Chapter Text
3 fics:
Branzy was not an intimidating man.
He was practically a badly wrapped ball of anxiety and overthinking with a tendency to get caught by everyone, and everything, on this server.
He also had a tendency to somehow get caught up with the most dangerous players on the server, however that “somehow” was a lie he told himself, he knows why.
He had a knack for creating traps, and not thinking about the consequences that came from said traps, and then facing the consequences for those traps, and then manipulating the people putting the consequences on him and escaping them.
He was actually smart about finding traps and he often wasn’t trapped, some skills he learned from Rekrap, but there were still a large number of people who have trapped, killed, and manipulated him on this server.
Prince Zam had trapped him in a well, Rekrap himself has taken a few of his hearts, he could not even count how many times he has had a heart taken from him in this server.
Yet, through all of the enemies, betrayals, and alliances, there has always been one remaining.
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Clownpierce was the most terrifying man Branzy had ever met, and boy is that saying something.
He could strike fear into the hearts of everyone on this server, and has, and commands the utmost respect and groveling when needed.
Yet, throughout all of Clown’s maniacal acts, he had never been that hostile to Branzy.
Sure he would sneak up on him, threaten him, put his scythe to Branzy’s throat, but compared to the others, he had not actually been hurt that bad.
Now, Branzy was taking this in while staring at his communicator with a notification from the one and only Clownpierce.
Oh boy.
_________________________________________________
The only thing in the message was coordinates, which was honestly terrifying, but could have been a lot worse.
He quickly got his elytra and flew over to the coordinates, being careful to look out for any stray arrows coming his way.
He eventually landed as he saw the bare bones of a large casino, a Clown themed casino.
This was definitely clown, but speaking of the man, where on earth was he?
He looked around and decided to walk into the large structure to see if he could look for the man.
While he was wandering, he took in the scale of this shell, and my god it was much bigger than what he remembered.
It was by far the largest thing Branzy had ever seen Clown build, and it was truly a marvel.
And it was also Clownpierce-less, which was honestly terrifying.
He looked around more, hand on his sword, and pulled out his communicator.
Yo I'm here, where r u?
He looked around more and saw nothing, which was totally fine.
Yep he totally wasn't panicking, why would he? It's not like there was a killer Clown that he couldn't find-
“Boo”
The high-pitched scream that came out of Branzy’s mouth was something he had never heard before and it was met by him quickly turning around to see Clown looming over him, scythe in hand.
This was absolutely terrifying considering that Branzy was alone, just having screamed like a little girl, in front of one of the most terrifying people that Branzy knew, scratch that, the most.
“Hello BranzyCraft”.
He could practically hear the grin in Clowns voice.
“Oh he-hey Clown! Uh- how, are you-uh, doing”?
Clown leaned back and clipped his scythe onto his back before looking back at Branzy.
“Better now, I assume you are wondering why I brought you here?”
That was indeed a question Branzy had.
“Uh yea, because not gonna lie, being sent coordinates and nothing else is just ever so slightly, absolutely terrifying”.
Clown stepped towards Branzy as he stepped back.
“Well, do you remember our success with the original funhouse?”
He nodded, how could he forget it?
It was honestly some of his best work and he is still proud of it to this day.
“Do you remember what the original plan for the tent was?”
He thought back, “Um, wasn't it supposed to be a Casino?”
Clown let out a small hum.
“Yes, and you know I am asking for a favor from you”.
Branzy’s mind blanked as he took in what Clown had just said.
Clownpierce, asking for a favor, from him?
His entire thing was indentured servitude, from Branzy specifically! Why would he give that up?
“Uhhh, what is the favor you are asking me?”
Clown rummaged through his bag and placed down a shulker between the two of them.
“Look”.
Branzy obliged and found it full of redstone, and a lot of it.
Stacks and stacks of the red stuff itself, droppers, comparetors, pistons, skulk censors, hoppers, repeaters, observers, and more supplies than he could even dream of.
He was at a loss for words as he looked up at Clown.
“As you may know, I am not the smartest when it comes to redstone, im pitifully bad actually, but you happen to be quite good at this”,
Clown gestured vaguely at the pile of equipment.
“Redstone thing”.
Branzy was busy looking in awe at all the materials he was given and absentmindedly gave Clown a response
“Yea, sure, oh my god where did you even-”
Before he could continue the feast for his eyes that was the, without a doubt, extremely expensive pile of materials, his shoulder was grabbed harshly, fingers digging into it.
“I don't believe I heard you in totality Branzy”.
A chill ran up his spine as he slowly turned around to see the clown meer inches from his face.
He barely squeaked out a response.
“Ye-yep! Of course C-Clown”.
He felt the hand release as Clown stepped back, picked up the shulker box, and signaled for Branzy to follow him.
Rekrap was right. He needed to stop getting himself in these situations
__________________________________________________________
Clown led Branzy to a computer and he sent a schematic to his communicator.
“This is the interior of the Casino. I need you to study it when you get home so when you return to the fully furnished Casino you will know what to do”.
Branzy looked at the file size and whistled at the size of it. This is gonna be a hard job.
“You will receive payment after the casino is up and running, and trust me it shall be a lot of payment”.
Branzy didn't think too hard about what that meant, he didn't really want to think about what that meant.
______________________________________________
Branzy pulled up the schematic on his computer and it was somehow more intricate than what he was expecting. Each game was styled with increasing amounts of rigged mechanics and the final large scale wheel at the end was the masterpiece of Clown’s whole operation.
It was completely rigged and Branzy could control what color it landed on to scam the most amount of hearts from their guests. He understood what Clown meant by getting paid. It just wasn't in money.
___________________________________________________________
Branzy went back around a week later to install some of the redstone and by god this thing was somehow more impressive in person.
He flew down and landed just in front of the tent as Clown was waiting there to greet him.
“Hello BranzyCraft, ready”.
Branzy walked with Clown into the building.
“As ready as I'll ever be”.
As they walked into the casino, Branzy looked around at all the work needed to be done.
He needed to rig the big slot machine in the second room of the casino, he needed to work on some of the inner workings on some of the other general smaller machines, and he needed to fully rig up the big wheel, which was gonna take a very long time.
Clown brought out the shulker and Branzy began to work on one of the larger slot machines. It wasn't too complicated, just some simple timing manipulation and a cut cord for the final prize and he was done.
This wouldn't have taken too long, if he didn't have a shadow looming over his shoulder, a terrifying shadow that is.
Branzy would see Clown out of the corner of his eye watching him, even with the mask he could feel Clown’s eyes piercing through his soul.
It was silent while he worked, and you could cut the tension in that small room with a knife, or a scythe, Clown would probably prefer the scythe.
Even through all of clown’s watching, he never actually seemed intimidating.
Sure he was naturally terrifying, but it never seemed like Branzy was in any more danger than he normally was without Clown, which was rare.
The taller man seemed almost, curious? Branzy could see glimpses of Clown tilting his head in what seemed to be confusion every time he did some harder redstone wiring.
Did clown want to help him? He could certainly teach him, but how exactly do you ask that to someone you are kind of scared to say even a slightly wrong thing to.
He finished wiring all the smaller machines in due time, his hands already covered with redstone and soot from working on the wiring, and now it was time for his big job.
The wheel.
This was one of the more difficult machines Branzy had made, right next to some of his Chicken powered deathtraps, and would definitely take him at minimum 7 hours to build and wire correctly.
That's fine, he didn't need sleep, he had already chugged an energy drink earlier and he had another one in his bag just in case he started to get drowsy again.
He had been up for around 30 hours at this point, but he had been up for longer, so he could handle it just fine.
He walked over to the wheel with Clown and he and Branzy set down a few shulker boxes of materials.
Branzy sighed as he looked at the job and then back at ClownPierce.
“Y’know, this favor is feeling more and more like a job by the second”.
Clown gave a small, satisfied hum, “Your gift was the materials, remember you still owe me for all the times I have saved your life. You owe me close to a dozen favors”.
Branzy let out a small laugh. Of course this was a favor for Clown, he was right about the indentured servitude being from him to Clown only.
He had to give it to Clown, he certainly had a way around words.
He gave Clown some of the lights and instructed him to place them in a border around the wheel in order so they could work inwards.
For this project he needed help on one of the parts, he could technically use his strength to do it himself, but why do more than you need to when you have a literal assassin at your side.
“Hey Clown, could you help me with this specific part of the redstone?”
Clown perked his head up and walked over to where Branzy was sitting.
Branzy gestured for Clown to sit down and he explained what he needed to do.
“In order to get this timing right so I can wire this correctly, I need you to hold up the wire while I connect this to the redstone lamp. This is the main mechanism for the actual shifting color of the wheel. When this lamp goes off, that wiring goes to a bunch of other lamps and lights up this whole thing. So I need you to hold it at a little bit less than 90°, maybe 80°, then it will line up correctly and I can work on this better. Kay?”
Branzy looked up at Clown and could see him thinking.
“Could you say that again?”
Branzy sighed as he stood back up.
“I can just show you, here”.
Branzy guided Clown over to the lamp and had him pick it up. He then went behind Clown and slowly attempted to tweak how it was angled. It wasn't working, so he went behind Clown and carefully guided the taller man's hands with his own until it was the perfect angle.
“Alright! Now don't move”.
Clown froze in place as Branzy looked at his stillness, his impressive stillness, and quickly looked back to his work.
He took the redstone and connected it to the repeater and signaled Clown to gently set down the lamp.
“Alright! I just need to test this a bit more, and then we’ll just need to decorate”.
Clown relaxed as he looked at Branzy.
“Also, how exactly did you learn to stand that still?”
Clown put his finger to his chin and tapped, seemingly recalling a memory.
“Well, for some of my previous jobs I had to stay hidden for long periods of time, so I learned how to temporarily stop my breathing and slow my heartbeat so I would be almost undetectable. My personal record is around 8 minutes, but that was with equipment, so I wonder how long I could do without the heavy equipment”.
Branzy stared at Clown in pure amazement and horror. Clown stopped breathing, for a full 4 minutes, just to hold something still for Branzy. He swears Clown could never stop surprising him.
“So, you weren't- nevermind I don't need to think too much into that”.
Clown quietly laughed and Branzy let him know that he was going up to test the base mechanism.
Now, this could have been very simple. He was almost certain it would work, he had tinkered with the mechanism at home, and yet he couldn't help but hatch a plan.
Clown had scared him many times, and had played with him like a cat playing with its food, now it was time to play with Clown.
He tested the mechanism and it worked perfectly, made sense, however he messed up the timing on purpose and caused the light to get stuck.
“Dang it, Clown could you hold that lamp again, I need to fix something with the wiring up here”.
It took everything in Branzy to not smile as he said it, knowing everything was perfect, he just wanted to have fun.
He went into the wires and disconnected a part and tried it again, it of course failed, but he acted like he was stumped.
This little game of “not quite..” lasted around 15 minutes, and oh boy did Branzy savor every single minute.
He asked clown to do increasingly weird things, not anything that would break the machine, the problem was the wiring he detached, but something to absolutely break him.
He saw Clown getting more and more confused and flustered by the minute, with Branzy finally looking back into the wiring, quietly fixing it, and going downstairs to go to Clown.
“I just don't know what's wrong, let me see the machine, can you go up and test it? Just click the red button”.
Clown, with what Branzy could guess was a look of pure relief, practically ran upstairs.
Branzy held up the lamp and detached and reattached something simple, before putting it back down.
“Alright, I think I got it! Can you check it?”
He heard the click of a button as the machine came to life and worked perfectly.
Branzy ran up to the platform and ran up to Clown.
“There we go, I think you were just holding the lamp at the wrong angle, was it exactly 83.4 degrees?”
Clown took a deep breath.
“How am I supposed to hold it at an exact measurement without knowing how”.
Branzy couldn't hold it in anymore and bursted out in a fit of uncontrolled laughter at Clowns tone of pure, held back rage.
“Why are you laughing!”.
“You- It was- oh my god-fi-fine”.
He heard Clowns' voice drop to a deadly tone.
“What.”
Branzy couldn't care less how scary Clown was, he knew he was far too tired to kill Branzy.
He stood up from rolling on the ground in pure bliss and wiped his eyes.
“Well, you’ve tricked me more times than I can count, and you also used one of your ‘I saved Branzy’s life’ cards to have me help you, so I thought I would have a little fun”.
Clown walked closer to Branzy and placed his hand onto the shorter man's shoulder and gripped tightly.
“Explain. Now”.
Branzy looked at Clown with a no doubt stupid smile on his face and explained the whole trick to Clown.
When he was finished, Clown put his other hand on Branzy’s shoulder and gripped with all his might.
“You’re telling me that you watched me for 15 minutes, holding up your heavy lamp in increasingly weird ways, and it was all a trick to get back at me?”
Branzy nodded, suddenly now realizing the severity of the situation he was in.
“That was…”
This was it, Clown was finally gonna kill him, he probably wouldn't even get a casket, just a box in the ground.
“...Clever.”
Branzy stopped. Did Clown just give him a compliment? After all of that?
Branzy’s face flushed with heat as he took in the reaction.
He heard Clown laugh, pulling him back into the reality that he was stuck in a hold, by Clownpierce, who had just given him a compliment?
“My my, I didn't even know you could turn that shade of red. Don't get compliments much?”
Branzy quickly broke out of Clowns hold as his face flushed even more
“Hey-I get compliments”.
Clown smugly tilted his head.
“Sometimes”.
Clown laughed to himself as he looked up at Branzy.
“We are done though? Just need to do the border?”
Branzy scratched his head.
“Well… maybe the timing might be a little-”.
Branzy felt cold metal at his throat as he looked to see Clown’s scythe.
“I swear if I have to hold that for another 5 minutes they wont find you”.
Branzy quickly held up a thumbs up and Clown and him walked downstairs to finish the border.
___________________________________________________________________
After everything was plugged in and clean, and the both of them were properly tired out, they both laid down on the little platform overlooking the wheel and finally relaxed.
Branzy had been up for around 40 hours at this point, and his energy drink supply had completely run out.
He sat up and looked in his bag to see how many rockets he had left and if he could get home without losing all of them.
He sighed with relief as he checked and saw all of his rockets intact, before looking over at Clown who was leaning on the wall, head down, in what seemed to be a deep sleep.
Branzy looked at Clown’s relaxed demeanor and paused to take it in.
Clown was never relaxed, he was always uptight and on edge about everything, which made sense, but seeing Clown like this was like seeing a unicorn.
Branzy quietly stood up and carefully walked closer to the Clown to marvel at just how tired the man was.
His mask was still fastened to the Clown’s face, but his overshirt was off to reveal a tighter black shirt underneath.
Branzy looked down and almost gasped out loud when looking at clowns arms and abs.
From what Kaboodle had told him, he knew Clown was toned, but this man looked like he was sculpted by the gods themselves, or the devil, both probably.
He looked at his arms and saw a plethora of scars running up from his hands to his shoulders.
Branzy looked at some of the particularly bad ones and sighed, Clown really needed to stop being so reckless in fights.
His right bicep was wrapped with bandages and he could see that they were old, soaked with blood, and needed to be changed badly.
Branzy shook his head as he walked down the steps to go find Clown’s ditched shirt and some bandages from the employee rooms.
He tried as carefully as he could to not drop anything, and yet he dropped the scissors when walking up to Clown.
He stopped, he had to have heard that right? Maybe he was too tired, God he hoped he was.
He quietly walked up the steps and let out a sigh of relief as he saw that Clown was still asleep.
And then Branzy tensed back up because he just realised what he was about to do.
What was he thinking? Clown was absolutely gonna notice that his bandages were new and different, would Clown even let Branzy get close enough to touch him?
He was going back and forth until he was quickly jolted awake by the sound of Clown moving.
He froze and looked over to see Clown slowly sinking to the floor out of, what Branzy could guess, was pure exhaustion.
He quickly ran over and caught Clown before he faceplanted and propped his body up against the wall sitting down.
Branzy carefully grabbed Clowns arm and slowly started unwrapping the bandages.
He set the dirty bandages aside and took in the wound.
It seemed to be a sword slash, pretty deep, but it was a clean cut so it wasn't jagged.
This kind of slash doesn't come without lasting pain, and Clown hasn't even mentioned it once!
No wincing when he was holding the lamp, if Branzy had known he would have not even thought of doing that!
He looked at the new bandages and saw the wound once again and realised he needed to clean it, which would hurt, and wake him up.
He picked his nails as he tried to figure out how to wake Clown with Branzy dying.
“Hey Clown, you fell asleep and almost faceplanted and now I am treating your wounds without your express permission because of how bad they were, please don't kill me”. Seemed like a mouthful, but he had to wake up Clown somehow.
He took in a deep breath, preparing for a scythe to his throat, and shook Clown’s shoulder.
The taller man stirred, and slowly lifted his head to look at Branzy.
He saw him tense up again and Branzy quickly looked around for something to distract him, or explain, or literally anything to save him.
He quickly put his hands over Clowns to keep them in place and looked at Clown.
“Listen I know I probably overstepped doing this but you have a bad injury on your are, the bandages are really really old, an infection could happen, and I have medical supplies on me, but I needed to wake you up to disinfect the wound, and yes i am aware I would have done this without your knowledge and I’m sorr-”.
He felt Clowns hands wrap around his as Clown tilted his head up to look at Branzy.
“First of all, thank you for getting my shirt, second of all, thank you for worrying about something unnecessary”.
Branzy sputtered as he looked at this absolute buffoon in front of him who just said that his very serious injury was “unnecessary”
“Excuse me! You have a gash in your arm and it is not only not fully healed, but it has clearly not been cleaned! Do you even care?”
Clown laughed, “Branzy I have had worse and been fine”.
Branzy stopped and stared at Clown and then put his hands on his shoulders, much more gently this time, and looked at Clown in what he could guess was his eyes.
“Clown, that is not a good thing.”
Clown just tilted his head and Branzy sighed, again.
“Okay, I am going to clean this now, yes it is going to hurt, ask me to stop anytime, no you don't have a choice”.
Branzy took out some disinfectant and put it on a cotton ball and began slowly pressing it on some parts of the gash.
He felt Clown tense up and he stopped, only to go back when he relaxed again.
He quickly wrapped up the taller man's arm and stood up to go put his supplies away in the employee room, and to give Clown some space to put his over-shirt back on.
Branzy wasn't sure why Clown let him wrap his injuries now that he thought about it, he never let anyone else do it, yet he always made an exception for Branzy.
He quickly shook off the thought and walked back out, he did not have time for a feelings crisis when said feelings may or may not be towards a killer clown.
Why is everything so confusing?
There was no way Clown had a soft spot for him, he didn't have a soft sport for anyone! Except Kaboodle, but that was his younger sister for pete’s sake.
As Branzy walked up the stairs and went back to the platform he was once again met by nobody there.
He frantically started looking around the platform area, looking in every nook and cranny he could find.
“Clown! Where the-”
Before he could finish he felt two hands wrap around his torso and pull him backwards into a hold.
He attempted to get out of the hold as best he could before he heard that signature laughter that made him instantly relax.
Clown rested his head on Branzy’s shoulder and turned his mask toward him.
“You really need to be careful around here Branzy~ someone might sneak up on you”.
A chill ran through Branzy's spine as he heard the assassin's voice so close to his.
“I would say that I need to give you a bell to carry around but,”
The two jangling metal pieces hung down from Clowns hood.
“You already have them”.
Clown chuckled and went even closer to Branzy to whisper something.
“Did you believe I was going to hurt you, BranzyCraft?”
Branzy could feel his breathing getting faster.
“Well, I mean not really! Maybe, kind of, you are just naturally pretty terrifying”.
Branzy was turned around to face Clown as he felt the man's hands clamp down right above his waist.
“You are important to me Branzy, you are quite the asset to me. I cherish your knowledge and the mind that it comes from. You can work others' minds as if they were redstone machines, yet you crumble under my voice. I would never plan on hurting you. In fact,”
Before Branzy could take in what Clown was saying, he was whisked around and found Clown looming over him, holding his waist and shoulder in an almost dance-like position, and staring down at him with intensity he could feel through the mask.
“If anyone lays a finger on you, or anyone even thinks about hurting you in their little heads”,
Clown leaned closer to Branzy, practically breathing down Branzy's neck.
“I will kill them and bring you their heads as proof of my care for you”.
Branzy completely short-circuited and attempted to sputter out a response, but seeing what situation he was in, and how his brain was the most jumbled it had been in his life, he settled on a nervous chuckle.
He felt Clown shake with silent laughter as he whispered,
“You are adorable when you’re terrified Branzy”.
Branzy could feel his face heating up more and more by the second. He could feel his brain practically moving around in his head from pure terror, confusion, and excitement that Branzy was not ready to think about too much.
Clown cared for him. Clown cherished him. Clown thought he was adorable. Clownpierce thought he was adorable when he was scared. How on earth was he supposed to react to that?
Was he supposed to compliment him back? Say nothing? Ask literally anything? His body and mind were failing him and he was now face to face with a Clown that Branzy may or may not have feelings for, and said Clown may or may not have feelings for him?
No, that was crazy, and yet he was being held by Clown like he was the most precious thing in the world.
Could he afford to risk everything right now? Just for a hunch that may or may not be real?
Branzy snapped back to reality as he reminded himself to focus on the current moment.
He cleared his throat and tried to think of something to say,
“Well, should we, uh, get some sleep?”
Clown brought Branzy back up to standing and let go of him, freeing Branzy from his hold, and stood up straight.
“I do suppose that rest would be a good idea, considering we have been working for quite awhile”.
Branzy sighed with relief as this meant he got to go home.
“Good because I can remember the last time I slept, what time is it?”
Clown looked at his communicator.
“It's around 10 pm”.
Branzy counted and realized he had been up for nearly 40 hours at this point, which once again was bad, but could have been worse.
“Why do you ask?”
Branzy looked at Clown before sheepishly admitting,”Considering I have been awake for nearly 40 hours at this point, time has become a blur”.
Clown straightened up and walked over to Branzy, putting his hands on his shoulders.
“BranzyCraft. Are you telling me that you have been working for nearly 10 hours helping me build this casino, and you already hadn't slept for around 30 hours beforehand?”
Branzy knew this tone of voice, and knew Clown was mad
“Well, I had to help Rek with something! I’ve been without sleep for longer”.
Branzy felt Clowns hands getting tighter on his shoulders.
“How long”
Branzy felt a lump rising in his throat as he shakily answered.
“Around 4 days…”
Clown looked at him and Branzy braced for the yelling about “being irresponsible” that usually came with admitting that.
What Branzy was met with, was Clown letting go of his shoulders and pulling out his communicator to text someone.
“Do you have anything going on tomorrow?”
Branzy thought about it, “No, I don't believe so”.
Clown finished typing and put his communicator away,”Good, because you’re coming with me”.
“Wha-”
Before Branzy could protest he was swiftly picked up by Clown and was being carried bridal-style down the steps.
“What the-holy you’re strong-put me down!”.
His protests were not heard as Clown began to carry him out of the Casino.
“Where are we going?”
Clown stopped and looked down at Branzy,”My house”.
Branzy stopped and took in what Clown said.
“I need to go home though! I need to take shower, I am absolutely disgusting, and I really need to just check something real quick-”.
“Branzy”.
That shut Branzy up quickly.
“You are tired out of your mind, you are incredibly tense, and you haven't slept for almost 2 full days, you are going to relax weather you like it or not”
Branzy attempted to protest, but when in the arms of ClownPierce, the deadliest player on this server, who just so happened to be quite comfy, how could he possibly say no.