Work Text:
Grian gripped his pencil, trying to concentrate on the math problem. He knew how to calculate Riemann integrals in theory, but perhaps not on paper. Which was a problem, considering one usually solved math problems on paper. Calculus was a wast, interconnected system of theorems and definitions and if one element slipped his mind, the knowledge he'd so carefully unraveled tangled up into knots again.
It didn't help that his roommates would not shut up. Grian wasn't trying to pay attention to the conversation, but it snuck in through the background noise, seeping into his head.
Scar's voice, now. "Yeah, so they were telling me about how there's this ghost of a student on the thirteenth floor…"
Can't use universal trigonometric substitution, because the intervals don't work out…
Then, Cub's. "… Yeah, I heard about that. If you take the elevator at 3 AM, the rooftop button works, apparently"
Cosine zero plus – no, minus cosine pi, that's one, two…
"Three students got sent to the disciplinary committee for trying to climb up there last week"
Three…
Grian flipped to the back of his textbook to check the answer. Incorrect. How? He'd used the exact same formula as the solution. He glanced at his notes. Two! One plus one wasn't three, it was two, why were his roommates talking about so many numbers when he was trying to do math?!
He shot up from the desk, louder than intended, the pencil's tip breaking off as he shoved his things into his bag. He should have gone to the study room in the first place, his mistake, really, but he'd been under the misguided impression that his roommates would at least keep to a reasonable volume. Grian had neglected to take into account that he lived with Scar.
He trotted off, slamming the door behind him, scolding himself slightly for how rude he was being. Well, whatever. He had a test tomorrow. Everybody could go stand in a fire for all he cared. His temple was throbbing. Maybe the noisy party on the ground floor had something to do with it. He figured he might as well go to the top floor, where it would be quieter.
Standing around the elevator for eight floors straight served to calm him a little. There was a mirror inside, which he was sternly avoiding, knowing well how much of a mess he was, how his hair was slightly greasy, his glasses were dirty, his clothes only somewhat orderly because he hadn't bothered to change since he got home.
He picked at the skin by his right thumb – an annoying, anxious tick he'd developed last exam season, which had persisted with the help of the self-feeding cycle of him repeatedly picking off the scab.
The elevator dinged, having reached the top floor. It was a little strange when he stepped out into the hall – the lights didn't seem to be working properly. Instead of reacting to Grian's path, the motion sensors appeared to have a mind of their own, coming to life in strange patterns around him. Well, no matter. Creepy lights or not, he was a man on a mission: A mission to find a quiet study room. He could have found his way there in the dark, anyway, the layout of every floor was basically the same.
He scanned his ID by the door, unlocking it, then stepped inside. Unsurprisingly, there was no one there on a late Tuesday night. He clicked on the lights and sat down at a desk.
This was possibly the dustiest study room he had ever been in and he sneezed as he tried to clear some space for himself. Now, to get back to work…
Grian was beginning to see integrals when he closed his eyes, which can't have been a good sign. A good sine… Oh no. It was happening more and more as his lids threatened to shut for good each time he blinked. But he had to fight it. For the sake of his grades!
The last few problems just wouldn't come out right, no matter what he tried, no matter what angle he approached from (even though the quarter of pi was a great angle!) – the skin by the nail of his thumb was completely messed up, again, despite him having been so careful this past month. At least he found some comfort in the confused and frustrated pencil notes left by the previous borrower of the math textbook. It included gems such as “The author of these problems was a sadist” and “I have decided I would rather go to clown college instead”
Drip.
At least it felt like he had someone to share his lightheaded suffering with.
Drop.
Something fell onto the page of his textbook.
Grian glanced down. There was a red spot on the page. Had he spilled ink? Then, there was another drop and, oh. Nosebleed.
He pulled back, scrambling for a tissue to clean the mess with. Oh, God, what were they going to say at the library when he returned it?! It looked like Grian had murdered someone with it.
The lights went out.
Grian blinked.
Well, this was just splendid, wasn't it?
Was it a power outage? Even through the window, or, where Grian remembered the window being, it was pitch black, like the city had disappeared. The air seemed to have turned colder, too.
Then, as abruptly as it had manifested, the darkness was gone, replaced by the warm glow of fluorescent lights. Grian squinted from how bright it suddenly was and was surprised to see someone sitting across from him.
It was a younger man, about his age, dressed in a white shirt and black sweater. He had dark hair with a single, white streak and a frankly fabulous mustache, Grian had to admit. But the fact that he had seemingly materialized out of thin air was concerning, to say the least.
Grian wiped at his bloody nose.
The stranger just sat there casually, looking around the room, sometimes back at Grian.
"Uh… Hi?" Grian greeted.
The pale, mustached man did not respond.
Grian squinted. Maybe… Maybe he was so tired he was seeing things, now. That would have made sense.
He waved a hand in front of him nevertheless, trying to get his attention. The man reacted to his hand being close to his face, but still didn't say anything. Grian snapped his fingers, middle finger painfully running past his bruised thumb. "Helloooo?"
"Oh, you can see me?" He had a sort of startled expression on his face before he smiled. His voice was somehow familiar to Grian, though he wasn't sure from where. It was like if a pile of blankets could speak. Soft, kind of muffled, in a way.
Wait, what did he mean Grian could see him?
"What"
"Uh, hello. Sorry, I haven't spoken to anybody in, I think…" he held a large hand to his chin, "Fifteen years? No, twenty, probably"
Grian blinked. Okay. Sure. He was too tired to question it and was too tired to be polite, so he just blurted out the first question on his mind.
"Are you a ghost?"
The man shrugged. "I dunno. It's kind of weird when you die, right?" he asked, like that was a normal thing to ask, "Because you can't talk to anybody and there's nobody to tell you if you're actually dead or if everyone's just playing a really mean prank on you" he said.
Grian just stared at him.
"Are you a ghost?" the man asked back.
"No, of course I'm not a ghost!" Grian protested.
"How can you be sure?"
"How can we be sure of anything?"
"Ah, a philosopher! Yeah, the problem of other minds is an interesting one. Maybe I'm just the singular entity of this world and everything around me is just a reflection of myself in the wast emptiness of the universe"
Grian closed the textbook and began putting his things away. Okay. He had too many things to be worried about to be wasting his time talking to ghosts. And he also maybe needed to get his head checked while he was at it.
"You know," he chuckled, "If I am just a… A what did you say? Reflection of your mind in the wast void of the universe? Then it's pretty interesting that I've had that exact same thought before"
The man's face flushed. "Well… Maybe my brain likes sound, internal logic" he pondered.
"But made you a ghost"
He sighed. "Fine, I concede that the outside world exists, if only for the sake of argument" he accepted, and got up from the table – though Grian wasn't sure if the chair even moved as he did.
He wondered why he found himself smiling from ear to ear. Maybe it was nice to just have a silly conversation instead of burying himself in books. Scar and Cub had been inviting him out, but he'd always declined on the account of being too busy. He couldn't deny that he missed their company, though.
"And what's it like being a ghost?"
"… Boring" the ghost replied, bluntly. "And often infuriating! You know the kinds of things people do when they think nobody's watching? Throwing their trash on the floor, leaving an – an inordinate mess in the bathroom, you couldn't imagine!"
Grian leaned back against the wall.
"Why are you looking at what people are leaving in the bathroom?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Well – …" he looked to the side, "Wow, no matter how I answer that I look like a weirdo, you really cornered me there" he chuckled.
"You didn't make it difficult, bud" he teased.
"Hey, twenty years with only one-sided interaction really grates on what you find socially acceptable, you know!" he objected, walking over to Grian – well, more floating, slightly, his feet made no sound as they supposedly hit the ground. Grian had thought a ghost would be more threatening, but this guy was just a dork, seemingly really happy to be talking to someone.
"What's your name, anyway, Mr Ghost?" he asked, observing how tall he was, easily towering over him – he could have been a cryptid even without the aura of the undead.
"I'm Mumbo" he replied.
"That's not a real name" Grian blurted out before realizing it was perhaps not a good idea to offend a ghost.
He shrugged. "No names are real, they all had to be invented first. What's your name?"
"Grian" Grian replied, convinced Grian was a more normal name.
"I've never met a Grian" Mumbo noted.
"So?"
"You know how when you go to primary school with some jerk and they're called Hunter, because of course they are, and then you meet a Hunter in like middle school and they can be the nicest bloke in the world, but you're always waiting for the ball to drop on the fact that they’re secretly another Hunter?" he asked, all in one breath, "Well, I've never met a Grian. So, you have an entirely clean slate, which is good – but also, you bear a lot of responsibility in terms of all future Grians I will meet"
Grian snickered. "And you aren't prejudiced whatsoever"
"No!" he smiled, mustache wrinkling, "Not against anybody, especially not big guys named Hunter"
"Uh-huh. Well, I'm sorry to say, but I have to go, Mr Ghost" Grian yawned.
Mr Ghost crossed his arms. "You forgot my name, didn't you?"
"… Noo" Grian's face flushed, looking like a dog pretending to be innocent next to a torn-up pillow. "It was… It was…"
"Yeah?"
"Well, it's getting late, see ya!" he exclaimed and bolted for the door, books in hand, making it into the elevator not soon after. He watched the doors close and tried to lean back against the mirror wall, only to meet something soft and screaming.
Grian jolted back and turned around to see the mustached man, who was yelling, as was Grian.
"Don't do that!" he let out, clutching his books.
"How can you touch me?!" he shouted.
"How am I supposed to know?!" Grian yelled back.
"Why are we yelling?!" he yelled again.
"I don't know!" Grian yelled. "… We should probably stop" he added, calmly.
The ghost held out a cautious finger and poked Grian on the shoulder. He was soft and squishy there – kind of like everywhere, now that he was thinking about it.
The man eyed him suspiciously. "You're not secretly an exorcist, are you…?"
"A… A what?"
"You know, like… One of those guys that comes and does… exorcist stuff"
Grian snorted. "You – You don't know what an exorcist is, do you?"
It was Mumbo's – oh, right, that was what his name was! – turn to shrink, so much so that he dipped back into the wall, only his legs poking out. "No, but I know they're my enemies!"
"I'm pretty sure you'd need to possess someone to be exorcised. Wait, can you do that?" he asked, his head perking up. "Are you good at math? Can you possess me and do my test tomorrow?"
Mumbo cracked up. "I don't know, I've never – I've never tried that. Couldn't really, you know, ask for consent or anything…"
"Oh, try me, try me!" Grian begged, not really thinking through the at least… Seven different ways this could go wrong. (Note: The author of this work did count them, but will not list them for the sake of brevity. The reader is welcome to insert their own seven arguments against asking a ghost to possess you in the following blank lines, or, alternatively, in the comments)
(insert seven reasons here)
"Oh! Okay!" Mumbo agreed and emerged from the wall, giving Grian an intense stare. "Is it working?"
"… No"
Mumbo waved his arms in the air. "Damn, I was sure that would be it"
"Is that how you usually possess people?"
"No, I just figured that's how you'd do it. Like, that's how I always imagined it from the movies"
Grian sighed and pressed the button to his own floor. Mumbo briefly lingered behind before moving to join him.
"You know, this is kind of nice" he noted. "I haven't gotten to talk to anybody in a really long time. I feel like I've had so much I wanted to say and now I don't really know what to start with"
The elevator opened with a ding. While Grian thought it would have been desperately funny to just leave him, again, the tone seemed way too sincere for that. Thinking it through – yeah, Mumbo had died over fifteen years ago, that must've been a lot to deal with on his own. Grian leaned back against the wall as they stepped out of the elevator. "It's okay, just start with whatever"
Mumbo's head perked up. "Okay! Did you – Did you know that when you turn on a light switch, the speed at which the electrons flow through the cable is only a few meters a day? That's crazy!"
Grian smiled and laughed so hard he had tears in his eyes. "You've been waiting twenty years to tell that to someone?"
"Well – Just two with this one. Oh, but what about – There's this species of octopus…"
It went on like that, increasingly evident that Grian was not making it back to his dorm room in time. Well, who cared, he was having fun talking to ghosts. That was a reasonable activity to be engaged in at two in the morning.
It seemed that Cub and Scar eventually heard his voice in the hall, though, as they peeked out through the old, crooked doorway.
Well, this was it, Grian figured. They'd see him talking to nobody in the hall and send him straight to the university pastoral center to get holy water sprayed in his eyes.
Instead, though…
"Hey, who's your friend?" Scar asked with a tired yawn, though he still had his usual bouncy steps and attitude. The steps and the attitude were a mandatory combination, one ought not to separate them. His long hair was tied back into a bun and he was wearing some loose, short pajamas.
"Oh, he's Mumbo, he's a ghost" Grian explained, which, of course, without a doubt, explained everything.
"Oh, cool! Hi, Mumbo, I'm Scar, I'm a regular flesh person" he greeted, because it was impossible to phase this man. It was all in the steps and attitude, you have to understand. He held out a hand.
Mumbo nervously reciprocated, surprised when the gesture made contact. Scar had a really firm handshake, which wobbled the ghost around like jelly.
"Wait, what did you say?" Cub squinted, just now exiting the doorway, having stood there until now like an old village hag suspiciously eyeing the new neighbors and their electric scooter (which was clearly a sign of witchcraft).
"He's a ghost" Grian repeated.
Cub raised an eyebrow. "… Sure. Don't you have a test tomorrow? You should get to bed"
"Fine, mom" Grian scoffed. "Bye Mumbo, it was nice getting to know you. I'll go pet the dust bunnies with you again, sometime"
"Oh, alright! Thanks, Grian!" he said and saw them off with a nervous wave, continuing to stand there after the door shut and the motion sensor lights went off.
"So, who was he…?" Cub asked again as he climbed back into bed.
"Told you, he's a ghost" Grian repeated with a mouth full of toothpaste foam.
"Uh-huh. And where's this "ghost" from?"
Grian spat out the toothpaste. "Thirteenth floor study room"
"Wait, you don't mean…?" Scar gasped, "That ghost? The one that… Died?"
"As opposed to all the alive ghosts out there" Grian replied.
"No, no, you know, that – That ghost, that haunts the thirteenth floor and makes half of your pair of socks go missing and – Well, apparently they were a student here and died as a – "
"Scar, I'm trying to sleep" Cub interrupted.
"You just asked me a question, sir, don't you turn this on me!"
"I was asking Grian a question and have since decided I don't care about the answer" he shrugged with a smirk before turning towards the wall and ending the conversation.
Scar stuck his tongue out. "Fine, I'll keep my ghost secrets to myself, then, sucks to be you, Cub!"
Grian felt so tired he found himself being unable to fall asleep. Which, to any alien reading these words, probably seems like a confusing concept, but any human readers can hopefully relate. On the other hand, if you are an alien, please consider reading my other work, "Hermitcraft: Post-Soviet AU", which will not only leave you more lost, but also more confused.
Regardless of any alien reader's sensibilities, which Grian was not aware of as he was a character in this work of fiction, Grian was tired. And when he felt something lukewarm start to weigh down on him, he startled like a cat.
He flipped around to see Mumbo floating there.
"Sorry?!" he half-yelled, half-whispered, a combination he had not thought possible until he was trying to scream at a ghost while simultaneously not waking his roommates. "Would appreciate a – You know, a warning? Jeez"
"That was a warning!" Mumbo rebutted.
"For what?"
Mumbo tilted his head, eyes glistening from the moonlight outside the window.
"… I, uh. I wanted to give you a hug"
"When I'm sleeping?"
"You weren't sleeping. You were tossing around like clothes in a washing machine" the ghost noted.
Grian sighed. "You never left, did you?"
Mumbo chuckled. "Comes with the territory"
Grian begrudgingly opened his arms, only to receive the most physics-bending embrace of his life – Mumbo collided with him, but not with anything else, perfectly reaching through his blanket, then up from underneath the bed. It was kind of amazing, actually. Mumbo would be the perfect big spoon, his lower arm could go through the bed!
Mumbo pulled back. "Okay, now sleep, you have a test tomorrow"
"Okay"
Grian turned to his side. Mumbo lingered.
He peeked an eye open and gave him a questioning glance.
"Let me guess: You want to stay?"
Mumbo shuffled his feet, as much as a ghost could while floating mid-air. He was kind of constantly shuffling, now that Grian thought about it. It seemed to be his thing. Maybe someone was about to give Scar's step-attitude combo a run for its money.
"I kind of – Well, I… You know. Twenty years"
Yeah, twenty years without getting a proper, long hug did seem like a long time.
Grian gestured with his head for him to come join him – and he was right (Grian was always right). Excellent big spoon. Maybe that also came with the territory. Not of being a ghost, but of being… Well, a spoon.
"Do ghosts sleep?" Grian asked after a while.
"Of course!" he said before moving closer to him.
Aw. After all of this horrible effort and studying, it felt really nice to lay next to someone. It was amazing to have made a new friend! Grian let his eyes shut, the tension leaving his shoulders.
His eyes opened to Cub sitting up in his bed. "Grian, why is that guy in our room?"
Mumbo jumped, floating above the bed. ”Sorry!" he sputtered.
Cub looked like he’d seen a ghost. Which was a reasonable reaction to having seen a ghost.
"Told you he's a ghost. Now let us sleep"
"I – Yeah. Sure" Cub stammered before laying back down and turning towards the wall in fear.
“Are you jealous? I can go over and cuddle you” Scar noted.
“No!”