Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Grian, c’mon man, you don’t need to do this.” Impulse pleaded, wishing that literally any other hermit was available to help him out of this predicament. 

See, Impulse had been working on a new project near magic mountain when (through no fault of his own) he managed to get tangled in the redstone. Luckily, he could reach his pocket to grab his comm and ask for a helping hand from one of his fellow hermits. Unluckily, Grian, known button-pusher and redstone-breaker, was the only one awake and online and thus, was the one to come ‘save’ him.

“But Impulse,” Grian whined, “I can’t not press a button. You know this!” Grian was visibly shaking, his wings puffed up and rustling with the strain of not pushing the button.

“Ok. Ok, ok, ok, wait. What if you let me push the button once and then I’ll help you out of there. Does that work, Dad?” Grian asked, sporting the biggest puppy dog eyes Impulse has ever seen. It might’ve even worked if it wasn’t to let him shock him for fun.

“No!”

Chapter Text

Grian’s cold. He’s been cold. He doesn’t know for how long he’s been cold but it feels like a while. Maybe he’s been cold all his life. He feels something on the sides of his head twitch and he flinches, looking around for the culprit. He sees his ear wings. Oh… Right, I have wings. He forgot about that. How could he forget about that?? Was he an idiot? He had to be to have forgotten that he had wings.

Wait… If he has wings, he should probably wrap them around himself to keep warm! Why hasn’t he already done that? Stupid, stupid, stupid. He rushes to move them but a sharp pain shoots through them, one of creaking crooked bones and rubbed raw wounds. He wants to yelp but even he knows, in his delirious, dazed state, that making noise only makes the hurt worse. He doesn’t know why, just that whenever he made any sound, pain was soon to follow. 

Instead he breathes as deeply as he can (it wasn’t very much) and gingerly moves his wings forward. He quickly finds that he can’t move his left wing at all. He can move his right wing, it’s just bent in some odd way wrong wrong it shouldn’t look like that. wHY DOES IT LOOK LIKE THAT-

He hears a noise. He jerks up and looks to the door, shaking only partially due to the cold. He doesn’t pay attention to the bloody feathers he just pulled out that now lay at his feet. He doesn’t pay attention to the tears streaming down his face, nor how they blur his vision. He doesn’t pay attention to his hyperventilating past making sure that his breathing is silent. He just…stares at the door.

And then he hears it again. And again, closer this time. And Grian scrambles back to get away from Ren, completely forgetting that he wasn’t that far off from the wall. This time he can’t hold back the screech that falls from his mouth as he slams his battered wings directly into the wall. He covers his mouth, as if that could stop the already escaped noise from leaving, and collapses onto the floor, terrified that Ren heard it.

He hears Ren call out his name, something Grian’s not heard in so long. He almost goes to respond but then he remembers Ren’s rule, that he cannot make any noise, so he stays silent, as much as he can while still trembling with pain and the cold that racks his body and seeps into his hollow bones.

Unfortunately, his efforts are in vain as the door to the dungeon opens, revealing… Ren? He’s not wearing his kingly clothing or his massive cape but it has to be Ren, who else would come down here?

Ren looks around before spotting him in one of the cells near the door and calls his name out again. Why is he doing that? Its been so long. He rushes over and takes a pickaxe to the iron gates. He must be furious to not even grab his keys. Grian starts apologising, completely forgetting that he needs to be silent in favor of maybe lessening the blow. “Ren, I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I don’t know what I did and I know I probably deserve it but please forgive me. Please, please, I don’t wanna go through another death loop again, please Ren.” 

Ren grabs his hands, which were apparently pulling feathers again, and pulls them away from his wings. Ren opens his mouth, probably to shout at him again and says, “Grian, Grian, it’s me Scar. Birdie, please, look at me, look at me. You’re ok. I’ve got you now. You’re safe now. You’re free now. Scar’s got ya. ”

“S-scar…rh?” He croaked out, not comprehending what’s happening. “I’m…free?”

Re-Scar’s features soften as he goes to hold Grian’s face, “Yeah Gri…you’re free.”

Chapter Text

Tango is good at games. He’s made several throughout his years here on hermitcraft. Tango is also very bad at games. One would think that with all his years of experience in game development, at least some of it would translate into gameplay skill.

“Oh! No, no, no, no! Wait, wait. Yes! No!”

One would think wrong.

“No, no, no. I’m almost there..! C’mon, c’mon..! C’mon! Yes-” Tango gets his celebration interrupted by a passing ravager that manages to clip him from where he was standing, just slightly too close to the edge.

Having already been hit by several other ravagers on the way to the end, he doesn’t get a chance to be angry before he’s poofed back to his bed.

“AaauurrggghhaaaaAAH!”

“...So I take it, you’re enjoying the game…” Etho drawled, sitting up from where he was working on a busted bulb in the Post Office. Which… Did he forget to set his spawn in Ravager Rush? Looking around at Pearl and Etho in their postal uniforms, it looks like he did. He slumps back onto the bed with a groan, mourning the high score he definitely would’ve gotten had he properly set his spawn. Definitely.

Chapter Text

Grian had been flying over to the shopping district when he spotted a trail leading…somewhere. Sensing that this was possibly related to his current case, he swapped out his normal skin for that of Sherlock Grian and followed the crumb path leading home. Or in this case, to a flying cookie? and a mess of shulker boxes on the ground? 

Curious man that he was, he just stretched his wings out and muttered, mostly to himself, “Oh I’ve got to see what’s going on here.” 

It only took him a single, strong beat of his wings to get him most of the way up there. A couple of flaps to keep the momentum going later and he was past the crest of it. Once he can see over it, he drops a few feet from the sheer absurdity of the sight that greets him. There, surrounded by even more shulker boxes, in the most ridiculous jester outfit, stood Scar, presumedly building his next prank as the Jangler.

Grian wanted to burst out laughing at the situation but seeing as Scar hadn’t noticed him yet, Grian decided this is the perfect opportunity to mess with the man. He landed silently on the cookie themed platform and creeped up to Scar, who’s currently digging through a shulker to see if he could find…whatever it is that he’s looking for. Grian got right behind him, took a deep breath, and yelled, “HI SCAR!”

 “OH, OH, Oh, Oooooh” Scar yelped, jumping back from the sudden noise. Not realizing that the shulker box he was just in was now directly in his path, he fumbled back over it and ended up flat on his back. 

Scar frowned up at him from his prone position. “Grian! You can’t just sneak up on a man while he’s building!” Grian couldn’t really hear him though.

He was too busy cackling at Scar’s reaction.

Chapter Text

Scar, who’s occasionally looked up from his cooking to see Grian mess around with the placement of shirts and blankets for the better part of an hour, decides he needs to stop this. “Grian, buddy, you can relax. The nest is lookin’ fine. How about you set out the bowls for when everyone gets here?” Scar coaxes, gently pulling avian away from the nest before he spends another hour on it. 

Grian pouts but relents, if only because he knows that the others are soon to arrive. He preps the bowls so Scar can fill them up with whatever it is that he’s been making. Looks like this week it’s kettle corn, key lime cookies, and potato wedges. Nice.

When Pearl gets there, she goes to sit at the kitchen stool right next to Grian, her lunar moth wings hanging loosely behind her. Skizz practically bursts through the door with a boisterous, “What’s up Homie Buddeh?” and crashes through the living room, his angelic nature doing nothing to save the poor rug from being tripped over. False arrives a bit later than she wanted to and tries to sneak in quietly. Unfortunately, nothing about Skizz is quiet and he shouts out a loud “Falsey!” the moment he sees her, startling the harpy so badly, she almost trips on the same rug that Skizz did earlier.

After some chatting (read: gossiping) and some eating of Scar’s delicious food (“Seriously Scar, you need to hand over that cookie recipe”), the vex stands up, stretches his arms up and his wings out and claps his hands to get their attention.

“Alright! It’s time to get started.”

Chapter Text

“He was a weird kid. He’s an even weirder adult. He walks around in the toxic sludge at the fields as if it’s nothing and goes on his merry way without any indication of the immense pain he should be going through.” One of the townspeople said. Another saw him building something up on the mountain that looked both old and new. We even caught one of the scientists after their shift and managed to get some information about the things they do at Mined. Mined is allegedly being funded by Mr. Jumbo and that he has allegedly directed their research to look into possible methods for immortality. Whether that is true or not remains to be seen. For now we only have a few questions to ask. Who is Mumbo K. Jumbo? And what the fuck is he doingoieraER-

“Fuck, fuck fuck! This article needs to be done by the end of the week and I’ve got pretty much nothing!” The journalist shouted, before slouching back down onto their desk. They groan for a moment, then they get up and put their coat on. They’re already walking out of the door, muttering to themself, “Maybe I can ask the couple at Bits and Bobs about their interactions with Mumb-” before the door closes.

Chapter Text

Bdubs was stressed. Being the mayoral assistant to someone like Scar would do that to anyone. Currently he was collecting all the papers that needed to be signed by tonight. It was an unfortunately large pile, but with a mayor like Scar, it was to be expected that these wouldn’t be signed until the last minute.

Once he found the last of it, he added it to the stack and headed off to the mayoral office. On the walk there, he leafed through the pages to see if he could find the ones marked urgent. One with a request to speak with the mayor from the landscapers union. Yeesh. One from the MooPop factories requesting more security. Oh! Only a week old! Either it’s just come in or Scar is finally getting on top of his paperwork…Probably just came in… One from a… Mr. Jumbo? offering his services? Bdubs double checks that this was meant to be sent to the city hall and not Scar’s personal address but, yep that’s definitely the right address. He guesses he’ll have to talk to Scar about keeping his private matters private… again. 

As he reaches Scar’s office, he turns a bit so he can open the door with his elbow, his hands currently occupied with Scar’s next couple of hours. Mind focused on making sure he doesn’t spill these papers, he’s well into the room, maybe a few feet away from Scar’s desk before he fully comprehends what he’s looking at.

There’s a person sitting on the desk. Someone who should definitely not be on the desk, let alone anywhere in the building, because the person on the desk was none other than Mother Spore.

Distantly, he thinks he’ll have to add ‘no making out with the enemy’ to his lecture about private affairs. Out loud, he yells, “WHAT IS HAPPENING?”

Chapter Text

Above him, he hears rockets. And yelling. And a few arrows faintly whizzing by. Great, he thinks, my show is on. 

He finishes up on making his coffee and walks over to the window to get a better view. There, above the shopping district, is the most recent chase after one Joe Hills. He’s currently trying his damnedest to lose his trail while also dodging the arrows flying by him.

Hypno decides to start commentating, if only for his amusement, “And it looks like Joe’s going for a dive in an attempt to evade the Poe. He’s maneuvering around the different shops and through the alleys, keeping low to hopefully out-fly them or maybe stay out of their sights long enough to make a grand escape.”

“Ooh, would you look at that? It seems the Poe has been thoroughly outplayed. While the Poe was above the rocket shop, our master escape artist turned on the rocket launchers, blocking the Poe’s vision. In the flurry of firework particles, Hills threw an ender pearl to the shore, and in a brilliant play, pulled out a trident to launch his ender pearl far using that added momentum from the riptide on it. Truly spectacular to see live. Well done, Joe Hills, get rekt Poe, and have a good day, imaginary audience.” Hypno concludes.

Heaving out a sigh, Hypno takes a sip from his mostly forgotten coffee, the ice mostly melted now. “Anyways, let’s go see if Wels is busy.”

Chapter Text

Skizz can hear Grian giggling as he’s walking to the locker room. Never a good sign. He braces himself and opens the door to see… Grian in a Poe uniform? What. “What?”

Upon closer inspection, Skizz sees that Grian is actually in his Poe uniform, which makes the giggling make more sense. Nevertheless, “G! What are you doing wearing my clothes?!” Skizz yells, flaring his wings to emphasize his (fake) outrage. “Don’t you have your own uniform to be changin’ into?” 

“Well I was gonna steal Scar’s but he doesn’t have the wing openings like yours do,” He flaps his wings to prove his point, “So, off to your locker instead. Very nice. Very roomy." Grian sings, dancing around Skizz’s attempt to grab him. 

After Grian flits about, dodging his every swipe at him, Skizz throws his hands up and groans, earning another peal of laughter from Grian. Skizz squints at him before getting an idea.

An evil smile graces his lips before he rushes past Grian, who squawks and jumps out of the way, and steals his discarded clothes from their pile on the ground. Grian, now realizing what Skizz was planning, bolts after him but he’s too late. Skizz has already locked himself in the changing room. Grian decides to cut his losses and goes to find Scar.

He luckily doesn't need to go very far as Scar walks into the locker room right at the moment. Grian perks up and rushes right up to him, nearly bowling him over. “Scar, Scar, Scar, Scar, Scar. Look, look, look! I’m a Poe officer now.” Grian exclaims, doing a little spin to hopefully fluster Scar.

Unfortunately, Scar already knows his game and decides to turn it around on him. “Why don’t you do another spin for me, birdie? I wasn’t quite paying attention.” He says in a deep sultry voice that makes Grian suspicious and weak-willed all the same. He slowly turns around, bracing for whatever it is that Scar is planning but it’s only after he’s made a full rotation that Scar strikes. Scar grabs him by his waist and savors that look of red-faced shock for a moment before he lifts Grian over his shoulder, stabilizing him with a hand on his back and his rear. (A better place would probably be across his legs, not his rear but Scar has never been one to turn down an opportunity.)

“Oh Skizzy, I think I’ve found our newest hire!” Scar sing-songs, walking further into the room.

Skizz pokes his head out of the changing room, clad in Grian’s now extremely stretched out sweater and pants, not even trying to put on his shoes. Skizz sees Grian squirming in Scar’s ironclad grip and grins, “Perfect.”

Chapter Text

“And that’s the last of it.” She mutters to herself, dusting off her hands and stepping back to look at the now fully stocked van. It wasn’t actually her turn to stock it but she just has to have a moment away from the guys and their…everything… if she doesn’t want to lose her mind.

She walks back into the lobby and looks around to see that, yep, everyone is still in the same place she left them. She rolls her eyes and walks over to Impulse and Skizz, who were arguing over which UV tool was better again. “Look, Skizz, I just think the glow stick has better coverage. I- Oh hi Gem, what’s up?” Impulse greets once he sees her.

“The van’s all stocked up, dads. Go double-check our equipment while I get the other idiots.” Gem informed them before heading up the stairs. Of course, they’re right where she expected them to be, making out on the upstairs couch. She eyes the bean bags gathered near the cornholes and she gets an idea.

Grabbing one, she tosses it up and down a few times to get a sense of its weight, aims, and tosses it right onto Scar’s back, earning her an  “OH, OH, Oh, Oooooh” from Scar as he tries (and fails) to stabilize himself from the fright, eventually ending up on the floor. Gem imagines that Grian would be glaring a hole through her skull if he weren’t cackling at Scar’s misfortune.

Scar sits up and looks confusedly at Gem (Grian’s laughter, a background) and asks, “What gives? We were a bit busy here, Gem!”

“Yeah, yeah. You can be busy another time. Right now you need to get off your butts because the van’s stocked and it’s almost time to ready up.” Gem turns to go back downstairs and once she’s hit the stairs, she turns back and says, “Oh and Grian? You owe me a favor now seeing as it was your turn to stock the van.”

“WHAT?!”

Chapter Text

Cub is taking a walk down the hall. He had been in his office, working on his papers when some vexes informed him that a hermit had entered the building. He pulled up the security footage to see who it was. He was worried, seeing as they wouldn’t alert him if it was Scar, he was doubly so when he realized that it was Grian, Ceo of ConCorp’s competition, Sahara, who was sneaking around. 

He was about to get up and send some vexes after him when he noticed that Grian had stopped right in front of the boardroom, where a dozen or so parrots, ehem, Directors were flying about. Cub smiled when he saw Grian’s eyes widen and his wings puff up before he moved to enter the room. It looks like our board members will keep our little infiltrator busy for a while.

It’s been a few hours now, Cub’s completed all his paperwork and Grian’s been thoroughly distracted the entire time. After the second hour mark, it looks like Grian decided to take a nap with his fellow bird friends and has been soundly sleeping for the last hour and a half. Cub had been done for the past hour and he wanted to let his friend sleep for a little longer before kicking him out but there’s only so many times you can solve a rubik’s cube before you start losing what little sanity you have left. So. Cub is taking a walk.

By the time he gets to his destination, Grian’s starting to wake up, which is a bit disappointing, seeing as he can no longer mess with him while he’s asleep. Cub mentally files those plans for another day and instead goes and looms over the still-half-asleep avian. He sees the exact moment Grian registers what he’s looking at because he tenses and immediately starts looking for escape routes.

“Whatcha doin’ there man?” Cub drawls, raising his eyebrow to fully sell the act.

“So. haha. You see, about that…” Grian stammers, before bolting up and out of the room.

Cub looks at where Grian was and at the door, then shakes his head and goes about his day.

Chapter Text

It was only meant to be Grian and Pearl tonight. 

False wasn’t feeling well and had to cancel, but where Grian goes, his boyfriends are soon to follow. And then Impulse had heard and didn’t want to feel left out so he showed up with snacks and extra pillows, stating that ‘a sleepover isn't a sleepover without snacks and pillows’ before passing them both out to the other Boatem members.

Currently Scar was playing with her hair, brushing it, braiding it, and then brushing again. Over and over. Gently lulling her to sleep. Across from them, Impulse was massaging Grian, Mumbo already put to sleep by his ministrations, and was slowly putting the chirping avian to sleep as well.

Once the siblings are asleep, Impulse wiggles his fingers at Scar, a clear ‘threat’ if he’s ever seen one. Quietly chuckling, Scar assumes position and he too, is quickly pulled into slumber by Impulse’s deft hands.

After he’s sure they are all asleep, Impulse creeps around and turns off most of the lights, leaving a few dim just so anyone waking up in the middle of the night could know how to navigate around in the near darkness without tripping over their feet (or worse, someone else's.)

It’s only after he’s done that and checked on the others, that he finally, finally lays down to rest. He will later deny that startled when Pearl’s voice sounded out though, whispering, “I was wondering when you were gonna come to bed. I was about ready to get up and drag you down here myself.” Pear waits until she hears his snoring to go back to bed.

Tonight was only meant to be Grian and Pearl, but she will never, ever turn down a Boatem slumber party.

Chapter Text

“GET BACK HERE SCOTT!”

“And why would I want to do that? I wouldn’t want to make it easy on you, Joel.”

“WHEN I GET MY HANDS ON YOU SCOTT-”

“Well, they’re a lively bunch, aren’t they?” Martyn said, having just come back from the Misadventures world. “How long have they been goin’ at it this time?”

“‘Bout an hour, I’d say, us hermits were just chilling for a while when Scott joined. We tried to keep them separated but you can see how well that worked out for us.” Pearl said, watching the chaos unfold while idly running her fingers through Tilly’s fur. “I would say I don’t know how Scott even knew we were in here right now but we have a few too many hooligans here for it to not have been one of them inviting him in.”

“True, true, that’s true. Well, I see they’ve got popcorn over there so I’ll be off. Enjoy your front row seats, Pearl.” Martyn said, already walking away towards the kitchen. 

As he gets closer, he hears Grian and Scar bickering over the loud crashes and even louder yelling. “-ook Grian, I think Joel might actually get him this time- Oh Hi Martyn, when did you get here? No matter, we’re making bets, you want in? Joel’s definitely gonna catch Scott today, I’m sure of it.”

“Oh there’s no way Scott’s gonna get himself caught like that. You’re on!”

Chapter Text

Grian’s currently up on the hammock, one of the few places in the van that can accomodate for the avian’s wings. It’s just another thing on the list of stuff they need to buy once they have the money for it. That was actually the reason why they were currently heading out to another ghost-infested house. They were one more Ridgeview or Maple Lodge away from being able to rip out the chairs and replace them with more wing friendly seating.

He gets pulled out of his thoughts by getting walloped on the head by a stray m&m. He looks down and sees the three mighty suspicious faces of his crew. He sees Scar talking with Impulse through the partition, a picture of innocence. Grian wouldn’t suspect him if it weren’t for him constantly looking back at him. He looks over and sees Skizz shaking from trying to hold in his laughter and Gem not even trying to hide the fact that she was the one who threw it, popping another m&m into her mouth while raising her eyebrow at him.

Grian picks up the m&m from where it landed in the hammock, holds it up demonstratively, before moving it to his mouth. Immediately there’s an explosion of shouts as all three shoot up, trying to take the chocolate from him. 

He just cackles and throws the m&m back at Gem, hitting her straight on the forehead.

Chapter Text

Crash!

Another brick, another window. 

He reaches back for another and finds that he no longer has a pile any more. He shrugs and puts on his elytra, flying up to the ledges up on the permit office and starts pinning the banners up on the wall.

Once he's done with that, he flies back down to admire his work. 

“Yeah, that'll teach those Poe not to mess with us.” Jevin said, proud of what he's accomplished. 

He remembers that he has a No-Poe meeting soon that he needs to report this win to. He sets off another rocket and flies away. He does not remember that he never put their list of demands down.

Chapter Text

Scar’s sitting on his bed,  frowning down at the hat in his hand, reminiscing, mourning his past crew, that past world. He might not remember every world he’s been to, there are too many to count, but he remembers that world.

He must have world-hopped while in the void. It was dark and quiet, it had been for quite some time. And then he blinked and he was in another world. He was immediately hit with all the sights and sounds and smells and feels-

He was a captain. At least, that world’s Scar was. (Maybe he still is, Scar’s not entirely sure what happens when he leaves a world behind.) He was dropped in at a tumultuous time. Heavy waves crashing into the already waterlogged ship, lightning cracking down onto the mast, bringing it down and adding a fiery inferno into the mix, voices, oh so familiar voices, screaming out for their captain, those same voices abruptly stopping.

That was one of the worst days of Scar’s life and it wasn’t even his life. He spent the next several days, months, years climbing his way out of that hole and making a name for himself in that world. He eventually reunited with some familiar faces (not them though, never them.) He stuck close to Martyn and got comfortable with the Kestrels and one day, he was…back? He laid in bed, closed his eyes and landed hard on the ground of season nine. 

A crash jolts him out of his thoughts and a familiar voice calls out his name (Scar, Scar, not Captain but Scar.) He doesn’t have a chance to muster a noise before his avian is popping his head up from the ladders, beaming at him when he finds him.

“Scar! There you are. I’ve been looking everywhere for you.” Grian takes a better look at the scene before him and frowns. Scar can see Grian stare for a bit before nodding to himself. He marches up to the bed, with such a serious face that Scar struggles not to laugh at. 

“Here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to head on down and pull out the old creeper models, and we’re gonna prank Mumbo and Skizz and maybe Joel too, okay? That sound good?” Grian pauses to give Scar a chance to decline if he wanted to. He doesn’t. “Okay, perfect! You need to get off your butt if we want this to happen though so c’mon now, up you get.”

Grian pulls Scar up and off the bed with ease and drags him off to go do exactly that, so excited that Scar can’t help but laugh along with him. The hat left on the bed. Long forgotten.

Chapter Text

Ren looks out of his window, waiting for Scar to come back with his quarry. It was only a matter of time before-

“Scar! Let go of me! C’mon man, you don’t need to follow Ren to the T, you can just let me go to make another resistance another day. Wait, no, not make a resistance, sCAR-” Grian gets thrown through the chamber doors. His breath gets knocked out of him and that moment he takes to regain his breath is just long enough for Scar to easily recapture him.

Grian is squirming in Scar’s grasp as he jokingly salutes Ren, “Here you go, Ren. One pesky bird, as you requested. Where do you want him?”

“It is King Ren to you and it would do you well to remember that,” Ren spat, finally turning around to look at the pair. There’s an extremely convincing hatred in his eyes when he looks down at Grian, so much so that it sends a shiver down his spine when he looks up from his bound position. Kudos, Ren. Grian thinks, You look just like you hate me. 

“Scar, here are the keys. Bring him down to the dungeon, where the prisoners of war go and come back up, I want to speak with you about something that enemy ears shouldn’t hear.” Ren hands Scar the keys and waves them off, looking everything like the busy king that he’s playing.

Scar manhandles Grian down, down, down the stairs and through the winding halls until they reach the dungeons.

Grian is struggling the entire way, trying his damndest to break free and escape, not wanting to stay here for however long Ren thinks it’ll be funny to leave him here for, but even with Grian’s heightened upper body strength from all the flying around he does, it’s still not enough to overcome Scar’s ‘superhero’ training.

Grian is easily maneuvered into one of the cells near the door, Scar momentarily collecting his wings so Grian didn’t accidentally hurt his wings in his flailing. Scar shoves him through the bars, locking the door shut behind him. 

Scar walks away from Grian’s cell, back towards the door. “Think of it this way, Grian. Maybe some time down here will be good for you, it might smooth out some of those destructive tendencies you have. Hopefully, you’ll learn not to be such a problem for your fellow hermits. Have Fun!” He says before walking back out of the dungeon.

This will be the last time he sees Grian for three whole weeks. This will be the last time he sees this cheeky carefree version ever again.

Chapter Text

Scar’s sneaking around, looking to see if he can see his target. He spots movement above him and quickly ducks around a corner. After a few moments of not hearing any squawks or shouts of his name, Scar figures that he’s in the clear.

He peaks back around to see where exactly Grian is, ready to aim one of his water balloons he brought with him when he sees Grian sway on the dirt scaffolding. Scar immediately abandons the balloons when he sees Grian lean too far to one side and overcorrects off the other side. He rushes to catch him as he falls, making it just in time.

Scar looks down at the avian in his arms. Grian is sound asleep, little snores coming from his bird friend. Scar gapes for a moment before shaking his head and huffing fondly. He adjusts his grip and walks out of the darkness of Midnight Alley and towards Grian’s starter base.

Chapter Text

Grian tried to swim in lava

Grian tried to swim in lava

Grian tried to swim in lava

Cleo tried to ignore it. People get into death loops all the time, some hermits, especially so. 

Grian tried to swim in lava

Grian tried to swim in lava

Grian tried to swim in lava

Cleo gritted their teeth and went about her day, ignoring the buzz. buzz. buzz. of their communicator. 

Grian froze to death

Grian froze to death

Grian froze to death

“C’mon Cleo. He’s fine. He got out of the lava death loop on his own earlier, he can do it again.”

Grian froze to death

Grian froze to death

Grian froze to death

They put their comm away and started gathering some shulker boxes, deciding that she’ll distract herself with some resource gathering. If she randomly needs a lot of powdered snow, well that’s for them to know.

Grian was blown up by Creeper

Grian was blown up by Creeper

Grian was shot by Skeleton

“Okay, that’s it!” Cleo shouts. They pull out her comm, typing furiously.

Grian was slain by Zombie Villager

<ZombieCleo> Right. That's enough

Grian was slain by Zombie

Grian was shot by Skeleton

<ZombieCleo> I’m calling an emergency royal meeting

Grian was slain by Spider

Grian was slain by Enderman

Grian was shot by Skeleton

<cubfan135> got it

Grian was killed by Witch using magic

<ZombieCleo> Ren, if you’re not there, then so help me, you’re going to regret it

Grian was slain by Slime

<BdoubleO100> are we meeting at the crastle

<joehillssays> i sthis aobut grian

Grian was blown up by Creeper

<GoodTimeWithScar> Heading there now

Grian was slain by Enderman

<RentheKing> I shall be on me way

Cleo sighs and drags a palm down her face. They stretch before walking up to the nearest window and putting on their elytra.

“Don’t worry, Grian. We’re coming to save ya.” Cleo whispers, before taking off.

Chapter Text

“So.” Xb started, “Keralis is back. And I was thinking. What if we. Rent out his base. To himself.”

Ren, the current proud owner of said base, stood shocked for a moment before groaning, “Dude…”

“No, no, no listen. It’s a foolproof plan. One that everyone benefits from. I keep the money I got from selling you his base. You get a continuous flow of diamonds. Keralis gets his base back. It’s a win-win-win. And it’s so frickin’ funny too.”

Ren continued just looking at Xb, speechless. “I can’t believe you’re convincing me to do this…”

“I’m not hearing a no.” Xb sang.

“Fine!” Ren shouted, before sighing, “Fine.”

Chapter Text

“Oh Zoom Zoom!” Scar calls out, flying above his admin’s pyramids, trying to see if the coast was clear. “Oh Zoom Zoom!”

Landing near his storage room, Scar looks around for a moment before heading inside. He paws around for a lightswitch and silently cheers when he finds it. Looking inside, he spots the walls filled with rows upon rows of shulker boxes. “Where would it be?” Scar whispers, feeling lost with all the options he has.

“Where would what be, Scar?” A voice sounds out from behind him making him jump about a block in the air.

“OH, Oh, oh, ohhh.” Scar shouts, turning around and relaxing when he sees it’s not a creeper, just Xisuma, “Oh! Xisuma! How has your day been? Mine’s been amayzin’ other than one little thing. There’s been quite a bit of lag recently.”

Xisuma raises an eyebrow, ready to pull out one of his admin panels when Scar continues, “You see, my friend, there’s been a lot of lag surrounding the new resin stuff.”

Xisuma, who was starting to look through the code to see if he could spot what Scar was talking about, immediately pauses and with a fond, exasperated smile, closes the panels and puts his hands on his hips. “So you were stealing.”

“No, nooo, I would never. I was merely searching for the source of the lag, that’s all. I’m doing you a favor, really. You should be thanking me for saving you from that dastardly-”

“Scar.” Xisuma deadpans.

“Yes, Xisuma?” Scar says, a picture of innocence.

“If I show you some of my new building methods with resin, will you stop trying to take my resin?”

“But of course, of course! A good honest businessman like me would never-”

Chapter Text

Grian walks into Keralis’ office, a skip in his step. Keralis smiles confusedly at him, and says, “Hello Brian, What are you doing on this fine morning?”

Grian waves dramatically but says nothing back. 

“Oh, it’s a quiet day today?” Keralis asks. When Grian nods, Keralis waves him on, “Okay, you can continue!”

Grian nods again and pulls out a wrapped box, not unlike a christmas present, and puts it on his desk, looking  expectantly at him. When Keralis reaches out to pick up the gift, Grian is quick to snatch it back, holding a hand out as if asking for payment.

Keralis thinks, ‘Grian is probably doing something here…And well no one can say no to such a sweet face so…’  before tossing a stack of diamonds Grian’s way. The avian catches it, just staring down at his hand for a bit. He doesn’t hand over the present so that must not have been enough so Keralis tosses another stack at him. 

That must have been enough because Grian scrambles to give the box to him before rushing out of his office. Well that was a strange scenario, but now I can see what my present is. Keralis thinks, before opening the box to reveal… a single rotten flesh. What.

“What?”

Keralis hears some nervous chittering and turns, still slightly shocked, to see Grian still there, shifting from one foot to the other. When Grian sees Keralis looking at him, he startles and fully runs away, leaving only a few feathers behind and the world’s most expensive piece of rotten flesh.

Chapter Text

“Well, that was a pretty successful mining trip if I do say so myself. Now it’s just a question of where am I? Looks like we are…” Grian pulls out his comm and checks his coords. “Looks like we are several thousand blocks out. How did we even get this far?”

Grian groans, rubbing his face after he puts his comm away. He sighs again and starts looking for any light sources around him, hoping that he can find his torches or maybe some surface light. 

Unfortunately he doesn’t find any of that but he did see some light shining around a corner so he rushes off in that direction. He turns the corner right in time to see black pants and a blacker shirt turn the next one. When he gets to the second one, he gets a glimpse of shock white hair before they get hidden behind some more blocks.

Grian, being the curious, button-pushing avian that he is, obviously chases after the figure, left, right, up, down, through mobs and caverns, slowly getting closer and closer. He can nearly touch this person when they turn one more corner and Grian goes to do the same but instead of seeing cave walls and the person within arms reach, he ends up running out into the center of the shopping district, The Entity visible from where he’s standing. 

Grian, confused on how he got here so fast and where the figure is, turns around and is shocked to find that there’s no cave or strip mine or anything there. He presses on the stone to make sure it’s real and not a painting or hologram but nope… as solid as any block can be.

“Well that’s weird.” Grian says, silent for a moment before shrugging and backing away. He mutters, “Not the weirdest thing I’ve dealt with this season.” and beats his wings once, twice before flying away.

Chapter Text

“Oh! I nearly have him!” Skizz yells into his comm. He readies up his shot, a surprisingly easy affair, and throws his trident at Joe Hills… Wait. 

“Where did he go?!” He shouts, looking around and spotting Joe several dozen blocks down, having deactivated his elytra to drop out of the way. “What the heck!” Skizz cries out.

“I got him. I got him!” Scar nosedived down, an arrow pulled back and he released it once he lined up his shot. Unfortunately, right before the arrow connected, Joe Hills disappeared.

Joe swims out of his stasis chamber, helped up by Cleo, the one who activated it to begin with. “Oh Cleo, you could not have had better timing with that, my elytra broke and I almost hit the ground when you flipped the lid. I can not thank you enou-”

Chapter Text

VintageBeef was blown up by Creeper

Beef opened his eyes and groaned. “Dang it!” He said, “Now I’ll have to deal with the creeper hole in the map as well as flying all the way back.”

He shot up from bed and grabbed a spare elytra and enough food and rockets to make it back to his stuff. 

The fight was fairly easy, no problems there, but it was night by the time he arrived and he could see mobs wandering around as well as the crater he had left behind. He managed to fly in and collect all his stuff and he as he made sure he had gotten everything back, he heard a hiss behind him.

BOOM

VintageBeef was blown up by Creeper

Chapter Text

“Okay, now that this is your base once more, here, take your junk back.” Zed says, relieved that he can go back to his base now. He starts throwing out the leftover stacks he still has in his inventory.

“No, no, no, no, no.” Grian cries out, throwing out his hands and flaring his wings in a poor attempt to dodge the blocks but unsurprisingly, he fails. He’s left with a completely full inventory with some extra stacks of the ground. Grian looks up at the shulker boxes in his inventory and gets a devious plan.

Smiling wickedly, Grian stretches his arms up and his wings out and says, “Actually… Now that there’s more space here, I can just…” 

“Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare!”

“Make myself at home and…” Grian starts placing down the chest monster he acquired while he stayed in Zed’s base. He looks up to see Zed’s reaction and is met with a face of horror.

Zed looks defeatedly at it, and then goes and hides around the corner, poking his head out as if the chest monster will bite him if he gets too close. 

Grian doubles over laughing at the sight.

Chapter Text

What. “What?”

“C’mon Wels, G-Team needs to be taken down a peg and what better way than with a diss track!” Ren exclaims, wagging his tail and gesturing wildly.

“I…” Wels rubs his face and looks around the room, seeing Xisuma and Impulse talk about how the background instrumentals will go. He sighs and looks back towards False, hoping that she’ll be the voice of reason but she just shrugs and says, “I’m not gonna lie, it’s definitely silly, for sure, but it sounds kinda fun. Why not give it a go?”

Wels gapes for a second, before searching for Doc, his last hope!-

“Grian, listen. No one’s gonna touch my shrub… no, no, no, how about…Listen Grian-” Doc mutters, writing something down before scratching it out and adding something else.

“...Fine… But Mumbo needs to have a part too.”

Chapter Text

“How do you deal with your dimension hopping?” Pix questions, holding up a mic.

Scott looks up from his chest, “Well, I just enjoy it while I’m there.”

A humanoid creature made of stars is shown launching themself up to a floating island, hollering all the way. A pirate captain is leading the charge. An elven prince is learning how to wield his ice magic.

“What would you say your experience is with dimension hopping?” Pix inquires.

Martyn crosses his arms, huffing, “I always get my ass handed to me is what happens.”

A pirate floats in the ocean for a while, eventually bumping into a pier and is pulled out of the water. A rat enters an unfair duel and quite understandably doesn’t walk out the victor. A man made for the cold is sent higher and higher into the air at the hands of a laughing teleporter.

“If you had to go back to a past dimension, which one would you choose?” Pix asks. 

Scar turns, a distant look in his eyes as he says, “I don’t know. Each visit was too short to tell if I would want to go back or too long to ever want to go back.”

A pirate mourns his past crewmates, his past friends. A pilot admires his bright red plane. A lone survivor searches yet another building for food, weapons, medical supplies, people, anyone.

Chapter Text

“Impulse, c’mon man. You gotta do me this solid. You’re the only one who can do this for me, Impy.” Skizz pleaded.

Impulse narrowed his eyes, “Well maybe I shouldn’t do it now, if you’re going to use that nickname.”

“No! No, I’m sorry Impulse, please forgive me! I can’t do it, it’s gotta be you, Dippledop.” Skizz begged, pulling out his puppy eyes in hopes to sway the demon. (And if he flared his wings out and flashed his halo for a second to add the effect, well… who’s to say.)

Impulse’s tail swished in agitation, even as he relented. “Fine! I’ll do it.”

—

“There we go, little buddy, you’re free now.” Impulse said, removing the cup from the paper so the tiny spider could walk back out into nature.

Impulse got back up from his kneel, dusted off his knees, and said, “You’re a big baby.”

“I AM NOT-”

Chapter Text

Doc placed the finishing touches, the best friend crown and signs, and chuckled. “That’ll teach Grian not to touch my redstone. Now he’ll know not to mess with the goat.”

Doc woke up to his base full of chickens. The next week is one of thinning the herd of chickens that now reside in his base, of taking swing after swing at the sea of chickens his base has become, of locating the stragglers, of moving a good six thousand chickens through the nether to get them into Grian’s base. 

After all that, Grian and the other buttercups still didn't get the message, setting up a camp and making themselves into general nuisances, writing ‘Live, Laugh, Love’ on his perimeter wall, getting his goat bot destroyed, and ruining his butterfly bots.

Doc shouts in frustration, “Your incompetence is your strongest power!”

Chapter Text

Etho walks up to Bdubs, “So, Bdubs, I was thinking-”

“AHHHH!”

“Relax, it’s just me. Anyways, like I was saying-”

Etho, spotting Grian in the shopping district, makes his way over to him, “Hey Grian, have you stocked-”

Grian jumps about a foot into the air, wings fluffed up, and rounds on him, jabbing a finger into his chest, “You’re not supposed to do that, Etho.”

Etho sees Cub on the ground and lands right in front of him. “Sup Cub.”

Cub stops for a moment so he doesn’t just walk into him, and nods, “Sup Etho.”