Chapter Text
The morning sunrays slowly woke Capitol City, warm and gentle, enveloping it in a soft hug.
The effects of the invisibility potion buzzed faintly on Wemm- well, the Invisible Knight’s skin, shaking him out of the sleepiness that he always carried this early in the morning. His polished, netherite-trimmed diamond armor reflected off the sunlight, its familiar light weight grounding, and clanking softly with each step he took.
It had been a couple of weeks since Wemmbu was declared officially “dead,” and he started living under a new identity, his real one unknown to all but two. He was now Capitol City’s mysterious protector, the Invisible Knight (stupid name, in his opinion.)
Still, it was… peaceful, a word that sounded so foreign coming someone like Wemmbu, but it was real. He’d gotten a break from the relentless hunting and fighting, but he still fought to protect Capitol City sometimes or sparred with other guards (the competent ones) when he felt too restless. He was able to walk through pathways without looking back every second to a chungie about to stab him, and overall, his life just… felt better as the Invisible Knight.
As Wemmbu lost himself in thoughts, he walked through the roads of Capitol City towards a certain location. There were very few people out this early, some greeting him, some chatting quietly amongst themselves. The sky was tinted in a soft orange hue that faded into an infinite baby blue, and clouds extended everywhere in different, nonsensical shapes.
Contrary to Wemmbu, the Invisible Knight was not as spontaneous and reckless as him. He was a man of few words, careful and quiet, nonchalant and aurafarming. The last two might’ve been out of topic, but not untrue, and Wemmbu felt weirdly… proud of that. I mean, with his hidden identity so well kept, how could he not glaze at himself at least a little? He was doing a great job. He even did so while looking tough in his netherite trims!
W glaze.
He got out of his thoughts when he arrived at the front of Parrot’s potion shop. He’d become a frequent buyer, getting full shulkers of invis pots pretty much every time he felt he was getting low. He could already hear the voices of both birds who managed the shop, exchanging words he did not bother to process. They’d become kind of… allies after some time of him buying from their shop constantly. It wasn’t that hard, Parrot was pretty biased towards those who helped Capitol City, or protected players in general.
The bells alerting a new customer rang when he came through the door, greeted by the familiar sight of both birds chatting about stuff while organizing their potions and brewing materials. Theo’s back was turned to him, getting some nether warts out of a shulker, and Parrot was kneeled, rummaging through a chest. He immediately stood and looked up at the sound of the bell, his eyes widening slightly. Not because of seeing the Invisible Knight, but because of how early he’d come.
“Oh, hey Invis!” He greeted him with that made up nickname and soft-spoken voice. A small smile played on his lips.
Wemmbu settled for nodding. In any case he would’ve answered with at least a monosyllable, but right now it felt way too early to speak.
Theo turned around the second he heard “Invis.”
“Oh, Invis, hey man!” he beamed.
Before Wemmbu could answer, though, Parrot spoke again.
“You want your usual invis shulker, right?”
Wemmbu nodded again, exaggerating the motion a bit to make it clear.
“Alright, Theo, can you get it for him?”
“One invis shulker coming up!” The cockatiel exclaimed.
Wemmbu didn’t really understand the morning energy that both birds had to be functioning members of society this early, but he was pretty sure it was a bird thing anyway.
Early bird, or however it was.
As Theo went upstairs, Parrot turned back to him, gaze running over him in a way that made Wemmbu want to crawl into a 1x1 in fear he somehow magically found out his identity.
“So, what’s up, bro? You don’t usually come this early.” He asked calmly.
Wemmbu took an invisible hand up to his voice changer, turning it on before lowering his hand and answering.
“Woke up at dawn for some reason and decided to restock on invis early.” The scratchy, deep Batman fan-boy voice came out concealing his normal voice perfectly. It scratched his ears a bit, and Parrot’s, too, considering how he shrunk a bit at the sound.
Parrot nodded, and after a second of awkward silence, he spoke again
“Yeah, uh… it’ll be the same as usual. One diamond per three potions.”
Wemmbu accessed his inventory, scanning rapidly over it until he saw his ender-chest, and after moving it to his hot bar, he placed it on the floor. He leaned down a bit to reach over the void-like matter inside the chest, and stuck his hand inside, taking out a couple of stray diamonds from it. He had a few saved up because guard force of Capitol City had given him a payment for protecting the city. He was glad they did, because even though he had a shulker with nearly 25 stacks of gaps, it wasn’t like he wanted to waste one stack each payment.
“Uh… here, keep the rest, I don’t wanna count it.” He said, giving 18 diamonds to Parrot, double the price of what his usual shulker would be.
“Are you sure, bro? I mean, thank you, but I feel like-” Parrot hesitated, before he was rudely interrupted by Invis himself.
“Just take it, buddy.” Wemmbu sighed tiredly. He re-potted invis quickly.
“Alright. Thanks.” Another smile slipped from him.
With that, they fell into a comfortable silence… at least for Parrot. Wemmbu always found silences awkward. While they waited, he decided to just aura farm and look out the window mysteriously while thinking about things, leaning against the wall on the corner of the shop. Parrot seemed to busy himself with whatever ParrotX2 did.
He thought about his identity as the Invisible Knight.
Yeah, again.
See, Wemmbu had to change a lot of aspects about himself for it to work. The most evident ones were the use of his orbital cannons, his maces, his armor and his voice, but if he went around acting like he always did, he’d get caught in under three minutes. Invis was the version of himself that did not pace while talking but kept still. He didn’t bounce his leg impatiently when people took too long, instead hurrying them with firm words. He didn’t cross his arms or make over-exaggerated motions when talking, he clenched his fists and kept his arms still. He actually tried to analyze people instead of outright switching to violence and thought about it not as a quick situation-ending tactic, but as a last resort.
Sure, his personality could still be playful at times, he laughed and threw sarcastic remarks, but he was surprised of how quiet he was when he was Invis rather than Wemmbu (how was he surprised with himself? He didn’t know. Maybe it was because of how much he kept in check his minutes of invisibility, or how much more aware he had to be of his surroundings.)
Hell, he’d even stopped using “bro,” as much. He opted for “buddy,” even though it was one of the things Wemmbu also said, it was much less common than the first. He stopped spamming wind-charges
at people while fighting, even if he sometimes did fall back into the habit. He eliminated every trace of what could get close to Wemmbu.
He stopped being Wemmbu.
He stopped being himself.
But then again, it was what he said he had wanted.
A true, fresh start.
Just as he started dwelling into things he might not want to, Theo came back downstairs carrying a shulker of invisibility potions.
“A shulker of invis delivered!” He said energetically, as Wemmbu pushed himself off the wall and took out an empty shulker of his. Parrot and Theo preferred if he had his own shulkers since the ones they used were much needed. Wemmbu didn’t mind.
As he transferred the potions, Theo spoke once more.
“Invis, you wanna train again sometime?” He offered, a relaxed smile on his face.
Right. He’d also been sparring with Theo, who was a formidable opponent.
“Sure, uh- anytime you want, man.” He answered, stuffing some of the invis potions in his inventory.
“Well, are you available like- today…? I don’t think me and Parrot have some quest to go to right now, so... what do you think?” Theo offered, one of his hands scratching the back of his neck.
Wemmbu mentally went over his schedule with the guard force. He didn’t remember having anything special to do today.
“Yeah, sure. I don’t have anything planned for today, I think…? So come whenever you want. Either I’m guarding the walls or somewhere with Salvationism. Capitol city is... not that big.”
Parrot watched the two talk, just kind of watching them both from where he was. Especially Invis.
“Didn’t you get yelled at by Salvationism last time for missing a meeting?” Theo snickered, remembering their last encounter.
“Uuhhh…. It’s- It’s whatever, bro. Just come whenever. It’s lowkey boring doing nothing all the time.” Wemmbu reasoned, glad the invisibility covered his displeased expression at the memory.
“Anyways, I lowkey have to go, so… bye.” He continued.
“See ya, Invis!” Theo exclaimed as Wemmbu mined his ender chest, turned around and walked toward the exit of the shop.
He was about to get to the sidewalk when Parrot’s voice stopped him.
“Wait, Invis!” He yelled, and Wemmbu could hear him sprinting, then stopping when he was behind him. What could ParrotX2 possibly want from him?
“Actually, I wanted to ask you a favor.”
Wemmbu did not like favors, but he stayed quiet, inciting him to continue speaking anyway. It couldn’t be something too complicated…
“Well, it’s not really a favor, but rather…” He paused, searching for the words to explain himself.
“Flame gave me this book a few days ago, and he said it supposedly contains cords to an old mafia tomb. I wanted to raid the stash to loot it and give it to the people here, so I wanted to ask you if you, uh-… If you’d like to go there with us.”
Never mind.
It seemed Parrot felt too much like a legendary side quest giver today. He handed him the book after speaking, then, as Wemmbu grabbed it and opened it, Parrot decided to open his mouth again, making his brain multitask between whatever the hell he was yapping about, and the text on the book.
“It might be dangerous, though. We don’t know for sure if we’ll find traps or players there, but I think you and Theo could be a huge help. I don’t think that as a guard you’d mind if we give some of the loot to the people, right? You could even keep some, too, bro.”
Huh.. so… mafia tomb… watch our for someone, and whatever Parrot just said…
“So, are you in?” Parrot asked again after his silence.
Wemmbu processed it for a second.
Going to a side quest like this with Parrot sure could be an interesting adventure, another one of the things he wanted when he decided to fake his death. He could explore and get the ultimate ParrotX2 experience firsthand, could keep some of the loot, and make both birds trust him more than they already did.
Plus, with Theo and him, there was low risk of dying…
And he kind of felt like he needed to agree for some reason. He’d just need to watch out for his health, so he didn’t pop a totem, and for his invisibility.
. . .
“Sure, I’ll go. I just need to know like- how long will this trip be? I don’t want to run out of invis potions mid-way.” He finally said, and his gaze slipped momentarily to Theo coming out to stand next to Parrot before focusing back on the latter.
“Glad to hear so, bro. I think about two shulkers or-”
“Why do you care about being invisible so much?” The question Theo interrupted Parrot with made Wemmbu go still for a moment. He tensed a bit, fingers twitching in an attempt not to clench his fists.
(The same exact question had come some time ago from Jaden, and later, his tone laced with disbelief when he asked for confirmation, eyebrows furrowed in a plea to be wrong, utterly betrayed.)
He sighed, looking away for a second before focusing back on both birds.
“...so you don’t know who I am, buddy.” The same response came from him for the second time. He just hoped it wouldn’t end like that, too.
Still, Theo had a pretty prominent trait of being insistent, something Wemmbu had known ever since he found his mushroom base millions of blocks out when he tried to retire (he’d be lying if he said had gotten over that.)
“Bro, come on. WHO could you possibly be? I’m sure that at this point we wouldn’t even mind! There’s no reason to be paranoid, buddy.” Theo tried to convince him, slinging an arm around his shoulder.
Wemmbu grimaced and pushed his arm away.
“I just don’t want to show my identity.” He said again, keeping his tone normal.
“But WHY, bro?! We’ve known each other for so long!”
Why had he decided to fake his death, again?
“What do you think, Parrot?” Theo turned to his duo, who seemed a bit too lost in deep though for Wemmbu’s comfort.
“Huh?” He said stupidly.
“Who do you think our Invis guy really is?” Theo pointed his index finger at him, almost poking his invisible cheek.
“Can you- can you stop?” Wemmbu tried to reason, feeling a year taken off his life each time Theo spoke.
“Stop pushing him so much, bro. Don’t be so curious. If Invis just doesn’t want to, then we have no reason to not trust he has bad intentions hiding his identity.” Parrot came to his rescue, hesitant at the suggestion. Wemmbu was pretty sure he had somehow noticed his discomfort, even through his invisibility.
Speaking about it, he took the one on his fifth hot bar slot and splashed it on himself.
“Yeah.. guess you’re right, but seriously, Invis, would you at least consider telling us?”
Theo poked at his shoulder playfully, snickering when Wemmbu slapped his hand away.
“Maybe someday.” He said, as if trying to reason with a kid who didn’t get candy for lunch. This was not something he could just do without a second thought.
He could start hearing more and more activity in the city. Everyone was already waking up and going on with their lives, players walking through the pathways, merchants announcing products they were selling, the sky now completely tinted in a soft baby blue.
Parrot took lead of the conversation again, changing the topic, much to Wemmbu’s bliss.
“So, when do you guys think we should go?” He asked, looking at both, putting a stray hand of his hair behind his ear.
“I need to make a quick trip to the end before we do, then we’re good.” Wemmbu answered first, since Theo just did whatever Parrot did whenever Parrot did.
“To the end again?” Parrot asked, eyeing Invis.
“What for? To meet up with Egg again? Can we go with you?” Theo asked relentlessly.
“Theo, bro!” The other bird scolded him, brows furrowed, calm tone rising a bit in exasperation.
“What?”
“Stop being so pushy.”
Wemmbu, feeling a little awkward, stayed quiet, but intervened after Parrot, not seeing an issue in them coming with him to the end.
“It’s fine. Y’all can go with me.” He said.
“Really?” Parrot seemed a bit surprised, eyebrows raising slightly.
“Bet!” Theo reacted quite differently.
Surely, nothing would really go wrong. Just- update Egg, get some gear, if necessary, then go onto the side quest with enough invisibility to not have any issues.
“…I still need another shulker before we go.”
.
..
…
So, back inside they were.
Wemmbu sat on a wooden chair next to Theo while Parrot was upstairs brewing the potions, and genuinely, he wasn’t really paying attention to what the bird next to him was yapping about, he was just… looking.
He never had time to observe back when he was Wemmbu. He was always too aware of what other people were doing and were doing to do. Being hunted constantly installed that habit in him, but right now…
He was actually left alone. Hell, even admired.
And since that, he’d just been looking. At buildings, at the sky, at the endless biomes Unstable offered. It felt a little cheesy, and if you were to say that to the Wemmbu from before, that he’d just like looking at the sky, or wandering aimlessly around, he’d have laughed at your face and called you a chungus.
He had matured, one could say. He definitely needed a chill pill back then.
So, now, he looked.
He looked at the shelf to his right, filled to the brim with books of different sizes, authors and titles, all stacked not-very-neatly, some crooked and some completely horizontal. Some plants were placed on top of the shelf, leaves spilling down in a cascade that covered the last row of books. They looked hydrated.
He looked at the counter, wooden and neat, aside from the book lying unused on one of the corners against a wall, three empty glass bottles meant for potions, and a singular bright green feather.
He looked at the corner to his left, where a cauldron was used as a pot for a tall bush, and leaning on the cauldron was a powdered rail, a quiver of arrows and an unenchanted bow.
It all had little quirks, imperfect details that screamed home.
They had a home; this was their home.
Wemmbu never had a home.
(He thought about his own empire.)
He never had a home.
(He thought about Mane’s tree)
He never had a home.
(He thought about Ranger Point)
He never had a home.
But... Perhaps, this, his new identity, maybe even Capitol City could be his first home.
…yeah, that sounded good.