Work Text:
The first time Grian sees Mumbo after he buries him, he realises that it would have hurt far less if he had just stayed dead.
The first time around it had hurt. All of it. There was the death of course, the long aching moment between the fall and when he hit the ground. The crunch of bone, the horror rising like a monster from within Grian’s chest.
And then it was over, and Mumbo was dead, and there was nothing he could do about it.
The grief came, because it had to. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression.
He was entirely convinced. Nothing was ever going to be okay again.
But then hours turned into days turned into weeks and he looked up at the sky above and he thought, finally, finally, of acceptance.
And then he saw him.
It wasn’t the same Mumbo he’d known before, in a pressed suit with a groomed mustache and solid limbs.
He was a zombie, pulled broken and bleeding from the earth with grey skin and glassy eyes.
Cleo stood behind him, reminding Grian that no matter how much this man looked like his Mumbo, he wasn’t. He never could be again.
And yet, feeling how time held still and seeing the way that Mumbo looked right back at him, he couldn't help but hope.
Grian discovers that the stages of grief are remarkably easy to reverse as he finds himself thrown bodily back into the moment right after the body hit the ground.
He’s not dead, he thinks, he’s not dead.
Cleo moves forwards, placing a hand on Mumbo’s shoulder. Grian watches as he flinches at the touch.
“Come on,” they tell him softly, only just loud enough for Grian to hear. “Let’s go.”
Mumbo turns, almost robotically, breaking eye contact with Grian and taking a step away from him.
Grian feels something small in his chest shatter for the second time.
Cleo turns, looking over their shoulder to meet Grian’s gaze. There is unmistakable sadness in their eyes, even as they lead Mumbo away.
***
He knows it’s a terrible decision even as he makes it.
It will hurt. It will rip and tear and shred him into infinitesimally small pieces. But, he is a masochist at his core, and he can’t stop pulling on that little thread that leads straight to his burning hot heart.
So, he mimics Cleo’s power.
It doesn’t feel like much, not like Pearl’s power where he could feel himself growing the wings, grotesque protruding masses that he knew were never supposed to be a part of him.
Instead, a sense of still coldness settles over him. It’s the remaining chill right after you warm up, the moment when the goose bumps have just gone down but you still feel weird and stiff and wrong.
It’s fine, it’s strange and uncomfortable and he feels a bit like he died a century ago and just came back to life. But, it’s fine. Really.
The Sub One Club isn't real anymore. Skizz died and Mumbo just after and Grian was left standing the final one left in his terrible spider’s web.
Just like always.
Regardless, it is in their former base, barely two blocks tall, that he sets up his summoning circle.
He has never liked the feeling of chalk, the thin power getting under his nails and reminding him too much of gunpowder and sand, of another time past.
But it remains a necessary evil and by the time he finishes the runes the sticks are worn down to small stubs, dust coating the ground and staining his clothes.
Grian feels disgusting but pushes past it, his ability will only last for so long.
He kneels in the centre of the circle, knees pressed into soft earth, and presses his forehead to the ground.
“Rise.”
The word comes out as a choked whisper, barely loud enough to be heard, even in the stiflingly small room.
For a second nothing moves, even the air stilling around him. Grian stops breathing.
One, two, three.
The ground shifts, sending Grian stumbling to his feet. Feeling it still writhing dangerously beneath him, he takes a step back, and when it doesn’t stop, moves to press himself against the wall.
He sees the hand first, grey, torn skin and dirt encrusted fingernails.
It grasps the earth like a drowning man would clutch a life raft, fingers dragging a forearm from the ground.
It does not take long for Mumbo to dig himself up. Maybe only thirty seconds with his erratic movement and apparent disregard for his own safety.
His arms flail and his legs kick and he wrenches himself from the earth like it burns his skin, and Grian can do nothing until he stands, hunched over himself, chest heaving.
Grian doesn’t expect that he needs to breathe, but he’s doing it anyway.
Up close, not across the grass, he looks the same, with his lanky frame and dark hair. He wears the same clothes despite their tears, and looking at him Grian sees Mumbo, more than he sees the monster he has become.
At the same time, for a moment Grian is certain he does not know the man who stands in front of him. Instead of slouching he is hunched, a posture he had never seen Mumbo take up, and everywhere that life had touched his pale skin has gone grey. Mumbo blushes easily, burns easily, every spark of red standing out against his pale skin.
It’s all gone now, nothing to prove he was ever truly alive.
Grian steps forwards, arms outreached before he can stop himself, before he can let the fear seep in.
“Mumbo,” he says, hearing the name leave his throat like a sigh of relief.
Grian wraps his arms around Mumbo, not caring for the dirt that stains his clothes. He feels the same, even with the cold skin and the coating of grime, it’s still the same beautiful body. Grian has charted every part of it, he knows it well enough by now to remember.
Mumbo doesn’t move to hug him back, doesn’t even make a motion to say anything, which Grian decides he is okay with. This will have to be enough.
He pulls away from where his head had been pressed to a heartbeat-less chest to raise his hands to Mumbo’s face, looking into his newly grey eyes.
“Darling,” he says, voice coming out soft and sad. “What have they done to you?”
Mumbo doesn’t respond to his question immediately, but Grian can see his lips moving. It’s a small movement, like a ventriloquist, like he’s hoping no one will notice. Grian moves to press his ear to his mouth so he can hear him better.
“Tell me to move.”
The words baffle Grian and he pulls away for a second to look at the man.
“Tell me to move,” Mumbo repeats, louder this time even as his voice barely constitutes a whisper. “Tell me to hug you back. I can’t do it myself.”
Grian examines him, every moment pulling the taught string of his heart further in his chest. It’ll break soon, he knows, and he’ll shatter.
“I don’t want to tell you to do anything,” the words come out quieter than he intends them to.
“Why not?” Mumbo asks, and it’s such a genuine question.
“Because I want you to be able to make your own decisions. I want you to do what you want.”
Mumbo smiles at him, a tiny movement that leads Grian’s gaze right to his mouth. “It’s a little too late for that I think.”
“It’s not, it can’t be.”
“I know what I want, Grian. I want to hug you, you just have to tell me to.”
Grian dips his head, letting his forehead rest in the junction between Mumbo’s neck and his shoulder. His skin is cold.
“Hug me,” he tells Mumbo. “Please.”
Mumbo’s arms move instantly from where they had remained motionless by his side, raising to embrace Grian fully, pressing them even closer together.
It feels nice, it feels safe.
Mumbo’s fingers move against his back, tracing patterns into his skin. It’s a familiar motion, something he used to do often, before it all went bad.
Grian closes his eyes and imagines that they’re on the bridges, the ones that span the gap between the mountains. He imagines he can feel the wind in his hair, moving his clothes. The chill in the air is from the breeze, not the man he’s skin to skin with.
Mumbo is warm and alive, they’re hugging because they want to and not because the world is ending. Grian can pull away any time and press a kiss to his lips and Mumbo will smile at him and everything will be alright.
Grian realises he’s crying, hot tears falling onto Mumbo’s shoulder, and he is not surprised at the discovery.
“I’ve missed you,” he says into Mumbo’s skin.
“I’ve missed you too.”
Grian leans away to look Mumbo in the eye, knowing the other man can see his red rimmed eyes and tear stained cheeks. Mumbo’s eyes are not red, but the weight of his life and death clings to the skin around them.
“Sorry,” Grian says.
“For what?”
“For crying. I didn’t want to cry.”
“You’re okay, G,” Mumbo’s hands continue up and down his back. “I wish I could cry. Make the most of it.”
“You can’t cry?”
He shrugs. “No tear ducts.”
“I’m sorry.”
Mumbo smiles. “You don’t have to apologise for that either.”
And Grian wants to apologise again but stops himself, instead pausing to examine Mumbo’s face, restarting the process of memorising every inch of it.
“Can I touch your face?” Mumbo asks.
“Go ahead.”
Mumbo’s hand shifts and then resettles on Grian’s back. His face falls. “You have to tell me.”
“Oh.”
“Sorry.”
“You don’t have to apologise either. Please touch my face Mumbo.”
One of Mumbo’s hands leaves his back to raise and rest against Grian’s jaw, his fingertips resting at his hairline behind his hair and his palm dwarfing his face in comparison. His thumb, still rough with redstone burns despite his undeath, brushes over Grian’s cheekbone, reaching up to wipe the tears away from under his eyes.
Grian’s eyes close, and he lets himself feel Mumbo against him. His cold hands. The tears seeping out from under his closed eyelids.
It’s too much and then it’s not enough. It's not enough, it’s not enough, it’s not enough.
He doesn’t know how to make it be enough.
Grian pulls away from Mumbo. It’s more sudden, more frantic than he intended it to be, with him all but shoving the other man away from him. He stumbles backwards until his back hits the stone wall before sliding to the ground, knees pulled to his chest.
Mumbo stands, arms lowering slowly, staring at him with his mouth slightly open.
“Sorry,” Grian tells him. He thinks about providing an explanation, saying something, anything, to make it better.
He doesn’t. Instead, he watches Mumbo’s face that had already fallen, but has now dropped further into sadness.
He can’t seem to stop hurting him. It was his fault he died in the end, wasn’t it?
He can’t think about that.
“Sorry,” Grian repeats again, stupidly. “You don’t have to stand there, sit down with me.”
He realises what he says the moment after the words leave his lips, watching in horror as Mumbo’s body moves as if on its very own marionette strings.
He less sits than collapses exactly where he is, limbs bent at angles that would not have been possible had he been alive.
“Oh my goodness,” Grian pushes himself onto his hands and knees frantically, crawling towards Mumbo until he is directly in front of him, looking into the man’s wide eyes and pained face.
“I’m so sorry,” he says, reaching out to place a hand on Mumbo’s shoulder.
He flinches, and Grian pulls away like he’s been burnt.
“I didn’t mean to, I promise I didn’t mean to. I should have thought about it. I really should have thought about it before I said it.”
“It’s fine, Grian.”
Grian watches as Mumbo’s shoulders untense, a forceful effort on his part, he knows, an action he has mastered after years of practice.
“I’m sorry,” he repeats uselessly.
“You didn’t mean to.”
“Of course not.”
Mumbo nods, moving so that he sits in a more comfortable position, legs crossed under him. Grian mirrors him, knees almost but not quite touching.
Neither of them say anything, Mumbo watching the ground, Grian watching Mumbo.
He will only have so long with Cleo’s power.
“I wish you never died.”
Mungo looks up, eyes glassy not with tears but with undeath. “It was always going to happen.”
“You don’t know that.”
“This is a death game, Grian. We both know I was never going to win it.”
“That doesn’t mean I can’t wish.”
Mumbo sighs. “It just hurts to wish.”
“So you don’t wish?”
“So I wish too much and then wish again to not feel the pain.”
Grian inches forward, slowly this time, until his knees press against Mumbo’s in front of him. He feels cold even through the fabric of their pants. He doesn’t pull away.
“Is this okay?” He asks.
Mumbo nods.
He reaches out with his hands, letting his fingers curl gingerly around Mumbo’s own.
“And this?”
“Yeah.” The other man’s voice sounds hoarse.
He’s still beautiful, even like this. Even dead and broken and beaten down. Even with greying skin and glassy eyes and wounds that won’t close. He’s still perfect, Grian still loves him.
“If I kiss you, will you be able to kiss me back?”
“Not unless you tell me to.”
“I don’t want to do that.”
“Then I can’t.”
Grian squeezes his hands, shutting his eyes against the rest of the world.
“I’m sorry,” Mumbo tells him.
“You don’t need to be.”
“But I am.”
Grian opens his eyes. “Can I kiss you anyway?” Grian asks. “Even if you can’t do anything?”
Mumbo looks at him for a long moment. He’s not breathing, he doesn’t need to anymore.
“Yeah, Grian,” he says, voice torturously soft. “Yeah you can.”
“Okay,” he says. He lets go of one of Mumbo’s hands, reaching for his face instead. “Okay.”
Grian curls his hand around Mumbo’s jaw, supporting his weight in his hand as he presses his thumb into his cheek. It’s a little harder than necessary, just so he can see the indent in Mumbo’s skin. The man leans into the pressure gratefully and Grian smiles.
He threads the fingers of his other hand through Mumbo’s properly, fingers interlocking like the pastry on top of a pie. The kind of pie is up to interpretation, Mumbo had always liked blackberry ones.
Can he still eat? Grian doesn’t want to think about that.
He leans in slowly, but as Mumbo closes his eyes, Grian doesn’t press his lips to his, instead letting them brush gently against his cheek. It’s barely a kiss, barely even pressure.
He stops, breathing there for a second before he resumes his motions, letting his mouth trail up Mumbo’s face, over his cheekbone and up his hairline to his temple. His kiss goes sloppy, his damp inner lips leaving residue against his skin.
Mumbo makes a small sound at the back of his throat, and Grian inhales and exhales carefully, breathing in that same musky scent that hasn’t left him even in death.
He keeps going, pressing kiss after kiss to his forehead, his eyebrows, the thin membrane of his eyelids. Grian kisses the bridge of his nose, and the tip of it, lips skimming his moustache before he finally finds himself hovering over his lover’s lips.
“Grian,” Mumbo’s voice is so soft that he’s sure it’s only their proximity that lets him discern his words. “Please.”
Grian sighs against his skin, knowing that Mumbo can feel his breath, before finally, finally kissing him.
Mumbo’s lips are cold and chapped, the skin rough and peeling over blood and muscle that no longer knows now to heal itself. His jaw is slack, lips slightly parted so Grian can slot his bottom lip between both of his own.
The kiss is wet and salty with Grian’s tears and even so, he presses closer, arms wrapping around Mumbo’s neck. He feels the man shiver under him, a full body motion that leaves Grian feeling the goose bumps on his skin.
He smiles against his mouth.
Grian kisses him harder, leaning closer, pushing and pulling, rolling Mumbo’s lip between his own. He moves to the upper lip and finds it quivering. He stills the man’s shudders with steady pressure and warmth.
“Shh,” Grian whispers into his mouth. “You’re okay. You’re gonna be alright.”
Mumbo lets out a whine, long and desperate and needy.
In response Grian moves, pushing himself onto his knees so he is taller than Mumbo for once, pressing forwards until he can sling his legs over Mumbo’s and sit down, straddling his lap while not once breaking the kiss.
Grian pulls away to gasp a ragged breath and finds Mumbo speaking his name in the same tone as that whine. Grian and please and yes and all of it all over again.
Grian kisses him again.
“I need to touch you,” Mumbo pleads. “Tell me to touch you.”
Grian kisses him again, again, again, still soft. Always so soft. “Please Mumbo, touch me.”
Mumbo’s hands move to grip Grian’s waist instantly, holding on to him as if he’s scared he’ll disappear if he lets go. As Grian leans back in, one of Mumbo’s hands slides up his back over his sweater, pressing strong fingers into his muscles until his fingers can curl protectively against the back of his neck.
He’s still shaking, whole body trembling under Grian’s touch.
“You’re doing so well, darling,” he whispers. “You’re doing so well.”
“Kiss me,” Mumbo tells him.
“I am, sweetheart.”
“Kiss me properly.”
Grian pulls away so he can make eye contact with Mumbo, pained and vulnerable.
“Are you sure?”
“I want to feel you. Please.”
Grian leans back in. “You don’t have to say please.”
Mumbo’s mouth is slack and needy against his own. He doesn’t move, but as their lips meet, Grian captures his sweet exhales before they can escape into the damp air of the cave.
He kisses him hard and fast and desperate, letting himself get lost in the sounds Mumbo makes, even immobile, even unable to reciprocate as Grian’s teeth graze his bottom lip, as his tongue pushes against his.
And yet, Grian can feel the white knuckled grip the man has on the back of his neck, his other balled fist in the jumper at his back. Mumbo is holding him like a prized possession, something to be cradled and protected and most importantly, never let go.
Grian returns the favour, his hand moving from where it had been trying in vain to untuck Mumbo’s button down shirt from his trousers to instead weave its way into the short hair on his head. He holds on tight, pulling slightly at first and then harder when it makes Mumbo gasp.
“I love you,” Grian tells him, voice cracking on the last word. “I’ll never stop.”
Mumbo opens his eyes slowly, arising from a trance like someone waking from a deep sleep. “I never told you to stop.”
“You died, Mumbo.”
“I know.”
Grian pulls away from him, examining his face for a moment. His lips are a raw red, chapped and bitten yet alive in a way the rest of his body isn’t. Not anymore.
Grian lets his head dip down until his face is pressed into the skin of Mumbo’s neck, the chill of his skin cooling the heat of his face. He kisses there, softly, once, twice, and then he stops. Letting himself rest there instead.
Mumbo’s arms move to wrap gently around his waist. Holding him, not tight, just there.
They stay like that for a long time, and even in his arms, even seated in his lap, even with his spit still drying on his lips, Grian misses him.
“It’s almost time’s up,” Mumbo says, softly enough that it almost breaks his heart.
Grian doesn’t reply.
“I’m going back under Cleo’s control. It won’t kill me but- but my last order was to kill you. I can’t let that happen.”
Grian doesn’t reply for a long time, letting himself bask in the scent of Mumbo’s skin before he has to face the world again.
“Okay,” he says. “What does that mean?”
He hears Mumbo inhale above him, even as he knows the man doesn't need to.
“I need you to kill me.”
And, in truth, Grian had known it was coming.
The zombies die quickly, revived within the hour. It’s a cruel loop to follow through, experiencing the last moments of your life again, and again, and again.
It had been a risk to summon Mumbo. It was never going to work out for either of them, one of them was always going to die.
And, well, Grian can’t remember the last time Mumbo beat him in a fight.
He sits up straighter, keeping his arms wrapped tightly around his partner even as he misses the scent of his skin.
“There’s no other way?” It’s useless, he still has to ask.
Mumbo’s fingers at his back dig further into his skin.
“I wish there was.”
“Okay,” Grian says, inhaling deeply even through the thick tears he can feel rolling down his cheeks. “I can do that.”
He releases Mumbo, with his arms, staying seated on his lap as he leans back to retrieve his sword, scattered on the floor behind him. Then, he lays the flat of the blade across their laps and leans in, pressing another kiss into Mumbo’s mouth.
He doesn’t respond, but his mouth is relaxed and pliant and Grian hears himself make a small noise at the back of his throat.
Grian pulls back, relaxing into Mumbo’s body and letting his lips brush his own gently, breathing the same air.
“What are you waiting for?” Mumbo breathes in this mouth.
“Tell me to do it.”
“What?”
Grian pauses, considering his words, careful not to compel Mumbo into doing anything he doesn’t want to. “When you are ready, I would like you to tell me to kill you.”
Mumbo doesn’t speak for a long moment.
“Okay,” he says eventually. “If that’s what you want.”
Grian lets out a wet laugh.
“Of course it isn’t what I want.”
Mumbo flinches slightly but returns, back in Grian’s space. “I know, Grian.”
“When will you say it?”
“I love you?”
“Bloody spoon.”
Mumbo laughs.
“I love you too,” Grian says, pressing another small kiss to his lips. “Idiot.”
He feels Mumbo smile against him before once more tightening his arms around him and moving his mouth to Grian’s ear. “Kill me,” he whispers there, slow and steady and somehow without a tremor in his voice. “Please, kill me.”
And, Grian listens.
He extricates his arms from around Mumbo’s body and reaches for the sword in his lap. It’s a weird angle, awkward and painful with too short arms and a too long sword, but he does it, drawing back the blade until the tip rests over Mumbo’s heart, right on his unarmoured chest.
“I’m going to kiss you,” he tells Mumbo. “I want you to pay attention to me and me alone, it’s going to hurt.”
He waits for the man under him to nod before leaning in and kissing him.
Grian’s lips are firm, kissing Mumbo hard and fast. He tries to overwhelm him with sensation, free hand rubbing circles into his jaw while his tongue traces the seam of his lips.
When Grian licks into his mouth Mumbo moans and Grian takes that moment to bite his lower lip lightly, exactly in the way he knows he likes.
Mumbo’s tenses all over, the good type that precedes a trail of goosebumps down one’s spine and Grian stabs him.
He tightens his grip around the pommel of the sword and presses it hard and fast into Mumbo’s chest, in the exact same way as he had kissed him.
The blade goes clean through, sharp diamond crafted by Grian’s own hand. Mumbo gasps and convulses and within seconds he’s dead.
It’s honestly insulting how quickly his once solid flesh and bone crumbles to ash under Grian’s touch.
One second they’re pressed against one another, as close as two people could bear to make their bodies before they combine into one, and the next Grian is sitting on the floor of a cold cave, hands stained grey and his partner’s lips only a memory of a touch against his own.
He will see Mumbo again, he knows, across the grass or a battlefield or from his pearl on top of the high walls of Cleo’s base.
He will see him and they will make eye contact and it will hurt more than killing him even had. Knowing he’s there and yet Grian can not have him, can not feel or touch or even revel in the warmth of a smile.
But, Cleo will have to summon him again for that to happen, and for now Grian has enough to deal with with the ash on his skin and the tears on his face and the aching emptiness taking him over.
The string holding up Grian’s heat snaps, and it plummets to the ground, shattering like a thousand crystal glasses.
He hurts and he hurts and he hurts and even as he presses his forehead into the stone floor, he can’t bring himself to regret summoning Mumbo.
At least he got to hold him one last time.