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“Wow, I can’t believe they demoted you to ‘imaginary friend’.” Zedaph closed the task book with a playful smile on his face.
“Hey!” Tango wanted to cross his arms and pout. He couldn’t believe that this was happening!
“Now you know how the rest of us feel!” Zed laughed, putting the book away. “But let’s get to starting the day, shall we?”
Tango was tugged along as Zed started going through his chests, seemingly scrutinizing his choice of organization.
“Your inventory is never this bad back home.”
“Shut it! Skizz is right over there!” Tango wished that he could point to where Skizz was standing near the edge of the island.
“Yeah yeah, I know.”
Would you prefer it if I talked to you like this? Even though the task specifically said ‘as if he follows you around the whole session’?
“Whatever.” Tango rolled his eyes, or at least he tried to. All of his movements were kind of weird and nondescript.
Zedaph ignored him, humming to himself as he went through reorganizing their chests and inventory.
Tango couldn’t help but focus on the fact that Zed wouldn’t use their bottom set of arms. It was something he always noticed with Zed — though he wasn’t really around enough for it to spiral into an actual pet peeve.
Tango’s ability to actually feel anything that the body could was vague and inconsistent at best, but the constant awareness that he didn’t have any control made him antsy.
He was very much not enjoying the feeling of his lower arms dangling unused by his sides, only ever twitching with instinctual reactions or lingering muscle memory. He didn’t know how Zedaph could stand it.
“Hey, TangoTop!”
Zedaph turned to look at Skizz, who was beckoning him over.
“What’s up?” Zed casually sauntered over, entirely ignoring Tango as he tried to talk to him.
“Remember the things, okay? It’s basic protocol-ification.”
Zedaph waved him off, which conveniently doubled as him waving to Skizz.
Skizz smiled brightly, leaning down so that he wasn’t towering over them quite as much. “So, homeh buddeh, I have some ideas for today.”
Zed nodded along as Skizz monologued, but Tango wasn’t paying much attention. He didn’t like the lack of control he was feeling. He couldn’t move his own body, and it only served to make him nervous and agitated. He didn’t know how anyone could deal with this.
“Right, well, it’s time to go get some work done.” Zedaph’s voice – no, Tango’s voice – snapped Tango out of his thought spiral.
He forced himself to focus on what was happening around them, but he was still too aware of the fact that he was watching the world from somewhere behind his own eyes to really be able to pay complete attention.
The next – what? Half an hour? – passed by in a nondescript blur. Tango could hear Zed talking to him, but he barely bothered with responding. He just wanted for the session to be over and for him to be in control of his body again.
But what if we don't go back to normal? What if I’m stuck like this even after we finish our task?
Tango was usually the one hearing voices in his head, and he knew what happened after someone was around for a while; They went away.
They’d come back… usually, but Tango couldn’t shake his fear of vanishing. Of being stuck in some kind of vague nothingness until he was thrown back into the passenger’s seat.
Tango! Wakey-wakey! Cleo’s here!
Tango snapped back to reality as Zedaph knocked on the side of their head with a fist.
“I’m here, I’m here. Sorry.”
Tango realized that, if he ever wanted to regain control of his body, he’d need to pay attention. He couldn’t let himself drift away. He’d have to stay present.
“Hey, Tango!” Cleo was in front of them, smiling. “How’re you doing?”
“We’re alright.”
Tango wanted to wince at how much Zed’s accent had bled into those two words. That was one of the rules; don’t talk in anything that wasn’t Tango’s normal accent. Another rule was to not talk to each other out loud, but that could be broken for the sake of a task.
Cleo raised an eyebrow, but didn’t comment on the obviously-british accent. “I was actually wondering, Tango, if you could spare me a heart today?”
“We can’t just give those away for free!” Zed exclaimed, hand to his chest in a gesture that was just so dramatically Zedaph.
“Why not?” Cleo stood straighter, and Tango was reminded just how much taller they were than him (almost everyone was, but that was besides the point).
“Well,” Zed hesitated for an uncomfortably long second, “that’s a pricey request! What do I get out of it?”
Cleo rolled their eyes. “You’re the Heart Foundation, aren’t you? You give away hearts all the time.”
“That’s… true?”
Tango realized that Zed was asking him for confirmation. “Yes, but it’s a lottery, we can’t do it without Skizz and BigB.”
“But we can’t give away hearts without the others!” Zed quickly added. “That’s not how the game works, Cleo.”
“Ah, darn.” Cleo grinned mischievously. “And here I thought I could get you to make an exception, just out of the goodness of your heart.”
“I’m gonna tell Skizz to take her out of the system.”
“Skizz is going to hear about this!” Zed proclaimed. He paused for a moment, then ran off before Cleo got a chance to retort.
“Playing it safe?”
“Wouldn’t you?” Zed raised an eyebrow, looking to the side as if he’d find Tango there.
They probably looked like they were going insane.
“...Let’s just go back to the base and tell Skizz.” Tango changed the subject. He wasn’t in the mood to argue about how he felt about things.
They walked in silence for a while, and Tango stopped paying attention to their surroundings.
You act as if you’ve never backseated before.
Tango blinked in surprise, though the action was vague. “What do you mean?”
I mean, you’ve done this before, and yet you’re still freaking out as if it’s the end of the world.
“…I have?”
Of course you have! Why do you think we even HAVE rules?
Tango didn’t know how to answer that. Of course he had backseated before! Obviously. He could remember the discomfort of it all clear as day.
“Wait… that doesn’t… why do I remember feeling like that?”
Do you seriously not remember me ever fronting?
No, Tango didn’t. Logically he knew that Zed must have been in control before, but he couldn’t actually remember when.
“Are you the only one who has?”
No, obviously. Torchy fronted when we got home after that second week.
“How do YOU know that?” Tango tried to cross his arms, and Zed must’ve taken pity on him because he crossed their arms for him (though the bottom pair still hung unused at their sides).
I’m very observant.
“Huh.” Tango thought that over.
He probably wouldn’t be as annoyed and uncomfortable with Zed ignoring their bottom arms if it hadn’t been a recurring thing, so that was… something. But he hadn’t even noticed Torchy still being around after he had turned in the task.
“So that means I’ll get the body back after this… right?”
Zedaph shrugged. Probably. I don’t really plan on sticking around too much when we get back home. I prefer my privacy.
“...Okay.”
Tango left it at that.
“What is the advancement ‘Spooky Scary Skeletons’?”
Tango hadn’t been paying much attention for the last hour or so, but Cleo’s words snapped him back into focus.
“Wait, isn’t that one–”
“‘Obtain a Wither Skeleton’s skull’.” Zed beat him to it. “That’s not good.”
“Oh no.” Cleo groaned. She spurred her horse to go faster, and Zedaph had to run to keep up.
“Who got that? Why are we on one heart?!” Tango yelled, but he went ignored as more achievements flashed through the chat.
InTheLittleWood has made the advancement [Withering Heights]
Smallishbeans has made the advancement [Withering Heights]
bigbst4tz2 has made the advancement [Withering Heights]
Tango stared, fear washing over him as six more Players got the same achievement.
Cleo stammered, shocked as they slowed their horse to a stop.
“That’s a Wither, right?” Zed glanced at Cleo, his voice heavy with concern.
The two made their way to spawn, Tango screaming at Zed to run the other direction the entire time.
“Okay, awful combo!” Martyn’s voice brought a new problem to light, and all of Tango’s thoughts came screeching to a halt.
“Zed! Warden!”
Zed spun in a 360, eyes wide. There was a Wither to their left and a Warden rapidly approaching from over the hill in front of them.
“Zed we’re on ONE HEART. Get out of there!”
“We need to get out of here! Come on, you!”
Zed sprung into action, running on the heels of Cleo’s horse as they retreated.
“We’ve had a lot of experience with both of these things, really, but not on–”
“Not on one heart! We are NOT doing this on one heart!”
Zedaph and Cleo started sneaking back closer to spawn, Tango screaming to just forget it and run the whole while.
The Wither was chasing Scar in the distance, leaving craters in its wake. It sounded like a tnt bomb going off, and Tango wanted to cover his ears to block it out.
The Warden, meanwhile, was wandering at the sides, near the Mounders’ base, snuffling as it searched for a single source of noise to focus on.
Tango knew Wardens, he had raised his own for Decked Out, but this was beyond terrifying to him. He had no control, and he doubted that muscle memory alone would allow Zed to survive this.
The Warden roared, and then there was a boom, one more deafening than the Wither. Light flashed, and Zed squeezed their eyes shut.
“JIMMY!”
Joel’s scream alerted them to what had happened.
“Timmy just got obliterated!” Zed’s words were clearly forced, and Tango was reminded about just how bad he was at offering condolences or sympathy. Those were always tough to word, but he knew that the real Zedaph had it worse. It also didn’t help that Zed clearly misheard Jimmy’s name.
The Warden was coming closer, and Tango felt the need to run. “No time for trying to help! Flee, Zed! Flee now!”
Darkness swarmed around them, and Zed finally, finally, did as he was told. Another deafening boom sounded behind them, and Zed ran faster.
It was chaos. There were screams that Tango couldn’t make out, and they were stumbling blind.
After a few agonizing moments the blindness effect dissipated, and Tango finally noticed the other Players around them.
“You should know how to deal with this.” Zed muttered, turning to look at no one.
“I’ve been trying to tell you what to do!” Tango shouted back. “Run away! Flee with extra flee and don’t look back! WE’RE ON ONE HEART, ZED!”
The next small period of time was nonsense to Tango, everything moving too fast and too loud for him to figure out what was happening. Zed seemed to still be functioning, at the very least. Probably better than Tango, even.
They were on Love Island, and then they were swimming, and then the sounds of destruction returned, and Tango’s ears were ringing.
Apparently the Warden was dead–
Grian was shot by a skull from 1 Stick Wither
–and so was Grian.
“Oh gosh that is more blood then we usually see back home. And now the Wither’s after…” Zed gestured vaguely, asking Tango for a name.
He mentally shook himself, trying to focus on what he could see. “I think that’s Scott.”
“Someone shoot it! I’m looping it ‘round, shoot it!”
Scott was yelling at the crowd, and Zed ran further away.
“I turned my bow into a dispenser!”
“WHY?!”
Zed didn’t answer, which was fair. But what wasn’t fair was that he was running back towards the action.
“Stop! Stop going back, you jerkface!”
Tango quickly lost track of the chaos, his ears filled with the sound of explosions and yelling. He felt the texture of wooden logs beneath their feet, and for a short moment there were unfamiliar flames reaching for him.
“Zed!”
“We didn’t take any damage! We also got a few hits on ‘im.”
Tango’s retort was interrupted by a blade scratching against their side, and another message flashed through chat.
“Someone just slashed us! Scar killed BigB! There’s too much collateral, Zedaph!”
“We can get the last hit, Tango! C’mon!”
“You aren’t listening!”
There was one last deafening cacophony, and then The Wither went silent.
“Look at that, Tango! We won!” Zed grinned.
“Shut up, jerkface.” Tango snapped. He was tired and frightened and he just wanted control again.
“I mean you’ve always been terrible at fighting, but we got a few hits in.”
Tango growled, desperately wishing that he could bare his teeth. Was he too quiet for Zedaph to hear? Was he just ignoring him? Tango wasn’t sure, but he didn’t have the energy to argue anymore.
He just wanted to close his eyes and go to sleep.
The next thing Tango knew was the warmth of a bed and the gentle humming of redstone.
He sat up groggily, rubbing at his eyes as he tried to figure out what was going on.
He was in his room back on Hermitcraft, and there was a piece of paper on his nightstand.
He rubbed his eyes one more time before reaching for his glasses.
What happened? Wasn’t the Secret Life session supposed to be today?
He grabbed the note, squinting as he read it.
“Session six went well! You didn’t die and everything is totally fine. You also owe maybe two people about five shards total? Didn’t entirely keep track. Hope you had a nice rest!”
Tango had no idea what that meant, but he was too tired to figure it out. It was fine… definitely, probably.
Wait– why do I owe people shards??