Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The End was cold as Grian and his friends watched the Ender Dragon disintegrate as the portal appeared in the center, the dragon egg on its pedestal in the center. As all the other Evolutionists cheered however, Grian was more focused on how the portal seemed to be glowing a slight purple, the color of the Watchers.

“Hey guy, the portal looks kinda weird”

The cheering and congratulations quieted as everyone came over to see what Grian was talking about.

“Portal looks fine to me Gri, you must have started at the dragon explosion too long” Jimmy said, shrugging off Grian’s concern. As Grian watched, his baby brother jumped into the portal, hopefully headed back to Evo, the server they all called home.

Putting a reassuring hand on his back, right on the sensitive spot between his wings, Pearl asked, “Want me to jump with you Griba?” The tension instantly left his body as his big sis started moving her hand, scratching in just the right spot as always.

He decided not to worry anyone, even though his mind was racing with possibilities as to what this could mean.

Sighing, he quipped, “No, I’ll be OK. You go ahead and make sure that idiot brother of ours doesn’t do something dumb.”

With that, one by one they all jumped into the portal until only the blonde was left, hesitantly inching towards the portal.

Before he could change his mind, he leaped into the disorienting depths, praying that he would end up back at spawn with the rest of his comrades.

*>·◡·<*

Grian sat up, breathing hard, and looked around. He was floating in nothingness. Where was he? This wasn’t spawn! Where were his friends? Why-

“Child,” a loud female voiced announced, “What is your name?”

Grian, startled, thought for a moment before answering, “M-my name is Xelqua.” not wanting to give away his real name just yet, “Who are you?”

The voice seemed to consider that for a moment before saying, “That is none of your concern, you are safe here.”

“Where is here?”

“All in do time, why-”

“Where are my friends? Why am I here? What-”

“Oh my Void shut up!” The voice yelled suddenly, seemingly angry. “Stop asking so many questions! Just let me…”

And Grian fell unconscious yet again…

*>·◡·<*

He woke up in a blindingly white room, void of any color except his green tunic which stuck out like a sore thumb.

After letting his eyes adjust for a minute, he stood up and quickly fell back onto the bed, his wings bound together behind his back. After trying to untie them and being burned by the magic ropes, he let out a sob and curled onto the floor next to the bed, crying on and off silently for what seemed like days.

Suddenly, he heard a click and quickly looked at the door, wiping his face on his sleeve. The door opened and two watchers stepped into the room, quietly murmuring to each other.

“A∷ᒷ ∴ᒷ ᓭ⚍∷ᒷ ⍑ᒷ ⍑ᔑᓭ wᔑℸ ̣ ᓵ⍑ᒷ∷ ʖꖎ𝙹𝙹↸?” (Are we sure he has watcher blood?) the one on the left said.

The shorter of the two on the right replied, “T⍑ᔑℸ ̣ ╎ᓭ ∴⍑ᔑℸ ̣ ℸ ̣ ⍑ᒷ g∷ᒷᔑℸ ̣ oリᒷ ᓭᔑ||ᓭ.” (That is what the great one says.)

“B⚍ℸ ̣ ℸ ̣ ⍑ᔑℸ ̣ ╎ᓭ ╎ᒲ!¡𝙹ᓭᓭ╎ʖꖎᒷ! wᒷ-” (But that is impossible! we-)

“H⚍ᓭ⍑, ∴ᒷ ᔑ∷ᒷ ⍑ᒷ∷ᒷ!” (Hush, we are here!)

The two fell silent as their gaze seemingly fell on Grian, the masks over there faces hiding the looks of shock they shot his way. Grian, confused as to what they were talking about in their strange tongue, stayed silent, still curled on the ground. The taller of the two handed a bundle to the Avian and silently walked away.

As the other turned to follow Grian asked, “Why me? Why am I here?”

The Watcher looked at him for a moment before saying in English, “You have Watchers blood running through your veins.”

Shocked, Grian stood there staring for a moment before the Watcher left the room, shutting the large white door behind him.

He looked down at the bundle in his hands, just then realizing he was trembling. He took a deep breath, and opened the bundle to find a crisp, white robe, white sandals, and a black Watcher mask. The tears once again flowed freely, and he began to change into the clothing, knowing he had no choice in the matter.

*>·◡·<*

The next time they came for him, it was only one Watcher. A female it seemed, as her mask slightly differed from the ones the other two and he were wearing.

She quickly walked into the room, grabbing him by the wings and almost shoving him towards the door, either not noticing or not caring how he flinched at the contact.

They walked the whole way in silence, coming to two giant quartz doors at the end of a long hall. The doors opened and he was escorted inside to where two Watchers, dressed much more elegantly than any of the others, sat in two large thrones at the head of the room. One throne sat noticeably empty nearby, but Grian quickly forgot about it as the more central one began to speak.

“Xelqua, we welcome you to the Downside Up.”

His voiced reverberated throughout the room, making Grian’s ears ring slightly.

“Why am I here?” He asked timidly, not yet knowing if he was allowed to speak or not.

“You are here to be trained as one of us. It will take time, but you will eventually be taught Language, how to use your magic, and our traditions. You will become one of us.”

“But-”

“Silence!” The Great Lord announced, making Grian flinch.

As if on command, two male Watchers hurried over, each one grabbing one of his arms and forcing him to kneel in front of the thrones. The Watcher in the throne to the left slowly stood, walking towards him slowly, as if to intimidate him. It worked.

He began to tremble as they came to stand directly in front of him, their hands starting to glow the purple of Watcher magic.

A large burst of magic.

Horrible, searing, burning pain throughout his body.

Darkness

Chapter Text

Purple.

That was the first thing Grian saw when he woke up.

His eyes gave everything a purple tint, still burning slightly from the magical blast that had knocked him out.

He sat up to find himself in a different room than before. This had a desk in one corner, so old fashioned it had an inkwell in the top right corner, full to the brim with pristine black ink. A quill sat directly to the left on a stack of paper. The chair that sat in front of it was very simple, almost a stool if not for the single board coming off the back, barely wide enough to support him.

In the corner opposite the desk was a small bookshelf, stuffed with a few textbooks, all of which looked to be written in Galactic except for one titled "Language for the Illiterate" which, upon looking inside, only had enough English to get the point across. 

Finally, there was a door to the right of the desk that appeared to lead into the temple. It, surprisingly, wasn't locked or reinforced in any way.

After inspecting the room, he sat on his bed to wait for the Watchers to tell him what to do next. He glanced down at the floor, but what he saw shocked him. The floor, so shiny it showed his reflection, showed Grian- but not Grian! His hair had gone from dirty blonde to platinum. His eyes had gone from coal black to a vibrant purple, the purple of Watcher magic. The feathers of his earwings, the reds, oranges, and yellows of a parrot he prided himself for, had been bleached a shining white. He turned, just barely able to see his wings attached to his back, and saw that they too were a stark white.

It wasn't long before a Watcher walked into the room and started, "C𝙹ᒲᒷ ᔑꖎ𝙹リ⊣-" before realizing his mistake and continuing in English, "Come along, it's time for lessons."

Noticing that the young Watcher had changed, he sighed and said, "Your new appearance is known as your Watcher form. When you eventually learn to control your magic, this form will be hidden unless using it."

Grian internally sighed in relief, not wanting the Watcher to know just how happy he was about that.

*>·◡·<*

Grian had no idea how long he'd been in the Downside Up. The Watchers had taken his communicator before he'd woken up the first time and there weren't any clocks anywhere as far as he could see. There wasn't even a sun or moon to keep track of the days! It was just blackness as far as the eye could see outside of the pristine white walls that were his prison. 

He had been to about ten lessons so far, with about three different "subjects" being taught. Those subjects being Language, magic, and history. Surprisingly, he seemed to be picking language up very quickly. After only five lessons he was able to say simple phrases such as "Thank you" or "Good day". The Watchers claimed it was because he was, according to the Great Ones, part Watcher, but Grian still denied that possibility, not wanting to be related to the monsters who had tortured him and his friends for years with their mind games and riddles.

*>·◡·<*

Xelq- Grian!

His name was Grian! 

Grian, as part of his Language lesson, had to have a random conversation with the teacher. Not knowing what to say, he said the first thing that came to mind, 

"How long have I been here?" 

The Watcher seemed to consider this for a moment and said, "Time does not work the same here as it does in the Overworld. By Downside Up standards, you have been here for approximately six months."

The conversation quickly switched topics after that.

*>·◡·<*

"Xelqua, come to the potion room."

Grian sighed quietly to himself. He stood from his desk, quickly grabbed his textbook, "Higher Species Brewery", and strode off towards the potions room. He was about ten steps out the door when he realized he hadn't even noticed when they called him Xelqua that time. He really needed to get out of there!

*>·◡·<*

After finally finding a way to keep track of the days long ago, he had started putting a tally mark in one of the blank books every day. After a rather long punishment for accidentally speaking in English even though he had become fluent in Language at that point, he had been sent to his room and had decided to count the tally marks in the book.

3,102 tally marks

Nine years.

He had been with the Watchers for nine years.

If the Watcher who came to fetch him for lessons found him curled on his mattress sobbing, she didn't say anything.

*>·◡·<*

Xelqua had had enough.

He has surpassed Watchers three levels ahead of him in power.

It was time to put his skills to use.

With an eye stationed just outside his bedroom door, he honed in on his magic, focusing hard as he tried to do the teleportation spell that sat in front of him. He had "borrowed" the book from his instructor a couple days earlier and had spent hours studying and trying to memorize the spell before someone noticed he had taken it.

He blinked, finding himself in a long, empty hallway lined with portals, each going to a different world. Knowing he didn't have long now, He quickly started searching for a world that would work. It didn't have to be perfect, it just had to have a couple important things.

A whitelist,

A strong barrier,

And a void surrounding it.

After searching about ten portals, Xelqua was getting frustrated. He hadn't found anything promising. The closest thing he found was a world surrounded by a void that had no whitelist and a very weak security system the other Watchers could easily break through.

Just then, he noticed someone hurrying down the hall towards his bedroom door. It was now or never, Xelqua thought, as he hurled himself through a random portal, praying that it was at least decently protected.

*>·◡·<*

Wind howled through his ears as he fell through the sky towards the land below. Xelqua tried to open his wings to fly, forgetting they were bound behind his back and would be no use.

'Well, if this is the end, at least I'm free" he thought as he plummeted towards the land below.

Somehow, by what seemed like a miracle, he landed in a small lake and survived. He tried to swim to the surface, but with his wings off balancing him, it was a losing battle.

>Grian Drowned
<Mumbo Jumbo> Who?

He woke up gasping for air on the shore of the lake, coughing out the phantom water, the feeling still lingering in his lungs. looking around, he found himself on the edge of a forest next to a large lake, a dock sticking out into the center. The colors seemed strange to him. It had been a long time since he had seen any color except white and black.

"Hi there, Grian was it?"

Grian jumped at both the sound of his real name and a voice that seemed to come from directly behind him. 

He turned around, fists raised, to find a man standing at the edge of the forest staring at him.

"Whoa there, I'm not looking for a fight! Saw the death message then heard you coughing so I came to make sure you're OK."

The man stepped out of the shade, giving Grian a better look. He was slightly taller than Grian, with a long slender tail, black hair, tan skin, and emerald green eyes. 

"You are?" Grian asked, English feeling foreign on his tongue after years not being permitted to use it.

"The name's Scar! Say, since your new, your probably gonna want a place to stay. You can come to my base, or I can help you build a house real quick. Or we could talk to Xisuma about some other living arrangement. He's the admin."

Grian hesitantly accepted the first choice, still wary of the stranger, and followed Scar through the woods. Now that Scar's back was to him, he noticed two fragile looking wings hovering just off his back. They were almost translucent, casting a silver-blue hue onto the man's back.

With Scar rambling on about what Hermitcraft, the name of the server, Grian rather enjoyed the walk, not having to talk and able to just walk and listen. As they reached Scar's base however, the man turned around to look at his guest and quickly frowned, seeing just how beat up the poor guy looked. 

Just as he was about to show Grian to the shower, he noticed how the blonde's wings were bound tightly to his back, paling at the site. He told Grian to wait there and quickly ran off to grab a pair of wire cutters, thinking scissors wouldn't be enough for the thick ropes.

He hurried over and motioned to start cutting, silently asking permission from the avian. 

Hesitantly, Grian nodded and braced himself warning, "They're magic so be carefully, they burn me if I try to touch them."

Bracing himself, he watched as Scar walked behind him and positioned the cutters, flinching when they brushed his wings. Even though it concerned him, Scar pushed that little factoid to the back of his mind and...

*Snip*

The ropes fell away, caked in blood and grime that must've taken years to collect. 

As soon as they lost contact with Grian, the blonde felt a wave of magical energy rush through his body, and he passed out, Scar barely catching him.

Chapter Text

"Ugh... what?" Grian groaned as he opened his eyes, slowly adjusting to the low lighting.

Laying on his stomach, he tried to push up on his forearms and cried out as his wings jerked at the movement, pain lacing through his wings and back. He glanced back, tearing up from the pain and shock at the shape his wings were in.

Sure, they had been bound for ten years, he had expected they would be in bad shape, but he didn't fully realize just how injured they would be. They were caked in all manner of blood and grime, most of the main flight feathers either broken or missing. It would take weeks for those feathers to grow back!

As he stared at what had once been his beautiful wings, the ones he has prided himself on so many years before, he heard footsteps coming towards the door. Realizing he was crying now, he quickly wiped away the tears and waited, memories of that same noise coming down the long, white hallways haunting him. He pushed them to the back of his mind as the door opened, the smiling face of his host peeking in, only for his expression to change to one of pity.

"You doing alright? What happened?"

Grian sighed, "A safety feature activated in the ropes when they were cut. They were made so that if I somehow managed to get them off, I wouldn't be able to get any further without help." He once again tried to sit up, this time being careful not to jostle his wings. "If I had been alone in the main hub for example, They could have easily found me and grabbed me before I woke up."

"Who's 'They'?"

Realizing he had said too much, the blonde quickly changed the subject to avoid saying anything else. "How long have I been out?" he asked hesitantly.

"About two days. I wasn't sure how you would react if I called Doc to take a look before you woke up," Scar said, gesturing at the mess of feathers, "so I decided to wait until you woke up so I could ask if it's ok. Doc's one of the best doctors on the server."

Grian considered it for a moment, but decided against it.

"I'm not sure how I would react to someone touch them, it could end badly..." 'I could lose control of my magic and hurt someone.' he almost said but caught himself just in time.

Scar looked like he wanted to argue but chose not to. After all, who knew why this guy was refusing help. Or even why he was in Hermitcraft in the first place!

"Ok, well, Xisuma messaged me earlier asking about 'the new player'. He said to message him as soon as you wake up so he can ask you a couple questions."

Grian paled a little at that, but knew he had no choice in the matter. Until he was well enough to leave he was stuck here and would just have to deal with it.

*>·◡·<*

Xisuma didn't know what to make of the avian that sat before him. The three sat at Xisuma's desk in his office, the blonde and X just staring silently at each other from opposite sides of the table.

The avian was wearing a well-worn green tunic and his wings looked like they had been through a blender, a mess of broken feathers and grime and... was that blood? Scar had said something about them being tied by some type of magic rope when he found the boy.

Scar cleared his throat and glanced between the two, not sure of what to say or even if he should interrupt their little staring contest. Grian, sensing the tension in the room, stayed silent, waiting for this 'Xisuma' to make the first move.

During his time with the Watchers, Grian had been taught about all the different species that lived in Minecraft and how to recognize them. It was one of the subjects he excelled at. It had only taken Grian one glance to know this admin was a Child of the Void, more commonly referred to as Voidwalkers.

His studies had taught him that Voidwalkers were one of the more dangerous of the eight higher species and should be avoided as much as possible, so sitting directly in front of one that seemed so calm and put together shocked him slightly. He wasn't sure what he had expected when he though about what a Voidwalker might look like - there were no pictures of them anywhere in the temple - but he definitely wasn't expecting this.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Xisuma decided to speak up.

"So how did you get through the security, and why are you here?" he bluntly questioned.

All the possible replies Grian had thought up in the time between leaving Scar's base and arriving fled his mind in an instant. He stuttered as he tried to come up with a believable story.

"I- umm- I... I w-was..." words just wouldn't come no matter what he tried.

"He mentioned something earlier about someone looking for him." Scar supplied, trying to help the nervous avian, thinking he was just anxious about meeting X after hijacking the barrier AND the whitelist somehow. Speaking of which, how was he even able to do that...

Scar focused back on the present as Xisuma spoke, "Mhm, and you just so happened to land in a whitelisted server with a barrier rivaling the strength of the main Admin world? That makes perfect sense." He sarcastically quipped, thinking Scar and Grian wouldn't even understand the reference and laughing to himself. The fact was that only Admins and a few trusted players knew about the secret 'Admin only' server. But as he glanced between the two boys, he saw a spark of recognition in the blonde's eyes.

Confusion took over his features for a second, and though he was quick to mask it with his poker faced neutrality, Grian caught the look and frowned slightly, wondering what he was thinking and wishing the Listeners had kidnapped him instead, then realizing just what he was thinking and overruling the thought, not wanting to have been kidnapped at all!

Putting on a calm, collected persona, Grian quietly asked, "Before we continue this conversation, could I please borrow your communicator? I want to check on- see when- see if an old server I used to be on is still running. If it is I'll head there as soon as I'm well enough to travel."

Xisuma seemed to consider this for a moment, and hesitantly handed his communicator to the Avian, making sure he was logged out of anything important so as not to allow the near stranger to see anything he shouldn't. The blonde quickly grabbed the communicator and tried to log into his old Admin profile, but all he got was an error message:

Profile deactivated - error code 485 

Frowning, he tried a second time but once again the error code appeared. He brushed it off, thinking they had assumed him dead considering he had just disappeared for ten years and forgetting the hours he had spent memorizing the different error code messages. He continued with a guest account and quickly typed in the name of his beloved server, 'Evolution'. Scrolling through the list of ten or so servers with the same name he finally found it.

He paled as he read through the info, realizing the implications of what the Watcher had told him years before, "Time works differently here than in the Overworld."

Chapter Text

Grian wordlessly handed the communicator back to Xisuma, looking as if he’d seen a ghost. X knew better than to ask questions. He knew by the look that the server was probably no longer active. There was likely more to it, but he was afraid that if he asked he might make the boy cry.

Scar has excused himself, saying something about finding a bathroom to get out of hearing this conversation.

Xisuma wondered what had happened to the blonde. Had he been abused? Maybe kidnapped for experimentation as a young child like Cleo was? He didn’t look like he could be any older than sixteen after all, nineteen at the most. Although something about him seemed to radiate wisdom, he pushed it to the back of his mind. After all, who had ever heard of an adult Avian looking like a teenager?! His feathers were bright and shiny as a fledgling!

He sighed, “Can you tell me anything about how you got here, maybe who you were running from?”

Grian seemed to shrink in his seat at that.

“I, um, T-th-they have eyes and ears everywhere. They might hear if I t-talk about them. I swear I j-just picked a s-server at random from all the ones that- that had strong security!”

The Avian was trembling now, tears starting to trickle down his face.

“I j-just- I just need a place to stay for a c-c-couple weeks until I’m f-fully healed then I’ll be o-out of your h-hair and you’ll ne-never see me again. P-please-”

His throat closed up as a sob rose, Grian just barely managing to keep it down.

X continued to look at the blonde, realizing now that he was just a scared kid running from his past, just like everyone else on this server he called home. He looked at the Avian with pity and said in a much softer tone, “We have a thing here on Hermitcraft called Hermit Code. Every person on this server has secrets. Heck, most of them are wanted criminals! Hermit Code allows us all not to have to talk about our past.” He sighed quietly. “You’re free to stay here as long as you need, although for safety reasons you have to have someone with you at all times. Do you understand?”

Grian jerked his head up and stared at the Admin, a look of shock on his face. The tears stopped flowing

“W-what?” he asked hesitantly. “I- why?” he almost whispered, shock turning into disbelief as he continued to stare.

Xisuma softly smiled, “I’m guessing you haven’t experienced something like this in a long time. I understand your situation, even if I don’t know the details. I’ve been in similar ones. You can stay here on Hermitcraft as long as you like. I don’t care where you go as long as someone is with you.”

The blonde took a second to process his words, and smiled as he finally understood what the Voidwalker was saying, tears coming once again.

*>·◡·<*

It had been about a week since Grian had talked to Xisuma, his wings still hadn’t been preened, but they had healed enough he could glide if he started high enough, although it stung slightly and his balance was a little off. He was sitting on the roof of Scar’s little cottage letting his mind wander as he heard a knock at the door.

“Scar? You home?”

Grian stayed silent. Scar had left a while ago to do… something. He hadn’t told him what exactly.

“Is anyone home? I could use some help.”

The Avian sighed. He knew of course that X had informed the rest of the server he was here and staying with Scar. He slowly stood and glided down to stand directly behind the giant that stood at the door, taking a second to study him before saying anything.

He was about a foot taller than Grian, with jet black hair. The blonde thought it odd that the man was wearing a suit, and even odder that it appeared to be stained with some red substance in a couple spots.

“Ahem” Grian coughed loud enough to get his attention.

He jumped about a foot in the air and spun around to face the Avian.

“Wha- huh?! How did you-?! Where did you-?! What!?!” the guy sputtered as he stared at the short man who had seemingly materialized behind him.

Grian just smirked, getting a better look at the guy. Seeing the strangers face, he now knew that the guy was human. He had always been fond of humans, thinking them lucky- he was getting sidetracked! What did the stranger say?

“I’m sorry, what did you say?” He hesitantly questioned, face slightly reddening in embarrassment for not paying better attention.

“I asked if your this ‘Grian’ everyone has been talking about.”

At a nod from the young Avian the man smiled, “Well then, the names Mumbo Jumbo, or Mumbo. Or Jumbo. Or, well I have a lot of names actually. I suppose that’s a strange thing to say…” Mumbo continued on almost incoherently mumbling.

“Umm, good to meet you Mumbo. Now, what did you need, exactly?”

Mumbo abruptly stopped his mumbling and smiled.

“Oh, yes, that! Do you know where Scar is? I was hoping to have some help testing one of my new redstone machines. Maybe you could help?”

The Avian looked surprised at that, “Yeeeaaahh… you really don’t want me anywhere near your project. When it comes to redstone all it takes is for me to come within a foot of it for everything to break apart!”

The Brit just laughed at that, “Oh! That would be perfect! That’s why I always ask Scar to help me, actually. He also has a way of destroying any redstone machine he comes in contact with.”

“Well, if your sure, I suppose I can leave a note for Scar when he gets home.”

Mumbo’s smile somehow grew even larger, “Great! You go ahead and do that, I’ll message Etho and let him know.”

Grian hurried into the house and quickly wrote a note to Scar telling him where he was going. He then went back outside to find Mumbo waiting silently by the door. When he was sure Grian was finished he strapped on his elytra and got ready to fly off, but saw Grian hesitate and remembered he had heard that the Avian’s wings had been injured when he arrived and he likely couldn’t fly yet.

He started saying, “I have an extra elytra if you want to try flying with it.” but then hurriedly continued, “Or we could just walk, I don’t live too far from here, we could probably get there by noon if we start now-”

“I’ve never flown with an elytra before, it might be faster if we just walk.” Grian quickly interrupted before the human started panicking or something.

“Oh! Ok then.” he muttered before taking off his elytra and starting to walk towards his base, Grian trailing behind.

*>·◡·<*

Grian heard Mumbo’s base before he saw it, the sound of dozens of contraptions ringing out for chunks around the place. When it came into view the blonde’s eyes widened at the sight before him. There were machines everywhere! It looked as if everything it was possible to automate was automated, even the small things that really took no time at all and were really too much trouble to motorize for most people.

They stepped through the piston door and onto a platform where, at the press of a button, they slowly began to descend lower into the base on an elevator. Mumbo glanced over at the Avian to see him looking around with a look of awe on his face. He chuckled to himself.

“You like it? I love doing redstone projects in my free time, which I have a lot of. Almost everything here and in Etho’s base is automated.”

Grian just nodded, to occupied staring at the machine shearing sheep to their right to answer. Suddenly, as he readjusted his footing to look up at the ground floor, the elevator shuddered to a stop below them. He sheepishly looked down at the now un-moving floor and muttered, “I knew it wouldn’t last long with me here.”

Mumbo just looked around confused, having heard the Avian but not believing that he was actually the cause of the failure. Surely he couldn’t actually be that cursed! After all, Scar rode the elevator just fine!

“I bet it’s just rusty wiring, nothing to worry about! Come on, we can take the stairs from here, I’ll fix this later.”

Still not fully believing that the blonde could seriously be the cause of the mechanical failure, he walked past the escalator and led him to the old, un-automated staircase he kept around for sentimental value.

They finally reached the basement floor where they found a masked figure waiting for them next to a very complicated looking machine.

The masked figure smiled, “Ah, you must be the guest player! Grian, right? I’m Etho.”

Grian reluctantly shook the extended hand, not sure yet how he felt about the masked figure before him, his single red eye slightly unnerving the blonde. Grian studied the player before him. He knew there was something off but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Then it clicked and his eyes widened it excitement.

Before he could think he excitedly exclaimed, “Oh my Void you’re a shapeshifter aren’t you?! I’ve read about them but I’ve never actually seen one!”

Etho just stared at him in shock, a little alarmed. How did the Avian guess that so fast?

“Umm… yeah. How exactly did you notice?”

Realizing his mistake, Grian paled slightly, stuttering, “I-I- u-umm… I read a lot…”

Not quite believing him, Etho shrugged it off and looked at Mumbo, “What took you guys so long? I almost tried testing it myself.”

“We had to walk since Grian has never used an elytra before, then the elevator broke half way. Should we get started?”

The three then began the task of testing the machine. The machine turned out to be a drilling rig to look for diamonds. They showed Grian how to use it, then after they made sure he knew exactly what to do, asked him to try operating it.

It only took two minutes for half the machine to explode in a cloud of smoke, the redstoners looking on in shock as the blonde, now sporting black, smoke stained locks, sheepishly turned around to face them.

“I told you I break everything redstone if I get too close.”

Chapter Text

It turned out that the machine had a lot of flukes that allowed it to either explode, catch on fire, or just stop working when Grian was the one operating it. They spent the next week messing with it, the blonde going over everyday to help test, although Mumbo was very explicit about the Avian NOT going near any of his important contraptions now that he’d seen ‘the curse’ in action.

After about a week Grian walked over to the base to find Etho and Mumbo at their workbench carefully editing the designs for the drill.

“What are you doing? I thought you weren’t gonna edit them until we were done?”

They looked up at him, redstone dust coating their clothes and faces as normal.

“Didn’t Scar tell you? We’re getting ready to move on to the next season. We’re gonna re-build the machine there and continue testing.” Etho asked, looking back down and continuing the design.

Grian winced, “Oh yeah, I forgot he mentioned something about that…”

Grian stood there for another minute then walked out of the base to leave them to it.

*>·◡·<*

*ding*

Grian jolted, still not used to the noise. Xisuma had given him a brand new communicator since with the next starting he would officially become a Hermit.

<XisumaVoid> Everyone please meet at spawn. It’s time to leave!

The blonde had been expecting the message, and quickly hopped off the tree he was perched in, noticing for the first time that his wings were beginning to hurt a little more whenever he moved them. That didn’t seem good…

He quickly walked towards spawn. He’d been waiting nearby since about sunrise so he wouldn’t be the last one to the portal since he was the only one who had to walk, everyone else used an elytra. He was still almost the last one there, tying with Mumbo who practically dive bombed the group as soon as he arrived.

“Okay everyone! Now that we’re all here, are we ready to move on to season nine?” Xisuma asked, grinning underneath his mask.

Cheers rang out from the whole crew.

“Alright then! Lets g-!” The rest of his sentence was cut off as he stepped through the portal, the crowd of Hermits following close behind. Grian and Scar the only ones left as everyone else disappeared. As Scar moved towards the portal, he noticed Grian wasn’t following and turned to look at the Avian, noticing he was trembling slightly.

Frowning, he asked, “You ok G?”

The blonde just stood there for a second silently before tentatively replying, “I- last time I stepped through a portal I was captured by Them…”

Scar’s eyes widened in shock! This was the first time Grian had talked about any of his past since the meeting with X a week earlier.

“Oh, Grian, I…”

The man had no clue how to reply to that, so he just walked up and grabbed the Avian’s hand, smiling softly.

“Come on, we’ll step through together.”

Grian hesitated for a moment before slowly taking a step towards the portal, then another. When they were standing right in front of the portal, he shut his eyes as he took the final step, the weird feeling of the portal’s power surrounding him for an instant before he once again felt the warm Overworld air.

Opening his eyes, he smiled. He saw exactly what he was supposed to. The Overworld stretching out in front of him. The large group of Hermits chatting and a little ways to his left. And Scar, standing next to him smiling like a madman at the blonde.

*>·◡·<*

“I know, I know! But it’s not my fault, I was born with the curse!” Grian huffed good-naturedly.

Mumbo laughed at his friend’s expression, “You do not seriously expect me to believe that ever since you were born, you have broken every redstone device you come in contact with.”

“Mumbo, we have been on this server for all of two days, and I have already exploded the entrance of your base trying to get through the redstone door, caught you auto tree farm on fire, and released all your sheep out of their pens with a misplaced water bucket. All I’m saying is that you should find a way to either Grian proof it or just have a normal door so I can visit you without destroying your hard work.”

“I still don’t believe that the sheep thing was an accident.” the man muttered as he continued repairs on what used to be the entrance of his base.

Suddenly, they heard a noise behind them and, seeing a portal, both stopped what they were doing and silently took up defensive positions in front of it, ready to attack whatever came through. What walked through the portal made them both freeze, one in confusion, the other in shock.

As Grian locked eyes with the Avian standing before him unsteadily, the newcomers eyes widened in amazement. He whispered, “Grian?” before his eyes rolled up into his head and he passed out, Grian lunging forward just in time to grab him but falling to the ground under the weight of the familiar figure.

The blonde stared at where the portal had been, arms coming around the other as tears streamed down his face, not wanting to look down for fear his eye were deceiving him. He willed himself to look down at the man laying in his lap, letting out a sob as he recognized the boy.

“Timmy…” He sobbed, holding the other close to him.

Mumbo just looked on, not knowing what to do to help or if he should interfere in the first place. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Grian’s sobs of joy turned into small sniffles as he tried to get himself under control.

“Mumbo, message Doc, tell him to get a cot ready, please.” he almost whispered.

The human quickly sent a message before walking over to help his friend and helping him lift the limp figure.

They picked him up, Grian grabbing his legs and Mumbo his arms, and hurriedly carried him to Doc’s base. Since the dock of his starter base was on the opposite shore, they had to set the man on the ground and wait as Mumbo built a one-block cobblestone bridge across the water and to the side of Doc’s boat where he proceeded to break a hole in the wall. Doc protested loudly until he saw the limp figure and helped them inside.

As they set the new Avian on the cot Doc had just set up, the creeper hybrid’s communicator dinged twice. He checked the messages on it and frowned, walking over to the supplies closet and getting out two more cots.

“What is it?” Mumbo asked, Grian too preoccupied with their ‘guest’ to be paying any attention.

“Xisuma and Scar both just messaged me separately. They both told me to get a cot out and that I would be getting a new patient.”

Chapter Text

The four arrivals each lay on a cot against the wall of Doc’s large cabin, a curtain in between each bed for the small amount of privacy it provided. The boat rocked oh so slightly in the water. About five minutes after Xisuma and Scar messaged, Etho came gliding in through the porthole of the boat carrying an unconscious man like a sac of potatoes. Xisuma, recognizing the unconscious form as Impulse, had immediately set up another cot before Doc could even register what was going on and Etho had swiftly set down the figure and promptly passed out on the floor from pure exhaustion.

Xisuma had just sighed at that. He supposed that’s what happens after not sleeping for two days trying to finish your base, then carrying your own body weight across a lake.

Grian hadn’t left the other Avian’s side since they arrived at Doc’s house, even when Doc insisted he leave so that he could examine his patient. Xisuma, Scar, and Mumbo had all been shooed out of the room, but when Doc went back in to likely drag the blonde out along with them, there had been an unintelligible yelling match, the sound of something crashing to the floor, and silence.

X had tentatively peaked his head into the room to ask Doc if he needed help, but at a glare from the creeper he had hastily walked back to the living room to wait with the others.

*>·◡·<*

Two hours later, an exhausted Doc walked out from behind the impromptu curtain and collapsed on the couch. Etho had woken up and left for home an hour earlier, X making him promise to get more sleep.

“They’re all stable, although they all have a little code alteration I’ll have to repair at some point.”

X hesitated, “Are Impulse and Skizz ok? They just disappeared without a trace years ago for them to show up now-, with Joe AND this strange Avian I-”

“X, they are both fine. Their code is slightly damaged, but it is not nearly as bad as the Avian. I can’t even begin to check Joe’s code for some reason… Scar, would you mind going to Grian’s base and getting his wing medication?” Doc said, then whispered under his breath, “The kid still won’t let me touch his wings, the idiot.”

Scar let out a long, tired sigh but stood up and walked out the door to head to Grian’s base. As he flew, he tried to remember where in that ‘entity’ Grian kept his meds. He really hoped that they weren’t in the blonde’s ender chest since he couldn’t access that but-.

He stopped, noticing something off about the entity. More off than usual that is. Hesitantly reaching out with the little magic he had left from his past, he stretched it out as far as it could go, and sensed a presence inside the giant creature. He took out his bow and crept towards the looming figure. Why had Grian decided to build a giant rock monster in the first place, it was so creepy?!

Reaching the entrance, he got ready, gripped his weapon tighter and…

“Freeze!” He yelled into the empty space as he jumped out dramatically, bow at the ready.

“Aw come on! That was an amazing entrance and ever-” wait, the room wasn’t completely empty after all. There, on the floor in the far back corner, lay a young Avian girl curled on her side, her pastel brown, blue, and white wings splayed around her, and a red macaw feather strung around her neck.

*>·◡·<*

Scar rushed into the room cradling a young woman in his arms. As soon as he got over the shock of seeing a random Avian girl on the floor in a giant ‘sentient’ rock, he’d carefully scooped her up and rushed across the cobblestone bridge Mumbo built earlier, hoping she was still ok considering she’d likely portalled in hours ago with the other newcomers.

Xisuma watched, bewildered, as the conman rushed past him and through the curtain, Doc starting to yell obscenities until he noticed Scar’s cargo. Grian, barely aware of anything outside of his own mind, turned to look at the commotion, couldn’t see what Scar was holding as the man’s back was turned towards him. He let out a small gasp and fresh tears threatening to spill over as he saw blue and brown tips of flight feathers peaking out from behind Scar.

Not wanting to believe that his luck had turned so quickly as that meant bad things were coming soon, he impatiently waited for Scar to turn towards him so he could get a better look at the figure.

Just then a loud gasp rang out through the room as Scar was knocked off-balance by the girl leaping from his grasp, getting into a wobbly defensive stance, although you could tell just how off balanced she was by the way she almost fell on her face.

She looked around the room and glared at the strangers in front of her, starting to move towards the door when she stopped, her eyes landing on the flash of familiar red a couple feet behind the men that had, as far as she could tell, kidnapped her. Her vision slowly came more into focus, first staring at the familiar fire colored wings, then slowly moving to the bright red turtleneck, and finally moving upwards to the face she thought she would never see again.

“Grian?” She whispered, her fists slowly lowering, tears at the edge of her vision but not yet falling for fear. Fear that her injured mind was playing tricks on her. After all, this was too good to be true.

“Yes.” he whispered back.

And in the next instant she was in his arms, squeezing the life out of him just like he remembered, her body racked with sobs, no one able to tell if they were the happy or sad kind. His arms wrapped around her and squeezed as tightly as he could, tears finally released as he buried his face in her neck and sobbed just as hard if not harder.

As soon as Doc got over the shock of being attacked by what seemed to him like an insane, mentally unstable bird lady, he ushered Scar out of the room to give the two Avians privacy, putting the pieces together after Grian’s surprising announcement that this ‘Jimmy’ was actually his brother when Doc had tried to forcefully remove the blonde from the med bay.

“What’s going on? Is everyone alright?!” the distressed Admin interrogated as he rushed up to the scientist.

“Not my story to tell. I’ll leave it to Grian whenever he’s ready.” the creeper replied as he pushed past the Admin, passing the still confused Scar’s arm to the Voidwalker to make sure he wouldn’t try to see what was happening, went to the couch, sat down, and promptly passed out after the day’s adrenaline finally ran out.

Chapter Text

Grian sighed to himself, slowly standing, his sleeping sister in his arms. She’d passed out about thirty minutes before after they’d cried together for a couple hours. It was night now. He slowly lifted her into the air, still drained from the experience and still slightly shocked that both his siblings had appeared at the same time, and that they were here at all. Alive, not dead like he had thought- no. Not dead like the Watchers had led him to believe.

He crossed through the curtain that separated his brother’s area from the empty one Doc always had ready. No matter how many patients he had, the creeper always had an extra room handy since, as he put it, “When one gets hurt, always expect more to follow on this server.” although he always seemed to say it in much more ‘colorful’ language.

Setting her on the bed, he sighed, sitting down and just staring. She had old burn scars on her right arm, a scar across her left cheek.

“What happened to you two? Where have you been all these years?” He whispered, barely audible.

He slowly stood, walking towards the kitchen to get a glass of water for his raw throat, when he heard a groan come from the room adjacent to Pearl. He rushed over to the curtain, slowly pulling it aside to find his baby brother trying, and failing, to sit up.

Noticing movement from the corner of his eye, Jim glanced over, pausing for a moment when he saw the familiar figure of his older brother standing before him.

Grian smiled, thinking that the surprised look on Jimmy’s face was a good thing, when the man growled and turned his head away, unable to move anything else without his body aching in protest.

“I already told you to leave me alone! Just stay out of my dreams, I’m not joining you to avoid all the torture in the world…” he grumbled, tears edging his vision against his will.

“Oh Jimothy…”

“Don’t you dare use THAT NAME, only he can use THAT NAME!!! You already took him from us, why do you keep expecting me to agree just because you use his face?!” the other blonde all but yelled.

Grian went silent, not knowing how to react to that. ‘What have those monstrosities done to you Tim’ he thought angrily.

He slowly approached the bed, stopping only when he reached the chair next to it and sitting down. The bedridden man tried and failed scooting away, opting instead for look in the opposite direction and pouting like a young child. And Grian started to speak.

“Do you remember how I gave you that nickname? We had just moved in with Netty and Martyn, and we were sitting at the table talking about… I don’t even remember now it’s been so long, probably something random. I kept calling you Tim and Pearl was calling you Jim, and when no one seemed to notice, Netty spoke up, asking why we were calling you by two different names.” he chuckled softly to himself, wanting to cry at the happy memory of times before, but having no tears left to shed, “We didn’t know what to say to that, and that’s when you spoke up. You were only eleven at the time, and no one had ever asked before while you were in the room, and yet you had the perfect answer, do you remember what you said?” he stopped, unable to speak for a few seconds while he composed himself, voice breaking as he continued, “You told her that names didn’t matter, as long as they were coming from the people that loved you, and that at this point you wouldn’t be surprised if someone made one up, like Jimothy. And that’s what I called you, because I was beyond proud about how you answered.”

Jimmy was frozen in place, afraid that the slightest motion would make everything disappear. That he would wake up and this would all be a dream.

“G-G-Grian?” he whimpered, slowly turning his head to face his brother.

Grian smiled in that way only he could, and Jimmy burst into sobs, Grian taking that as a cue to quickly stand up and squeeze his little brother tightly in a bear hug.

“H-how are you h-here? You- they- you were gone! They told us you were with T-Them and that w-w-we’d never see you again!” he cried into his brother’s shoulder

“Shhh, I know.” Grian shushed, rubbing circles in his brother’s back like he did when they were younger, his hands remembering the motion perfectly

“I-I-I’m s-sorry, I-I sh-should’ve kept l-looking, I sh-should’ve known they were lying I-”

“Hey, you did nothing wrong.” Grian chastised softly, “They-” he sighed, “They did take me, they weren’t lying about that part. And we were never supposed to see each other again, I just changed their plans when I escaped.”

Jimmy pulled away, pressing his forehead against the others and softly asking, “Why do you look so young? You look as if you haven’t aged a day.”

Grian flinched at the comment.

“I could ask you the same thing.” he hesitated before saying even quieter, “How old are you now, Tim?”

The other seemed to consider this for a second, seemingly confused at the question.

“It’s- I think I’m… eighteen? Maybe? I haven’t thought about it in so long.”

Grian flinched even harder when he said that, a couple tears running down his face, but still smiling sadly.

“Timmy, umm… time works differently in the Downside Up than it does in the Overworld. Physically, I haven’t aged a day. I’m stuck in a sixteen year old’s body. But…” he trailed off, trying to figure out how to break the news, “In the Downside Up, it’s been ten years.” Jimmy pulled away slightly and was about to speak when Grian shushed him, though there was no edge to it.

“I’m not done yet. In the Downside Up, it’s been ten years. But here, in the Overworld, Evo has been inactive for two hundred.”

“W-what? It… but it’s only been four! I’d actually be dead if it’s been that long and so would-” he cut off abruptly, eyes widening in realization at what he had forgotten in the moment.

“P-pearl, where-”

“Calm down Jimothy. She’s in the bed right over there.” The Avian pointed at the curtain he’d come through earlier.

“What about the others? Joe, Skizz, and Impulse, are they…?”

Grian nodded his head, concern etched on his face.

“Where have you been for the past four years? I overheard Xisuma say something about losing contact with, umm… Oh! Skizz and Impulse I think. He also mentioned the other one randomly disappearing one day.”

Jimmy pursed his lift, “We’ve been…” he trailed off, eyes furrowing in confusion.

“What?” Grian asked confused.

“I… I can’t remember! Everything is just blank! I remember Joe, Skizz and Impulse, and I remember that we were all together along with Pearl, but I have no idea where we were! It’s like there’s a wall keeping me from remembering!”

He started panicking slightly and Grian had to take a second to come him down before saying, “let’s just take a while to talk, ok? You can tell me about your new friends.” At a nod from his brother he stood up slowly. “I’m gonna go get some tea, do you want any?” Jimmy nodded again, watching as his big brother stood up and turned to head towards the kitchen.

“Grian!” he gasped, staring in horror at his brother’s back, “Your wings! When was the last time you preened them?!”

Grian, in all honesty, had completely forgotten how much his wings had been aching recently from the lack of cleaning.

“Uh… I-” He sat back down at the foot of the bed, trying to figure out how to word this and tearing up, “They- um… they, t-tied my wings with magic binds so I couldn’t fly away or something, and- and they never took it off so- and then they kept grabbing them when they needed me to move or something so…”

He was crying now, unable and unwilling to tell his brother that they haven’t been preened in over ten years and that anyone touching them sets him off.

Jimmy, getting the gist of what Grian was implying, sat there, shock rippling through him. His brother had always been so insistent about keeping their wings clean and preened that he’d been too shocked to consider why his brother’s wings looked so rough.

Pursing his lips with the effort, he slowly sat up and crossed his legs.

“Go get water. We got a cloth right here.”

His brother just stared at him with confusion, the look slowly changing to something akin to fear as he realized just what Jimmy was planning.

“Tim I-”

“Grian, I am your brother. It’s literally in the job description to enforce this stuff. Besides, I’m technically the older brother now. At least physically.”

Grian looked at him, disbelief etched into his features.

“Wha- you are so not! I-”

“We will talk about this as soon as you go get the water. Unless you want to watch me fall on my face when I try to get out of this bed to get it myself.”

The boy just sat there for a moment then, glaring over his shoulder the whole way, he slowly walked into the kitchen and filled a bucket. When he came back through however, his expression had changed to something closer to fear once again.

“Sit down.” Jimmy commanded, taking the bucket from him.

Grian did as he was told and sat on the bed, not yet opening his wings.

“Let me see, G.” Tim said, softer this time, and Grian, hesitating for a long minute, slowly opened his wings fully for the first time in over ten years.

Chapter Text

Jimmy just sat there, shell shocked. He’d known the damage was bad, but he wasn’t expecting this! When his wings had been folded, the feathers on the outside had been slightly stained by grime, but they’d looked as if they just hadn’t been washed in a couple weeks.

Almost all the feathers that had been covered up within the folds were damaged in some way, and all of them were either a much darker shade of the original color, brown and dirty with grime, blood red from, well, blood, a nasty mold green color, or a combination of them. There were many feathers just missing entirely that hadn’t been able to grow back in.

Even with all that though, the first part were the scars. Two long lines where feathers and skin had been rubbed raw stretched across his wings, one near the top and the other near the bottom. Jimmy didn’t know how since binding an Avian’s wings should only do that where the rope touches the wings, which when they’re folded shouldn’t be all the way across, unless…

“Grian, how long have your wings been bound?”

The words were so quiet a sheet moving could have muffled them completely.

Silence.

“How long?”

The injured Avian who hadn’t moved a muscle since he opened his wings began to tremble.

“T-they… they never took it off.” he breathed even quieter than Jimmy, the other having to strain to hear it.

Jimmy was white as the sheets he laid on.

“…When did they tie them?”

The silence confirmed Jimmy’s worst fears.

Ten years.

That was too long.

Way too long.

The Watchers had wings, they should know that.

How could they do this?

How could they be so cruel?

“Why?”

It slipped out before he could stop it.

The other just trembled more, crying silently.

*>·◡·<*

It was meticulous work.

Going through and plucking out most of the ones that had been covered under the outer layers so they didn’t clean feathers that would just be thrown away anyway, then painstakingly cleaning every feather individually, getting rid of any trace of the pain they had felt.

At one point Doc stopped by to check on everyone, but the second his brain translated what was happening he had quickly ducked back through the entrance.

Grian flinched at every small amount of contact and at one point they had to take a small break when Jimmy started on the exact spot they had always grabbed him, initiating a small panic attack as the memories plagued him.

*>·◡·<*

Doc cleaned his house, deep in thought.

Why did he wait? Yes, preening is an intimate ritual in Avian culture, but how could he not have noticed the critical condition of the boy’s wings?! He should have cleaned them himself when the Avian had first arrived on the server.

It was clear the injuries were from some sort of bond, and he should have realized that the blonde wouldn’t do it himself without at least a push.

As he beat himself up, fuming about his incompetence, Xisuma walked through the room, heading for the infirmary.

“I wouldn’t go in there, the kid’s finally dealing with his wings and… it’s not something I’d wanna see ever again…”

X stopped, not moving a muscle.“It’s that bad? I thought they were just a little dirty.”Doc winced, “I didn’t know the full extent before I walked in on them about an hour ago. It’s bad, Suma. I got barely a glance and I know that he won’t be able to fly for at least a week, most likely closer to a month.”

“Well, contact me if there are any issues. I’ll come back in the morning to check o everyone.” Xisuma sighed, walking back to the entrance and disappearing into the night.

*>·◡·<*

Neither of them knew how long they spent caring for the abused feathers, they just knew it was long enough for the sun to begin to peak over the horizon.

By the time Jim was finally finished, they were both exhausted.

Jimmy was running on pure adrenaline from the shock and it had started to fade hours ago. He was still sore and drained from his arrival and any doctor would have forced him to bed a long time ago.

He slowly stood, wobbling at first but mustering the rest of his draining energy to walk to the kitchen, bucket and towel in hand.

He dumped the now dark red, disgusting water into the sink and rinsed the towel thoroughly, being sure not to get any of the nasty concoction on anything. His hands shook, fingers not cooperating like they should. When he was done he walked back into the infirmary to find his big brother passed out on the bed, likely just as exhausted as he was from all the emotional carnage.

As soon as he reached the side of the bed, the room began spinning like he was the center of a tornado. He wobbled, and fell more than sat at the foot of the bed. Mustering all the strength he had left, Jimmy carefully maneuvered into the bed, knowing that he would feel every movement from that night when he woke up and all the adrenaline fueled numbness was gone.

He cuddled up to the other avian like they were little kids all over again, except this time Jimmy was acting as the older sibling, cocooning them with his wings, and falling into a deep, dreamless sleep.

*>·◡·<*

They woke up to the sound of yelling.

Impulse woke up in a panic, having no idea where he was and being tied to the cot after he’d fallen out the day before. Doc had ran into the room to see what the problem was and Impulse, not recognizing him, had started yelling, waking up Grian and Jimmy along with Skizz, who promptly fell back asleep.

“Calm down boy or you’ll hurt yourself!” Doc exclaimed as he tried desperately to hold calm him down.

Jimmy, hearing the commotion, tried to walk over to help but his legs turned to jelly and he fell on the ground, Grian having to help him back up. At his insistence, Grian helped Jim limp through the curtain and over to the other’s bedside.

“Impulse, I’m right here, calm down. Your safe.”

The man in question stopped struggling and looked at the Avian, fear morphing to confusion.

“Jimbo? Wha- where are we? I-I can’t- water please?” he gasped, still breathing heavily. Jimmy looked around for a second, then snapped at Doc, “Where’s the water? Your supposedly a doctor right?”

Doc huffed, “I’m the best doctor on the server, what-”

“Then why don’t you have water for a Merling?!”

“What do you mean by that?”

The voice made everybody jump.

“X-Xisuma?” Impulse croaked, tears welling up as he stared at the Admin, recognition finally sparking. The poor guy looked like a lost puppy.

“Yes, Impulse. You’re back home.” X smiled at the man, and walked to the kitchen, coming back with two pitcher of water. Before he could get a cup or hand it to the man however, he stared as the water shakily drifted out of the jug and into the empty glass Impulse had somehow gotten a hold of.

As everyone but Jim stared in awe, Impulse promptly drained the glass, floated the rest of the water over, and dropped it all on top of him, getting himself and the cot completely soaked.

“Uhhh… since when can you do that?” X asked, making a great effort to act neutral once again.

“Um, yeah… I’m a Merling apparently? I found out about it sometime in the last few years when I… uh, well I don’t actually remember how.”

“…Ok then.”

The soaked man took a second to sit there and calm down before asking, “Jim, how am I back- are we in Hermitcraft? And where are the others?”

“the others are all here. As for how we got here, I’m not quite sure, I haven’t gotten the chance to ask yet.” He shared a conspiratorial look with Grian.

“If I may ask, Jimmy, how do you and Grian know each other?” Xisuma’s expression was unreadable thanks to a glare on his mask. “I’ve been meaning to ask since it seems to be important to figure out how this happened.”

Grian paled slightly.

“Uh, well- um… it’s really complicated?” he said, although he seemed to phrase it more as a question than an answer.

“Welp, we’ve got time, so spill.”

Once again everybody jumped as a new person walked into the room.

Scar looked around at the group smirking. “Oops. Did I scare you?”

As Grian started to stutter through an explanation as to why he couldn’t give an explanation, the boat started to rock more violently. As the rocking turned to vibrating and finally to a full on earthquake Xisuma exclaimed, “Oh what now!?”

Chapter Text

As suddenly as the shaking started it stopped.

As everyone stood up from wherever they’d lost their balance and fell, they all sensed it.

There was something on the ship- no, in the ship. It was like something had infected it’s very code.

The group bunched together, backs to the inside partially surrounding Jimmy and Impulse who sat on the bed, neither able to stand on their own just yet.

A flicker.

A shadow.

Dead silence…

Glowing white eyes.

“Oh come on, not now! Can’t this wait until we can move?!” Impulse whisper yelled to Jimmy.

“Is that-” X was cut off as black mist circled his ankle and yanked him towards the black abyss, eyes staring straight ahead.

Grian was panicking now, trying to remember the Watcher lessons and wishing now he hadn’t slept through most of them, “What is that?!”

“That would be Joe.” Jim said much too calmly for Grian’s liking.

“Gri help me up, we need to calm him-” Jim was cut off by a voice yelling, “Doc grab the glasses NOW!”

Doc, apparently understanding the vague phrase, sprinted over to a cabinet and pulled out a very ordinary looking pair of green-framed glasses and promptly ran into the growing cloud of black.

“Doc!” Scar yelled and tried to run in after him, but Grian held him back.

The black cloud receded, barely noticeable at first but growing in speed, until there was nothing left but Xisuma and Doc standing over a tan figure wearing green-rimmed glasses.

“Wha- how- what was that?!” Scar whispered

Grian just stared, dumbfounded, then muttered, “A virus… your the… how are you…” decending quickly into unintelligible gibberish.

Jimmy and Impulse glanced at Joe laying on the floor, beginning to stir, looked up at Scar and Grian, looked at each other, and burst out laughing.

“Hey, what’s ‘ll the r’cket I’m try’n ta sleep” a tired voice muttered from the other side of a curtain. Doc, hearing the voice, left Joe with Xisuma and went to check up on the newly awakened Skizz.

*>·◡·<*

About an hour after the whole fiasco all of the new arrivals sat on their cots, having pushed them all together to make a big platform of mattresses since Doc had refused to let Skizz, Pearl, Jimmy, or Impulse out of bed just yet no matter how much they’d insisted they were fine. He’d almost forced Joe too but all it took was one look from Joe to stop that argument in its tracks. X and Joe had promised to answer Grian and Scar’s questions about what had happened later, when there was time.

They all sat together in a circle. The newcomers, Grian, and Xisuma. Scar and Doc stood of to the side, acting as if they totally weren’t eavesdropping.

Pearl and Jim sat on either side of Grian, both refusing to leave his side.

The Admin cleared his throat, “Ok, let’s get started. Who knows who so we know what introductions need to be made?”

When no one spoke up X sighed, “Alright, let’s see… I’m assuming all the newcomers know each other seeing as they arrived at the same time, correct?”

“Yeah” Pearl replied, finally building up the courage to speak. “I know Joe, Impulse, and Skizz all come from here, I remember them mentioning it before.” “If I may ask, how do you and Jimmy know Grian?” X asked, looking at the three.

Grian sighed, realizing this couldn’t stay hidden any longer and speaking up, “We’re siblings.”

Everybody just stared, including Pearl and Jim who hadn’t expected him to be so blunt about it after everything that happened.

“How have you never mentioned you have two older siblings?” Scar exclaimed then slapped a hand over his mouth, face reddening in embarrassment slightly.

Pearl seemed confused, “Two older siblings? What do-” she cut off abruptly and looked down at her hands, glancing at her brother sitting next to her. “Oh…”

Jimmy snickered, trying and failing to mask it as a cough.

When Grian glared at him his smiled widened, “Sorry G I can’t help it! I know this is a terrible thing to laugh about but come on, I’ve always been the baby!”

Pearl smirked, unable to hide it any longer.

Grian just sighed, a hint of sadness to it, “Jimothy is actually my little brother, I’m two years older than him.” He then mumbled under his breath, “I used to be anyway.” Although thankfully no one overheard.

At least, no one reacted.

*>·◡·<*

Once any necessary introductions were complete, Xisuma stood up to leave, saying he had a meeting with Cub to discuss something about redstone, Pearl hadn’t really understood what he exactly. She’d never really dabbled in redstone. It was too dirty and complicated for her taste.

After he left Pearl carefully got off the giant ‘bed’, being careful not to jostle any sore body parts, and pulled Grian behind a nearby curtain to talk in private.

“Griba, what did you mean when you said you ‘used to be’?”

Grian looked at her for a moment before realization dawned on him, face paling slightly.

“I- um, it’s complicated.”

She looked on, un-amused, but concern etched her features, before looking at him with puppy dog eyes.

“Please?”

He hesitated for a second before sighing in defeat, somehow still unable to resist his sister when she did that.

“Ok, I- well…“he trailed off not knowing how to phrase this. He was really gonna have to get better at explaining this.

“Time, aging, eating, everything works differently in the Downside Up. Their dimension. It’s been ten years there since I was taken, and you don’t physically age. Also, Pearl… it’s been two hundred years here in the Overworld.”

“Wha- how- what do you mean…” now it was her turn to sputter as she tried to process what he just said.

“Ten years there, is two hundred here. That’s why I was so shocked when I saw you and Tim.” he had no idea how he wasn’t crying again at this point. He guessed he had run out of tears and energy to shed about this particular realization.

Pearl exhaled deeply, knowing she couldn’t freak out about this right now. They had bigger problems at the moment, she’d focus on this later.

“Ok, let’s head back. We’ll talk about this more later, there are bigger problems now.”

As they rejoined the others, the sound of rockets filled the air and landed on top of the boat. Minutes later Mumbo and Etho came running into the room. They paused when they reached the door to the infirmary, staring at the three Hermits that had been missing for over four years. After what seemed like an eternity they both rushed at the three, who were coincidentally grouped together, tackling them all in a big pile of limbs, laughter, and happy tears.

Chapter Text

Three days later they were finally allowed to leave the infirmary after Doc did a thorough physical on all of them. When he got to Pearl and Jimmy he spent an awful long time thoroughly checking their wings, although neither of them had had their wings injured and it was completely unnecessary, they suspected it had something to do with their brother after Jimmy told Pearl what happened.

Since none of the newcomers had a base built or any supplies at the ready, everyone reluctantly decided to separate and live with someone else until the large base they’d all be staying at was finished. Even though no one seemed to remember any of the details of the four years they spent together they were all really close and agreed they wanted to stay together, so as soon as it was built they’d all be moving in where they could live near to each other.

After about half an hour of talking and arguing about it, it was decided that Joe would stay with Xisuma, Impulse and Skizz with Etho, and Pearl and Jimmy with Grian. X had argued for a while that maybe the Avians should stay with Mumbo since his base was bigger with it’s underground labyrinth of tunnels and testing rooms, but Mumbo was quick to refuse when he was informed about their relation to the ‘redstone obliterator’.

Grian, to satisfy Xisuma, built two more temporary ledges inside the entity for the two to keep their nests and belongings. The two other Avians, upon getting to the rock for the first time late that night, took one look at the two separate nests and flopped right next to Grian in his, passing out instantly.

*>·◡·<*

Grian woke up early the next morning, confusion setting in the minute he felt two warm lumps on either side of him. He drowsily reached out his hand, keeping his eyes shut in the hopes he could go back to sleep if he was safe, and felt warm feathers cuddled up next to him. The second his fingers brushed whatever it was it twitched, smacking him in the face.

His eyes flew open, about to scold what he thought was Scar whacking him with a pillow to come face to face with his little brother, his brain finally catching up.

He slowly began to sit up, huffing as he was pushed right back down by Pearl, half draped over his chest.

He groaned as he tried to push her off, only succeeding in causing her to pull him closer.

“Pearl!” he whisper yelled at loud as he dared, not wanting to wake his brother.

She just groaned in response, the sound muffled by the pillow.

He sighed, “Pearl if you don’t get off me I’m gonna do something you’ll hate”

He knew she was at least kinda awake from the fact that she pulled him even closer, turning her head towards him with a slight smile.

He huffed before smirking slightly, sticking his finger in his mouth, and shoving it right into her ear, laughing as she shrieked and launched herself away from him.

“Wha- what was th- Grian! That is SO gross!!” she yelled, throwing her pillow at him and causing him to cackle harder.

“Skizz shush ‘m tryna sleep!” Jimmy whined as he rolled over, trying to block out the noise with his pillow.

Grian stopped laughing and looked at his little brother, a smirk slowly making it’s way onto his face.

“Jimmy, I’m not Skizz. Just out of curiosity, is there a reason you would think I am?” he questioned, laughing as his brother shot out from under the blanket and looked at him, fully awake and red as a tomato.

“Wh- Grian?! Uh, it’s literally nothing, ew! Why would you even-?! We were having a sleepover with Joe and Impulse not-! You know what, it’s none of your business!” he sputtered, pouting.

“Ok, ok, enough with the drama.” Pearl announced, standing up and looking around, having not gotten a very good look the night before. “Griba, not to question your building or anything, but what in the world have you built? It looks like a giant rock from in here!”

“Uh, Pearl? That’s because it is a gian rock.” he countered, grinning. “Welcome to the entity, soon to be the most well known shop in the shopping district!”

She just stared at him, not sure how to react to that.

After a few minutes Grian stood up, stretched, and silently jumped off the ledge.

“Why’d you build your nest so close to the ground?” Jimmy asked through a yawn.

Grian had built this one only a block above the ground as a temporary sleeping spot when he first arrived. Close enough to the ground that he could jump off without using his wings. He could have built it higher, but he couldn’t think of a reason to.

“Um, well I can’t fly at the moment and I couldn’t think of a good enough reason to build it any higher, so- what? Why are you looking at me like that?” He stopped his explanation as his siblings stared at him wide-eyed.

After the silence got slightly awkward Pearl finally spoke up, “Um, Griba, we always build as high as possible. It’s- well… it’s instinct. We’re Avians.”

Grian stared at her, realization dawning as he paled slightly- barely noticeable. He’s known that he’d likely lost some of his instincts thanks to Their transformation and the years spent trying to hide them, but he couldn’t remember what was normal well enough to actually know what instincts he’d lost.

Jimmy keened softly, seeing the slightly horrified look his brother quickly hid. As he reddened slightly from the noise (it was a side effect of being an Avian they usually only let show when in an Avian server or when they were kids but usually made through adulthood if left unchecked as children), he though, ‘I haven’t heard Grian make any of the normal sounds since I got here.’ but he quickly shoved it to the back of his mind, believing he was reading way too far into it.

G, hesitating slightly, said, “I, um, it’s easier to get up to when it’s lower. This platform is just temporary, I’ll make a more permanent one when I’m able to fly again and I’ll probably make an even better one when I build my main base later. I, er, Mumbo has a new machine he needs tested and asked me and Scar to come help, your can come if you want. I’m sure he won’t mind.”

The smirk on his face said otherwise, but the two Avians excepted the offer anyway, hopping off the platform and following him to the redstoner’s base.

*>·◡·<*

Mumbo was not very pleased, to say the least.

Instead of having his normal two testers, one of which was bad at redstone and the other seemed to actually be cursed, he had his normal two testers plus two extras that may also possibly be cursed. Upon their arrival he exclaimed, “Oh no, um, G, maybe it’s not the best idea to have your family near my redstone? I, um, I don’t want to sound rude, but if they’re anything like you I’d rather they stay outside, um…” he trailed off, staring at the siblings as they looked at him in confusion.

When Grian finally realized what Mumbo meant he cackled, “Oh! You mean-! Oh that’s- haha!” he stopped, unable to continue through his laughter. Pearl and Jimmy just stared at him, having no clue what was going on.

When Grian finally collected himself he explained, “Pearl is actually pretty decent with the stuff and Tim is just a klutz no matter what he’s doing-”

“Hey!”

“But they should be fine, nothing to worry about.”

Mumbo was skeptical, but Etho just laughed and led them to the newest contraption. They explained how the original design had been trashed thanks to the new update and so they would have to start over. After a very long winded instruction on how to use the thing, Jimmy and Pearl watched as the two testers got to work slowly going through every step necessary for use so they didn’t mess up, and yet still somehow making it explode in their faces when they pressed the start button.

Etho groaned, “What the heck! Well, looks like you two can leave early, we’re gonna have to rebuild the whole thing and try to figure out what happened before the next test.”

Grian pumped his fist, “Yess!” and grinned at Scar. “I was gonna give Tim and Pearl a tour of the server so far so they can decide where they want to build the megabase, want to come with?”

Scar nodded eagerly and the group walked out the door as Grian started his ‘tour guide speech’ explaining who built what and occasionally waving at others as they passed. Pearl and Jim just smiled, seeing how happy their brother seemed compared to before when Scar leaned over and whispered to Jimmy, “I’ve never seen him so active and talkative. He’s usually pretty shy around the other Hermits and only really talks to me, Mumbo, and Etho. He only recently started having full conversations with us.”

That comment stopped Jimmy in his tracks as he laughed, “Grian? Shy? I don’t think I’ve ever heard those two words in the same sentence before!” he chuckled, “Are you sure you’re not mistaking him for someone else or something? He literally started his own prank empire in-” he cuts off, frowning slightly. “Uh, never mind, not important.”

As the blonde hurried off to catch up with his siblings Scar frowned, thinking as he stared at the grinning Avian he’d known for almost a month and yet it seemed he didn’t know him at all.

*>·◡·<*

“Ok, let me get this straight, you weren’t joking about Grian being older than Jimmy?” Scar said, looking between the three and eyes finally landing on a red faced Grian, ducking his head as his ‘little brother’ cackled next to him, seemingly hysterical about the disbelief about the age difference for the first, and certainly not last, time in his life.

Still red faced, Grian sighs, “Yes, Jimmy is the youngest, I’m in the middle, and Pearl is the oldest.”

Scar considers for a moment, sitting on his living room couch, before asking, “So how old are you three? The age difference seems to be pretty big between the three of you.”

That comment sobers them all instantly as they look between each other.

“Er- well… what age are we going by?” Grian says, barely above a whisper.

Scar, oblivious to the tension in the air as always, says, “I mean, you can only have one so, I mean, I don’t know. What year were you born? I should be able to figure it out from that.”

As Jimmy goes to answer Grian shoves a hand over his mouth, a silent conversation occurring as they stare at each other before Jim, seeming to understand, looks away from the group and says, “We, er, Avians don’t keep track of birth years.”

It’s clearly a lie, even to Scar who is usually clueless when it comes to that sort of thing.

“Uh huh, I’ve never heard of anything like that.”

None of them would meet his eyes, and after a long silence Pearl finally whispers, though not very quietly, “How much have you told him about before?”

“Um, basically nothing?”

Jimmy groans, “Guys, this is a question we’re gonna have to be able to answer!”

Scar just looks on, utterly baffled but seeing they need some space to talk.

“Okay… I’m gonna go grab us some tea from my kitchen… I’ll be right back”

As soon as Scar is out the door Grian stands from the comfy couch they’d all squished onto when they’d arrived, looking between his two siblings, and goes into full on speech mode- pacing and everything.

“Ok, how are we gonna do this? You two are simple, you stayed three years apart, but what about me? Physically I still look 16, but I’m actually…” he trails of for a second, doing a little finger math, “26 mentally.” Pearl and Jimmy both gasped when he says that, causing him to pause again.

“What?”

“Er-” Jimmy starts, looking sheepish, “we just never really considered what ‘ten years’ actually means…”

They’re silent for a second before Grian continues, “Well, anyway, umm… so either way I’m either the oldest or the youngest. Unless we want to consider telling people we’re 214, 216, and 218 years old, but that would be really hard to explain.”

“I mean, we could lie and tell people you’re 19 or 20 but-” Pearl trailed off.

Jimmy cuts in, “That wouldn’t work since he won’t molt for four years.” He grins as he continues, “And 26 won’t work either which means…”

Jimmy laughed, pumping his fist victoriously as Grian groaned, “Ah come on!”

Pearl chuckled, “Ok, so we’re agreed? I’m 21, Jimmy is 18, and, um-” she smirked, trying to cover it with a cough, “Grian is 16.”

She and Jimmy burst out laughing, unable to control their cackles as Grian colorfully ranted about how, ‘The world isn’t fair!’ and ‘I’m not being younger than my baby brother!’ continuing to mutter to himself when Scar walked in.

As they talked deep into the night, the group finally allowed themselves to relax, Jimmy occasionally vaguely teasing Grian and Scar not getting the joke when G pouted as the other two laughed.

Chapter Text

*Ding*

Scar winced at the loud noise. Apparently he’d forgotten to turn his communicator down from it’s night setting that morning. He wasn’t surprised since he had been up almost all night finally finishing his starter base. The giant tree had taken all week to finish after he’d spent the first few days in the new world lollygagging, and then all the drama with the newcomers in the past few days. Had it really been two days since Doc released them from his in-house infirmary? Anyway, he was just happy to get the couple hours of sleep he did.

He stood up and stretched where he perched on top of the large canopy of his masterpiece and opened his communicator.

<Grian> Scar, can you look at the mountain behind you?

Scar stared at the message, waiting for his brain to process what Grian had said, when he heard a huge explosion behind him and whirled around to see familiar parrot colored wings jumping towards him, silhouetted by one of the biggest explosions Scar had ever seen and waving at him with a casual smirk on his face as if he hadn’t just exploded a giant hole into the mountainside!

“Wha- what did you just- Grian?!” Scar sputtered, fully awake now.

Grian just walked up to him like a normal day and said, “Hi Scar! How’s your day going so far? I found this really cool cave inside the mountain and I wanted to explore it more, but my pickaxe broke.” he grinned “I didn’t want to lose the cave and I didn’t have another pick so I thought it’d be fun to cause a little explosion with the TNT I found.”

Scar just stared, speechless. He found himself slightly in awe of the young Avian. He’d never met anyone as chaotic as him and definitely wasn’t expecting such a dramatic shift from the little shy Avian who’d dropped out of the sky what seemed so long ago. The blonde had been a little chaotic ever since Doc cleared him to fly.

“How did you know you were close enough to the surface for that to work? You could have exploded someones base!”

The blonde just grinned, “Nah, I have a great sense of direction. Want to come explore the cave with me?”

Finally knocked out of his stupor, he sighed, “Sorry Gri, Cub is coming over today. We’ve both been so busy lately we haven’t seen each other since the season started.”

Grian considered his words for a minute before announcing, “You can invite him to go if you want,” then adding sheepishly, “er- I mean, if you want to go…”

“Well, he’ll be here any minute so if you wanna stick around I’ll ask when he gets here.”

Right on cue, a man comes swooping in on an elytra, almost falling on his face on the landing but catching himself just in time. He glances around, eyes landing on Scar, and grins, moving to hug the conman.

“Scar! It’s great to see you, how you been?”

Scar grins just as big, pulling away from the other, “Ah, same old same old. Chaos following me wherever I go!” he motions to Grian and continues, “Cub, this is Grian! I don’t think you two have met other then in passing maybe.”

Grian studies the man before him, the loose jeans clashing slightly with the white lab coat drawing his eye. He’d looked slightly familiar when Grian had first seen him at the portal a couple weeks before, and Grian now knew why as he studied his friend next to the man. Their hair was almost the same shade, scars being a dark shade of brown and Cub’s a an almost brown shade of black, and they both had emerald green eyes, Cub’s slightly darker but still close enough.

“Are you two related?” Grian asked, the words slipping from his mouth before he could stop them. Thankfully Scar just laughed, “Wow, straight to the point! Yeah, we’re brothers. No ones actually ever noticed before, at least not that fast.” and continued, turning to Cub, “Anyway, Grian was wondering if we’d like to go caving with him. He apparently found an awesome cave in the mountain and sort of… um, well lets just say there’s an easy access point.”

Cub smiled, glancing at the newly missing chunk of earth, still smoking slightly, “I see that. I’d like to if you want to Scar.”

At that, Scar strapped on the elytra Cub brought for him to borrow and they flew off towards the mountain.

*>·◡·<*

“Ok, we are officially lost!”

Scar sat on the stone floor next to Cub, fingering his pick as he watched Grian pace through the small tunnel. They’d been here for hours mining every ore they could find, going deeper and deeper into the cave system, and now that it was time to head back they couldn’t figure out which way they’d come. Everyone was exhausted and most of the picks were either broken or almost broken, so they’d been amelessly wandering around hoping to find an exit.

“Left, left, right straight, far right, mid ri- or was it mid left…” Grian muttered to himself as he paced.

Scar groaned, he’d known it wass probably a bad idea. Things never went according to plan when they involved him or Grian, let alone both! He never should have come along…

“Didn’t you say you have a ‘great sense of direction’?”

The Avian glared at him, “I do normally, but it gets hard when I’m keeping track of directions AND trying to answer the avalanche of questions you two have! Also, wasn’t it YOUR job to place torches so we could follow them back?!”

“Well… yes but- I- well- it’s not my fault Cub placed torches on the opposite wall at the same time!”

Cub turned to him aghast, “Wha- I didn’t- you know what, arguing will get us no where. How about we just- CREEPER!!!” He screamed at the top of his lungs, scrambling up and running down the hall.

Grian and Scar turn to look just in time to see the creeper bulging, eyes popped out in a way that would haunt their nightmares. They both turned and started running seconds too late as the detonation rocked the tunnel, dust raining from above as the two were sent flying away from the blast.

Grian groaned, his ears ringing as he turned his head slightly from where he lay on his stomach to look at the blurry form of Scar sprawled next to him, unconscious.

As he went to try and sit up he heard Cub whisper yelled, “Grian, don’t move a muscle!”

Grian froze in place, barely daring to breath as he turned his head to look at the man, sitting up and staring in horror at the floor. Confused, he stared at the spot he seemed to be looking at and paled, realizing why Cub sounded so scared.

The entire floor of the area of the tunnel the were in was made of gravel, and a little ways down the tunnel, about where the creeper had detonated, they could see the rocky dirt slowly but surely beginning to fall, the hole in the floor growing with each moment.

“I’m not sure how the entire floor hasn’t collapsed yet, probably by pure luck, but one wrong move could send it all falling at once, and us with it.”

“How are we gonna get out of here?!” Grian said, barely daring to even talk above a whisper, his eyes not moving from the slowly growing abyss. He knew that he might be able to use his magic to turn the floor to obsidian or something, but that would be impossible to explain without revealing who he really was.

With perfect timing, as always, Scar grunted, sitting up as both Cub and Grian screamed at him not to move.

“What’s the big-”

And just like that, the floor collapsed, taking the trio with it.

Chapter Text

They tumbled head over heels down the deep ravine, losing all sense of up or down as they all tried desperately to halt their fall.

“GRIAN USE YOUR WINGS!” Cub screamed, his fingers sharpening to claws as he tried desperately to grab the wall.

Grian, forgetting he could in fact fly, spread his wings wide and grabbed hold of Cub’s wrist. Off balance from the extra weight, he reached towards Scar, yelling for him to grab hold.

Their fingers brushed as Scar’s terrified eyes met Grian’s, falling past the hovering Avian and his brother, who was holding onto Grian’s other arm for dear life and screaming his brother’s name.

Scar plummeted deeper and deeper into the ravine, his breath finally running out as his screams tapered out into a whimper. Time seemed to slow as he looked down, smacking into the surface of a black, murky lake, as everything went black.

Grian dived towards the bottom of the ravine, praying to every god he could think of that Scar somehow survived the fall. Cub was still clutching his arm and screaming for his brother.

At the speed they were going they reached the bottom in seconds, stopping when they saw the swamp-like water below. Grian finally allowed himself to breathe before he dropped Cub into the underground lake, earning a startled yelp from the man.

“If I get my wings wet we won’t be able to get out of here, you have to dive down and get him.”

Cub nodded in agreement before he ducked under the surface.

Grian hovered above, becoming more anxious with each second the two were below the surface. Knowing he would help no one by just sitting there, he looked around above them for any sign of an exit, seeing a tiny sliver of light coming from above a little ways down the tunnel. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, Cub broke the surface, holding Scar’s limp figure.

Grian dived down, ignoring how his wings began to ache at the strain of the past few minutes, and grabbed Cub under the arms who in turn held Scar against his chest. He struggled upwards, having never carried this much weight before, the only thing keeping him in the air seemed to be the adrenaline flowing through his veins.

They slowly made their way towards the light, the sliver growing bigger the closer they got.

Grian’s wings began to tremble violently, spasms rocking his muscles as he flapped one more time, trying to get as close as he could to the crack, before he tossed a surprised Cub towards the hole who, getting the motion, let go of Scar with one arm and grabbed onto the edge of the hole, clutching the rock desperately. The man, with surprising strength, heaved Scar upwards and onto the safety of the surface before grabbing the edge with both hands and heaving upwards.

Grian however, didn’t see what happened to his friends as his wings, with one final spasm, gave out, and he fell deeper into the ravine.

*>·◡·<*

Grian flailed, trying desperately to force his wings to open and move to no avail.

He had no choice.

He would die if he didn’t.

His friends might die.

He took a deep breath, feeling the power deep within himself…

He only needed a little, and he knew he had to calm down if he didn’t want to cause a surge that the server’s security would surely notice.

Calming down slightly, he found the tiny spark he needed and made it grow, grunting in pain as his second pair of wings grew and his original pair changed color from it’s beautiful blues, yellows, and reds to pure white.

The surge of power gave him enough energy to soar towards the crack. When he was about two yards away he shoved his magic down again, the second pair of wings disappearing and his wings changing back to their normal color as with a final burst of speed his grasped the edge with both hands, his energy spent and unable to pull himself up.

As he tried desperately to get his arms to cooperate, he felt someone grab his wrists and drag him onto the surface. He looked up to find Etho of all people looking down at him. He glanced around, seeing an unconscious Scar laying on the ground nearby, Cub miserably performing CPR to try and revive him. Grian observed that the amount of trauma on the man’s body would most likely result in a permadeath if they didn’t revive him right now, and he gasped out, “Etho, go help Scar, I’m fine.”

Etho hesitated, looking between the two, before rushing over to help Cub.

Grian laid on the ground, mentally cataloging all his injuries. There weren’t many. Actually, the only thing he could find was his wings, that had barely healed from their neglect prior to the cave, were cramping horribly and felt like they were on fire after being pushed beyond their limits, and the pure exhaustion was settling over his entire body.

‘Huh, I must have used more magic then I thought…’ he mused as darkness began to creep into his vision.

Fighting as best he could, he slowly opened his communicator and sent the most coherent message he could before the darkness finally won.

<Grian> -1282 1882 64 Send help doct

<Mumbo Jumbo> Grian?! What’s wrong!!?

<Mumbo Jumbo> GRIAN

<DocM77> I’m on my way

<xisumavoid> I’m coming too, anyone know what is happening?

<Rendog> No clue dude

<Zombiecleo> Ot sure

<Zombiecleo> *Not*

<Zedaphplays> Nope

<xisumavoid> Cub, Scar, Etho?

…

<xisumavoid> This does not sound good

*>·◡·<*

Xisuma flew at top speed towards the coordinates Grian had sent, narrowly avoiding dying on impact when he dived towards the ground. It’d been roughly two minutes sent Grian sent his message and X of all people knew how badly every second counts sometimes. He stumbled, falling to his knees as he looked up and paled, taking in the scene before him.

Grian laid to his left, wings visibly trembling and twitching. To his right Etho and and Cub were performing CPR on Scar, tears streaming down Cub’s face. Making a split second decision, Xisuma rushed over to the group and hurriedly pulled off his communicator, coding like a life depended on it, which it did. Cub didn’t even look up from what he was doing but Etho looked at him hopelessly.

“Explain what happened.” X demanded in his ‘Admin voice’ as everyone had taken to calling it, not looking up or slowing from his rapid finger strokes.

Cub began to stumble through an explanation, “W-we were c-caving and- um- the- we.. lost in th-the tunnels and- creeper… er- f-floor- gravel-” he stopped his incoherent mumbling, unable to continue even that, and continued giving chest compression. He grunted with effort, sweat glistening on his brow after doing the motion for such a long time.

*cc-CC-CRACK*

They all flinched at the noise of Scar’s rib cracking under the pressure and Xisuma went impossibly faster, finally finishing the code. He strapped the makeshift AED to Scar’s chest and yelled, “Everybody clear!”

They all backed up just in time for a Scar’s body to jerk and once again go still. X pressed the button again and once again announced, “Clear!” as Scar’s body jerked again.

Cub was pacing now, tears streaming down his face as he once again heard Xisuma’s loud voice, “Clear!” unable to look at his big brother.

Scar was still silent, not moving a muscle.

Cub couldn’t think clearly, the only thing he could think to do was pray.

‘Please! Please, whatever gods are out there please don’t let him die keep him alive!’

“Clear!”

Chapter Text

*Gasp*

Cub whirled around.

‘He’s alive! He’s ok!’ he thought elatedly as he ran over to Scar, now coughing up lungfuls of water and gasping for air, ‘Air- He’s breathing!’ Cub laughed, still crying and hugged Scar to his chest, not caring how X grunted in annoyance at the motion.

At some point Doc had arrived and apparently went over to Grian, who was conscious and looking around in confusion.

“We… we made it?” the Avian asked, and everyone winced at the fact that the poor guy was confused about being alive.

Doc and X met each others eyes, having some sort of silent conversation, and switched places eerily in sync, each going to the other patient.

“Grian, we got your message, what happened?” X asked when he reached Grian’s side. He did a once over of the Avian, and was bewildered when he found the Avian almost completely unharmed. The only injury he could see was Grian’s poor wings. The limbs were shaking horribly, and it only took a glance for X to know this incident would likely be a huge setback in the blonde’s recovery. Not even the small cuts and bruises that seemed to cover Scar and Cub could be seen.

Grian grunted, sitting up slowly with little assistance from Xisuma, and peered at Scar. Doc was carrying the now unconscious but alive man, Cub stumbling along behind, leaning much of his weight on Etho. They seemed to be in a rush, although that was likely because they didn’t want Scar crashing again, at least until they got to the infirmary.

Looking over to X, Grian sighed, “Long version or short?”

The Void Child considered this for a moment before replying, “Let’s go with short, I can get details from all of you later.”

“Basically, we went caving and a creeper took out the gravel floor. I managed to grab Cub and stop falling with my wings but…” he stared at his hands, “I, um, I couldn’t grab Scar in time. He fell into some super icky water at the bottom and must have hit his head on the ground. Cub dived in after him and I stayed out so I could fly us to the surface.”

Xisuma considered his words. He supposed that could be why Grian wasn’t as scratched up as the others, but that didn’t explain the complete lack of visible injuries. He’d have to look into it later, right now his Hermits needed him.

“Ok, let’s get you to Doc’s.” he said, helping the Avian to his feet and starting to walk slowly back to spawn. He paused, a thought pressing to the front of his mind, “How did you get your coordinates anyway? I don’t have them turned on right now.”

He then made a mental note to his future self to turn coordinates back on since Doc turned them off for an ‘experiment’ earlier.

Grian froze, glancing up at the taller man before continuing walking by himself, X having no choice but to follow. “I- er… I recognized this area as one of the locations I’m considering putting my base and I have the coordinates of all the locations memorized.”

X could tell it was a lie but didn’t push, sensing it was a sensitive topic.

“Okay, let’s get you checked out. You shouldn’t even be walking right now you know.”

“It’s my wings that are hurt, not my legs.”

“But there could be internal…”

They continued bickering all the way to the infirmary, Grian’s message and the questions that come with it forgotten.

*>·◡·<*

To some it up, Scar was in bad shape.

He had several broken ribs, bruises and scratches covering the majority of his body, a collapsed lung, and a concussion. And that’s just what they knew about, Doc said there could be neurological damage since he was, ‘Officially dead for an unknown amount of time.’ and that he wasn’t out of the woods yet.

Grian sat by his bed, willing him to wake up. Neither he or Cub had allowed Scar to leave their line of sight for longer then a quick bathroom break since Doc brought him back to the main room after a long surgery to repair the collapsed lung, and were now waiting, hoping there would be no lasting neurological problems from his crash.

“How’re your wings doing?”

Grian jumped, glancing at the door where none other than his brother stood. Jimmy walked over, pulling up a chair and sitting next to the other. Grian glanced at Cub, sitting on the other side of Scar’s cot, and the man got the message. Cub muttered something about going to the bathroom and hobbled off to give them some privacy.

Cub hadn’t been hit as badly by the initial creeper blast, but he’d been close to the edge of the ravine when the floor had collapsed and had slammed against it several times, causing small fractures to a couple ribs, a sprained wrist, a broken leg, and a mild concussion. The water hadn’t done any favors either as he’d inhaled a little when he was dragging his brother to the surface. He’d stubbornly refused bed rest all the same no matter what Doc threatened, although he agreed to walk as little as possible and try not to move around.

Grian sighed quietly, “They’re… fine. I just overworked them a bit. A couple days of rest should do the trick, I’m able to move them again.”

Jim stared at his brother, disbelief etching his features, “‘A BIT?! Grian, you couldn’t move them for hours and they were trembling so badly I thought you’d start hovering! They-” he quieted, looking away so Grian couldn’t see a tear trace it’s way down his cheek, “You could have lost your wings, Gri. It’s a miracle that you made it to the surface at all. In fact…” he looked Grian right in the eyes, surprising the other with the fierceness within them, “When I asked Etho what happened he said he saw Cub drag Scar out of the ravine, but it was like two minutes before you followed. How is that?”

Jim saw G pale slightly and look away, back at Scar, “Tim I- er- umm…” he went quiet, and just as Jimmy was about to push for details the blonde spoke again, a hint of fear and confusion in his voice, “Timmy, is it just me or does Scar look more pale then he did a few minutes ago?”

“Don’t try to change the subject, you-” Jim cut off as he glanced at the sleeping con artist.

Scar, in the few minutes the brothers had been talking, had paled significantly, skin going from a deep tan to almost deathly pale.

“Doc?!” Grian yelled, the creeper hurrying in a minute later to see what the problem was, X close behind.

Quickly deducing it was not Grian but Scar that needed attention, he walked over, frowning as he observed how the patient was so pale it began to take on a bluish tint. Confused, he opened one of Scar’s eyelids slightly and his eyes widened in shock.

“Suma we need to get him into the chamber right now!” Doc ordered as he began hurrying around, pocketing syringes full of… something as he prepared to leave. Xisuma, apparently understanding the vague command, started adjusting the cot, getting it ready so they could lift it like a stretcher.

“X, what’s going on? What’s wrong?” Grian was panicking now, worried about what this meant for his friend.

“Don’t worry, as long as we get him there in time everything will be fine.”

That did nothing to ease Grian’s anxiety, “And if we don’t?!”

Of course, Cub picked that moment to limp into the room.

“Cub don’t!” Doc yelled, but it was too late. As Cub’s eyes landed on his brother’s still form his eyes widened in apparent fear. He tried to turn around and leave but a small breeze seemed to blow through the room and he collapsed.

Doc cursed, briskly walking to where the man had fallen and flipping him to see the color draining just as quickly as it had Scar.

“Xisuma, message Ren and Imp-” he didn’t get a chance to finish as Scar’s eyes snapped open, but instead of their normal emerald green they were a glowing vibrant blue.

Grian stumbled back, eyes wide as memories flew through his brain, clogging his every thought. The Watcher who’d taught him everything there was to know about all the different species flashed across his vision, his words playing in his mind as if they were a recording.

“The higher species we will be looking at today is the Vex. Vexes contain illusion magic. While they do have their own hybrids labeled Faeries or Fairies depending on which species the child takes after, they also have a special race of humans often considered descended from them. Well these humans are not genetically related to them, the humans have the ability to bond with Vexes, using their power in exchange for the Vex to possess the human’s body occasionally. Most of the time these humans are unable to contain more then one Vex and have to be careful not to use the Vexes’ full power or they risk disintegrating themselves, but every hundred years or so a special child is born who is able to contain hundreds of Vexes and can use their magic fully. These children are called Convex Children. They are recognized by their Vex-like features and glowing blue eyes and are often mistaken for Faeries. Now, turn to page 1094 and read abo…”

“-ian! Grian!” Just as soon as the memory took his vision it vanished, being replaced with Jimmy standing in front of him calling his name.

“Finally, you wouldn’t respond for like two minutes! What happened?”

Grian looked around, eyes widening as he took in the scene before him.

The room was completely destroyed, broken medical equipment covering the floor. In the middle of it all lay Doc and X, looking dazed and slightly roughed up but ok.

“What. Just. Happened.”

The two seasoned Hermits looked at Grian, Xisuma sighing and explaining, “Well, the secrets out now so I guess it’s ok. Both Scar and Cub are Convex Children. Convex Children are-”

“I know what they are, don’t ask me how, just please get to the point.” Grian interrupted, walking over to help them up.

X looked a little shocked that he knew, but continued, “They were both weakened significantly by their injuries, giving Vexes a chance to take over without their permission. Now, we need to find them and catch them before the Vexes hurt anyone or… or injure Scar and Cub irreversibly.”

“Neither of them should be standing, let alone running around the server causing mischief. The Vexes can’t feel their hosts’ pain, so they will keep using their bodies until they both die unless we hurry.” Doc supplied, sifting through the destruction looking for anything salvageable.

*Ding*

They all checked their communicators to find a server-wide announcement sent by X.

<xisumavoid> Everyone, both Scar and Cub were injured badly and became susceptible to Vex possession. We need to find them and tranquilize them as soon as possible before the Vexes do any irreparable damage to them. Please meet at spawn, we will split into four groups to search for them.

They looked up to find a mentally distant X making his way to the door, and all hurried after him, no one speaking a word in the grim silence.

Chapter Text

Nova: Hi everyone! I know it's been a while since I've posted, but I just want to let everyone know that we have NOT given up on this fic! We are however taking a break for a little while to catch up on life, so chapters may come a lot slower than normal. As much as we really don't want to take a break from writing this, it's for our own well-being. There won't be a strict posting schedule for the foreseeable future, pretty much just posting whenever we're able and feeling up to it! 

But, even though we won't be posting chapters very often, you can go over to our Tumblr (@Nova-Gekko) and see all the amazing artwork Gekko's been posting. I have a couple pieces too, but I think she is a much better artist and she does it a lot more often!

As for a little teaser, another reason we won't be posting 'Escape to Hermitcraft' as often is because we're currently planning another temporarily unnamed fic. I don't want to go into detail for the risk of spoilers, but lets just say it'll feature everyone's favorite flirty hero duo (for lack of a better term ;) ) <3<3<3