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True to Grian’s word, the Buttercups met up every odd Wednesday (i.e., every Wednesday that they were free, which happened more often than they thought) after they officially closed the prank war with Doc.
Their meet-ups consisted mostly of picnics up on their bonsai base, more often than not just them relaxing after a couple days’ of grueling hard work, and other times were spent goofing off or having lunch or—Mumbo suggested they call it their “tea time”—snacks.
This Wednesday afternoon, though, Scar wanted to braid their hair.
“ Pleeeeaaaseee ,” Scar whines, waving flowers in front of their faces. “I spent so much time gathering these and growing my hair out! I have my elf hair back, buttercups! It would be such a waste if we let this opportunity go!!!”
“My hair isn’t even long enough to braid!” Grian protests, pushing the flowers gently aside.
“Oh yes it is mister.” Scar pouts, and plops the basket full of flowers on the floor. “Just a bit of braiding! Then back to our usual shenanigans!”
“If I’m being quite honest, Grian.” Grian groans as Mumbo sheepishly speaks up, and he sees the mustached man weaving a hand through his hair. “I think I’d like a new style than just letting these get in the way while I’m redstoning.”
“It’s what you get for focusing on the bike-riding aspect of your trip,” Grian replies, matter-of-factly. Mumbo splutters at that and tries to protest, before Scar interrupts them both.
“What if we just braid mine and Mumbo’s hair? You get to be the caboose!”
“Never ever say I’m the caboose ever again, Scar.” Grian wrinkles his nose, but sighs. “Fine. I’m the caboose.”
Scar cheers while Mumbo snickers, settling on the floor quickly. Scar gestures for Mumbo to sit behind him, and for Grian to sit behind Mumbo. Mumbo grabs a few flowers while he’s at it, while Grian grumbles, settling behind Mumbo. Scar quickly instructs them on how to do it, and how to weave in the flowers. Grian gets the hang of it quickly, ever the fast learner, while Mumbo had a slightly harder time organizing the strands of hair.
“Oh, organizing lines of redstone is easier than this!” Mumbo bemoans, dropping his work in the process. “I’m so sorry Scar— I’m absolutely pants at this.”
“It’s no problem,” Scar encourages. He reaches behind him for as far as he can, and helps Mumbo out. “I don’t mind if it’s messy.”
“Yeah, well, Mumbo does.” Grian snorts. Mumbo just slumps and grumbles at Grian, seeming to find motivation in his words.
And it’s quite peaceful, really.
“Oh, Mumbo,” Scar begins brightly, as he weaves a flower crown. “You watch the Life games, right?”
“The one that was like, a couple months ago?” Mumbo says, sounding amused. “Why do you ask?”
“Oh you— stop bringing up the betrayal, Scar!” Grian groans, even as he braids Mumbo’s hair.
“He did it to me twice.” Scar sniffs, and he momentarily falls into Mumbo’s lap with a hand pressed to his forehead. “But the last one was just uncalled for!”
“What are you suggesting?” Mumbo raises an eyebrow and holds up the braid in Scar’s hair he was doing. “Because if you didn’t know, I’m not yet done mate.”
“We should cancel Grian.” Scar cheerfully says, sitting back up to allow Mumbo to finish.
“What?!” Grian squawks, dropping his braid. “It was a part of the game Scar! If anything, I’d say it’s payback for Third Life!”
“You got revenge two times?” Mumbo says, disbelievingly. “I think that’s a little unfair now.”
“So true, Mumbo,” Scar agrees, shooting his friends with a mischievous grin. “I don’t think that’s very fair of you, Grian!”
“And to be fair,” Mumbo adds, slipping in a flower as he works. “You do end up as a lot of your teammates’ cause of death.”
“We should get Joel, and Jimmy, and BigB, and the other Southlanders in it.” Scar nods sagely. “Ooh, this is very pretty Mumbo!”
“Thank you!” Mumbo responds proudly as Scar pats his new braid. “And to think I would’ve thrown in the towel!”
“You’re a natural at this.” Scar laughs.
“Excuse you two!” Grian points an accusatory finger at them. “You can’t just drop the topic of wanting to cancel me for— for a death game ?!”
“Now that you’ve brought it back up,” Scar muses, tapping his chin. “I really do think we should send out a message.”
“I— you— argh!” Grian flops onto his back, groaning. “That’s not what I meant!”
“You did kill me and Scar,” Mumbo says, sounding almost sympathetic. “Scar more times than me.”
“You two are unbelievable.” Grian drags a hand across his face in an attempt to hide his growing smile. “Why did I agree to keep hanging out with you two.”
“You get a free Scarland ticket,” Scar says at the same time Mumbo shrugs and replies, “You made the Buttercups mate.”
“One.” Grian points to Scar, with an unimpressed smile. “We both know that’s not why, and two!” Grian turns his exasperated gaze to Mumbo. “You were the one that pushed it!”
“You agreed.” Both Scar and Mumbo said. Grian grabs a nearby pile of leaves and shoves his face into it, screaming.
“You haven’t finished my braid, by the way,” Mumbo tells Grian once he reemerges. Grian looks like he’s trying to sour his face, but it really doesn’t work if he’s got a huge smile on it. “I don’t think I will finish it now,” Grian grumbles as he takes the braid back into his hands. “I won’t stand for this bullying.”
Scar giggles at him, before exclaiming out. “Oh! How about this, as an apology—”
“You wanted to cancel me!” Grian says disbelievingly, but Scar presses on.
“—we braid your hair!” Scar beams at him.
“You missed the part where I said my hair isn’t long enough,” Grian deadpanned, and Scar laughed heartily.
“That’s not a no!”
“Besides, a small braid looks equally as cool as our long ones.” Mumbo gestures to both his and Scar’s braids. Grian’s wings rose up, and they both took it as a “I’m interested”.
“You sit there and finish Mumbo’s braid,” Scar instructs, scooting over to sit behind Grian. Grian moves so there’s enough space, and Scar takes Grian’s hair in his hands gently. “I’ll braid for you!”
“I feel a bit silly,” Grian admits, color creeping up his neck and ears.
“At least you’re not the caboose anymore!” Scar tells him cheerily. “I’m the caboose!”
“Scar!” Grian groans, face falling into his hands. “Stop saying anyone’s the caboose!!”
“Why?” Scar innocently asks, tucking his tongue out as he starts to work on Grian’s hair.
“You can’t seriously not know!” Mumbo laughs, bending over.
“This is a braid train mister,” Scar says, in a way that’s almost matter-of-factly. “The buttercup braid train. And as there’s a conductor—”
“Don’t say it,” Grain says, despairingly. “Scar—”
“There will be a caboose!” Scar finishes, cackling as Grian drops his head in disappointment. “C’mon G! You used to be a conductor!”
“The front train car is actually called a locomotive,” Grian states, not a hint of misery in his voice.
“I thought that locomotives are the entire train,” Mumbo wonders.
Grian shakes his head as he laughs, raucous and loud. Scar can’t help but laugh with him, but in between chuckles he sternly commands, “Stay still, buttercup!”
Grian only snorts as he deadpans, “Okay buttercup ”, soon getting back into the rhythm of braiding Mumbo’s hair. Banter soon dissolves into what flowers Grian wants in his hair, if Mumbo can also make flower crowns with the flowers they aren’t going to use, and about the absurdly short amount of time Scar grew out his hair.
“What do you mean!” Scar feigns innocence, gasping in faux-offense. “My hair grows fast, sir!”
“Oh, there’s got to be some elven magic woven in there,” Grian teases, but let’s out a yelp as Scar playfully tugs at his hair (not enough to hurt, but enough to send Grian a warning).
And then there are times where it grows into a comfortable sort of silence, where they’re too absorbed in what they’re doing to manage a conversation. Grian liked the peace, Mumbo needed it to focus, and Scar liked it when it let his thoughts wander.
“So are we actually canceling Grian or—”
“Oh my gosh— Mumbo!” Grian threw his hands in the air exasperatedly. “How about I turn this on you, hm? Let’s cancel you for— for—”
“For…?” Mumbo prods, and Grian screeches at him in return, causing Scar to tumble into a laughing fit. “Well then! I guess I’m just too un-cancellable.”
“Yeah Gri.” Scar nods. “You’ve made a mistake there, pal.”
“I can cancel you ,” Grian threatens, not looking around to face Scar as he finishes Mumbo’s braid. “For your numerous scams.”
“Scams don’t equal murder!” Scar tells him cheerfully. Grian just leans forward into Mumbo’s shoulder and sighs. Mumbo only chuckles at his antics.
“Oh, and I’m done too!” Scar proudly shows Grian his braid with a hand mirror. Grian takes the time to pull himself out and admire it, begrudgingly going, “If it weren’t for your antics, I’d say it looks fantastic.”
“But you admit it looks fantastic,” Scar teases. Grian visibly sighs, before grinning.
“Yeah, it’s very cool .”
“I told you!” Mumbo exclaims, and he looks at his own braid. “Now we’re buttercup matching.”
“Oh I love that.” Scar gasps, and takes his own braid to show it. “We’re buttercup-matching !”
“You’re all silly,” Grian says, before agreeing. “We really are buttercup-matching.”
There were still some flowers leftover, so they all decided to make flower chains with the rest until they stopped for snacks. And for that, they resumed their usual banter and gossip, and the occasional insult to Doc’s announcements, which then signaled the end of their day.
“If you cancel me, I know where you live,” Grian threatened to the both of them, one last time.
Scar laughed, unaffected. “Of course you do, buttercup, you live next to me!”
“Aye,” Mumbo resolutely echoed, grinning. “Plus, it’s not like you can get in the vault.”
Grian just rolls his eyes before calling over his shoulder, “See you later buttercups!”
“That’s the first time you’ve ever said goodbye like that!” Scar says gleefully, taking off with Grian as he does so.
Mumbo only shakes his head fondly at the both of them, before equipping his elytra and going home, one last, “Bye bye, buttercups!” thrown over to his friends.
It was certainly a great Wednesday for all three of them.