a Wither for a Nether Star so a beacon could be crafted.
Grian, despite knowing that he had initially been planning to create the Wither near Tumble Town, continued on with the topic anyway. Having Jimmy perched on his shoulder was nothing new, the pair having spent hours of their time on Evo perching on each other and the other Evolutionists, so he decided to take it as a challenge to plan the Wither fight with Joel without Jimmy figuring out where the Wither would be constructed. He had a feeling that Jimmy already knew, hence why he had perched on him rather than Joel who was significantly taller than him and a much better perch, he would know having perched on him recently and absolutely loving how tall he was, but that didn’t really matter all that much to Grian.
In reality, Jimmy had decided to perch on Grian because he wanted to perch on his oldest flockmate, but there would be absolutely no way that he would ever tell Grian that. He had a feeling that Grian would be perching on him in the near future as retaliation, but for now he settled down on his friend’s shoulder, content with the feeling of familiarity that came with perching on Grian, only half focusing on the conversation at hand. He had a feeling that he would come to regret not paying attention to whatever it was that Grian and Joel were planning, but that was future Jimmy’s problem, present Jimmy was happy right where he was.