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Martyn stared at the quest board. He'd keep staring until he processed what it said. He'd been staring for a while.
He couldn't help it. His brain wasn't working at full capacity and he– well, he knew why, even if he didn't really understand or want to confront it. He was tired (as fuck) and had been the past few days. It was just– time spent sleeping was time spent not really doing anything, and after getting so caught up in Rats and potentially annoying Doc in the process, he wanted to make the most of his time here and…
Well, it was Minecraft! Heavily modded, clearly, but Minecraft nonetheless. Since when would sleeping be such an important part of the gameplay loop, especially when there didn’t seem to be phantoms about? He could hardly remember the last time he really slept for any reason other than "what else are you going to do in the Datastream?" It seemed every other (presumably) player only "slept" when they logged out, or had technical issues. Although, the latter gave him a pretty good out for when he did end up dozing off at the wheel. Couldn't help it, really, with the rocking of the boat and hey, maybe there was something in the salty air–
Point is: Martyn never had to worry about this kind of thing before. Why now? Why was he so damn tired? So damn can-barely-read, stumbling-about-like-a-zombie, hardly-keeping-his-eyes-open tired?
Maybe a better question would be why he wouldn't just take a rest, but Martyn hadn't gotten there yet. Too tired to think of that.
He continued staring at the quest board.
After some amount of time, it was eventually Scott’s voice that startled Martyn back to reality (“reality.”) Martyn didn’t actually catch what he said, but jumped when he heard him, turning to see him and getting a little dizzy because of it. He tried to steady himself.
“Martyn?” Scott asked. Martyn nodded as decisively as he could.
“Yeah?” he asked, trying to keep his voice steady.
“Uh…” Scott gave him a look that may have been concerned, Martyn couldn’t really tell. His vision was a bit blurry. “I asked if you were okay.”
“Oh,” he said. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”
He could tell that wasn’t very convincing. Especially with the way Scott raised a single eyebrow. Then he narrowed his eyes and stepped forward.
“Oh god, Martyn,” he said. He raised a hand, but Martyn didn’t notice until his fingertips were on his cheek. He stumbled back slightly from the surprise, but Scott went on, “Have you slept, like, ever?”
Damn. Perceptive guy, was he.
“What?” Martyn asked. After stumbling he found it difficult to regain his balance. He kept having to catch himself from tipping over. “Yeah, ‘course I have.”
Scott rolled his eyes. Martyn just focused on staying upright.
He wasn’t supposed to let anyone see there was something amiss with the game. He had to pull through this.
“Are you seriously gonna try and do a quest like this?”
“Like what?” Martyn asked.
Scott grabbed both his arms firmly.
“Martyn, you’re literally falling over.”
“You’re just so swoon-worthy,” Martyn grinned. Scott was now practically holding him up.
“You flatter me,” Scott deadpanned. “What is wrong with you? Have you seriously just been not sleeping? How are you still alive?”
Martyn had died a fair few times, some of which probably could’ve been avoided if he’d slept. He wouldn’t be bringing that up. For the moment being, his plan seemed to be just brute forcing his way through this until Scott left.
So, naturally, he said “What makes you think I’m tired?”
“Martyn,” Scott said, while shaking Martyn in a way that made the other’s vision go black for a moment (that was fine.) “Look at you. You have got the darkest bags I have ever seen on someone, you can’t stand on your own– you sound like you’re talking in slow-motion–”
Did he? Martyn was hoping he’d had pretty good control on his voice.
“– your eyes just glazed over, for god’s sake!” Whoops. “You’re ridiculous.”
“I’m fine,” Martyn tried. Now that he thought about it, he could feel his mouth struggling to make the sounds it was supposed to.
Scott scoffed.
“Sure,” he said. Then he let go of Martyn’s arm, and Martyn fell directly on his ass. “You’re fine.”
“I am!” Martyn protested, albeit struggling to stand. Scott offered a hand, and he took it. “I’m fi–”
Scott pulled him up, quickly. And apparently the headrush that followed was the last straw, because Martyn’s vision went completely dark.
“I’m fi– ahh…”
Martyn seemed to finally collapse, and Scott had to move quickly to catch him. He ended up as totally dead weight in Scott’s arms, and Scott had to lean up against the quest board to keep from falling himself.
He huffed.
He didn’t know why he cared so much. He barely spent time with Martyn– most of the time he did spend with him was passing needless bickering and insults. And yet here he was, holding him up like some kind of dead animal to keep him from laying on the ground. I mean honestly, he may well just set him down and leave him for someone else to deal with. It’s not like he could get robbed on the island– and even if he did, it was his own fault–
But here Scott was. Looking like a damn fool.
He’d just wanted a quest.
Sausage’s voice was his saving grace. From a distance, he heard “Scott!” and then, as he got closer “What’s that?” until eventually he was in front of Scott and having an unconscious Martyn being shoved into his arms.
“What the–?” Sausage took Martyn by under the shoulders and looked at him, like he was inspecting a dog. “What happened to him?”
“Hell if I know,” Scott said, straightening out his clothes. “He clearly hasn’t been sleeping.”
Sausage tsked, hefting Martyn up into a bridal carry.
“Sorry about him,” he said. It wasn’t the first time Sausage had told Scott this, wouldn’t be the last, but Scott had to admit these were some new circumstances.
“You oughta give him a curfew or something,” Scott hummed.
“How am I supposed to enforce that?” Sausage asked with a smile, “My nights have been real busy.”
“Not sure how I feel about you flirting with me while holding an unconscious man,” said Scott, smiling as well.
“Thought I’d give it a shot.”
Scott chuckled.
“Take him back home and we’ll talk after, how’s that?”
Sausage grinned, hoisting Martyn up and adjusting his grip.
“Deal.”
Martyn woke up groggy and hungry as hell. Luckily, it seemed someone was there to help with that second part. It felt like the second he woke up, he was being sat up having food being handed to him. He barely had his eyes open, and sort of doubted his motor skills at the moment, so he just groaned and pushed it away. He leaned his head back, and it hit the back of a couch. Honestly, he very well could’ve gone right back to sleep, if it wasn’t for the anger of his stomach and conversation around him.
“Oh, he’s grumpy.”
“Well, he’s just woken up. I think I’d be too, after sleeping two days.”
Two days? Jeez.
“I think I’d love to sleep for two days, personally,” said the voice that Martyn now realized was Scar. “Me and Jellie would have great bonding time.”
“You and Jellie would starve,” that was Kyle.
“Would not!”
“Rather starve than have beetroot soup again,” said Oli.
Martyn groaned.
“Look what you did, now he's not gonna eat it," Kyle said.
"He will–" Sausage said, and Martyn felt someone sit next to him and nudge. "Hey, Martyn."
"Mh."
"C'mon, y'gotta eat."
"I don't want any damn beetroot," Martyn grumbled, voice hoarse.
"Amen!" said Oli.
"There's bread too!" Scar said helpfully. Martyn sighed and opened his eyes.
He was in the Kestrel base, in the sitting area to be precise. The sunlight from the windows made him squint and brought to his attention the pounding headache behind his forehead. Sausage was next to him, Scar and Oli were on the other couch, and Kyle was standing by him, handing him a bowl and a large bread roll. Martyn took the roll.
"So…" Sausage said when Martyn was halfway through eating it. "What's up?"
Martyn turned to him and looked for a moment.
"Nothing much," he said, mouth full.
"Not what I meant," Sausage said as everyone else giggled. He seemed to chuckle a bit himself.
"Whadja mean then?" Martyn asked, trying to play oblivious. Sausage huffed dramatically.
"I meant why did you just pass out for 2 days?"
"Mh," said Martyn, who'd finished his roll but was now still hungry enough to reach for the soup. "You shoulda said that. Don't worry about it."
"Uh, too late for that, Marty," Oli interjected.
"Yeah, we're worrying," said Kyle.
"What use is a faction-mate if he's passed out the whole time?" Scar asked.
"Among other, more important things," Sausage added. "Have you not been sleeping?"
"I'm serious," Martyn said. "Don't worry about it. I know it's a problem now so I'll fix it, okay? It won't happen again."
The Kestrels stared at him.
"Now you know it's a problem–?"
"What does that even mean?"
"Do you need a room? Is that it?"
Martyn busied himself with his soup. By the time he finished, and everyone was still waiting for him to elaborate, he just said
"Could I get some water?"
A collective sound of annoyance, but Sausage did stand and start walking towards the kitchen.
"Okay, fine," he said. "But I'm gonna start checking on you,"
"We're gonna start checking on you," Oli corrected.
"Yeah," said Kyle.
Scar also nodded, although seemed preoccupied with letting Jellie play with a bit of string.
Martyn scoffed.
"Fine," he said. "Not a problem here."
(It may be, if they started looking too close. But for now he'd act as though he had nothing to hide.)
Sausage nodded.
"Alright. Now let me get that water."