Chapter Text
when double life is proposed, impulse doesn’t mind the idea. the watchers are in charge of the life series, and they’ll be playing a death game anyways, so if grian wants to add something new or fun to mess around with, it’s not really a problem. the watchers will happily oblige for the chance of new ‘fun’, and what is insanity if not infinite repetition?
it was supposed to be simple- for the time that they were in the double life server, they would be paired up with a random participant. they would share pain, mild empathy and would die upon the others death. all outside soul bonds would be temporarily dulled to what grian described as a ‘dull, buzzing feeling’ in the back of the players minds’.
but this was the watchers the plan was proposed to. and when did they ever go with a plan? so when impulse was snatched onto the server, he was surprised he hadn’t already anticipated the sudden, excruciating pain of his soul bond with skizz snapping. there was sudden worry, a terrible sense of half-his dread roiling through his gut, and then... nothing. and then everything was wrong.
he was.. empty, for the first time since he turned eighteen and his soul bond with the angel snapped into place. he felt nothing, and everything. he felt like he had been sheltered under an umbrella, so used to the cool comfort of rain it was scary to feel a sudden, blinding sun. never had silence felt so deafening. and then a few moments later, a new, different soul bond wrapped itself around his heart like a noose.
it didn’t feel like the one he had with skizz. not really. it felt more constricting, like he had to find this person, had to protect them- it wasn’t a natural inclination, it wasn’t a choice. he had to. or else... or else.
he finds bdubs, and they marry, just because (because why?). the strings tied around his heart only loosen around bdubs, but he still doesn’t feel good when he’s with him. he feels wrong. all he can properly think and feel is that it should be skizz. back home, him and bdubs are friends. they’ve known each other for ages. and here.. bdubs is nice, they wreak chaos together. tear apart relationships, mess with people (for what? because nameless gods compelled them?). it’s good fun.
but then they’re yellow, and then they’re red, and there’s this pervasive wrongness that’s been creeping up, up, up his throat the same way tears make him unable to speak. he’s always been an angry crier. so they’re yellow, and they’re red, and people are dying left and right.
it’s whatever. that’s what this server is for, for gods sake. he doesn’t know why he ever expected anything but torment from gods made to be entertained. everyone is dying, and then there’s pearl, and then he’s dead too. and his bonds with bdubs is gone. and he wakes up on hermitcraft. and the emptiness isn’t gone.
oh, sure, the strings are gone, the haze of bloodlust felt twofold is gone. but his bond with skizz isn’t back. it’s still gone. he sees others reunite, hears grian and mumbo and scars threefold bond slip back into place like pieces of a puzzle, pearl and gems platonic bond rekindle like embers in a hearth. but his isn’t coming back. he turns, then to look at ren, ren who he knows has a bondmate on another server. he watches the horror slowly dawning on his face. the reignition must be proximity based.
but it’s fine. they can just contact their partners. ren does just that, xisuma temporarily whitelists a shaky martyn who crashes through the server borders into his lovers arms. but when he opens up his comm to search for his (best friend, lover, everything) bondmates name, to ask if he’s on their shared world and if it’s okay to pop over and fix whatever the watchers did, he finds.. nothing. simple blank emptiness. nothing more or less.
sure, skizz and impulse never had a conventional relationship. neither of them said i love you romantically, even though everyone said they could see chemistry (except impulse and skizz themselves, of course). and sure, maybe it always felt like they were holding back because they were angel and demon, fated enemies. but that was old fashioned, and impulse and skizz were best friends.
or they were. now, for whatever reason, skizz had vanished from his phone. perhaps he just got rid of his comm, got a new one. but skizz had been using that old thing for years (‘it’s sentimental, dippledop! you don’t get it!’). so maybe... maybe he just blocked him. impulse understood. he would never do it to skizz, no matter if he abandoned him once or a thousand times over. but skizz was holy, was beautiful. impulse was a demon. he was made to be unforgivable. his existence is a sin, seemingly one skizz grew tired of tolerating.
that’s okay. that’s fine. he- he can deal with that. he can. he keeps building, keeps growing, and somehow, he survives. he smiles, smiles, smiles. builds, builds, builds. none of the hermits have ever seen him truly upset. none of them knew who skizz was. he plays the game, plays the game well, and lets time slip between his fingers like sand. and he’s okay with it, he has to be okay with it because he deserves it, because it was a matter of time. angel and demon pairs are fated only for ruin, and he’d rather it ruin him than skizz. he’s fine, he copes. he copes. there’s another life series, limited life. a time gimmick. skizz isn’t there. that’s fine. that’s fine. he gets second place, fights honourably but without passion. martyn wins. he’s happy for him.
impulse doesn’t eat much, or sleep much. but he builds, builds builds. he makes, makes, makes. he loves someone out of his reach with the fury of dying suns, burning hotter than the flames of hell from which he was born. he doesn’t need food when he has this ache inside of him. the reminder that he is not, and will never be enough is a good reminder of why he needs to keep working. sure, he’s been getting tired earlier in the day, and maybe he’s lost a bit of weight (which hey, isn’t a bad thing, he knows he isn’t exactly pretty to look at), but he is alive. he’s alive, and so is skizz, somewhere out there. that’s enough.
then season 9 ends. it’s been over a year of radio silence. he starts a new season. he tries to forget his memories of showing skizz around his early season 9 bases through videocall. he tries to forget the ache, the deafening silence of a broken bond. they have a new hermit, one impulse knows. he’s glad Joel is here, even if sometimes all he can think of when he looks at him is third life, is skizz. he’s glad joel gets the chance to live in this wonderful server that for over a year has been impulses only lifeline to keep him from slipping into the dull blankness of permadeath. and then, an angel with voidburnt wings slips through the borders of their new server like a shooting star.