Chapter Text
Wemmbu was walking around the outside of the treehouse that she called her home. She was calm as everything was so pretty. The stars in the sky were glimmering to her and whispering all their comments of pride to her. Turning around, she saw a mysterious portal appear, it wasn’t the normal dark purple color she was familiar with. Before she could call for Egg to ask if they knew anything about it, the star born was pulled in as if the portal was created by a black hole.
Parrot sat in the meeting of the Northern Council going through reports. Theo was pacing around the room getting restless. The brunette saw the restless nature in the blond and realised how late it truly was as it was nearing midnight. He called out to Theo.
“Theo, you can head to our chambers. I’ll finish up these last documents and head up myself.” The cockatiel was skeptical about it, but took the excuse to leave the room.
“I’ll keep you to that promise.”
After Theo left, Parrot finished reading the last reports and documents. As he got to stretch and head up to his chambers, the macaw saw something swirling in the corner of the room. Once he made his way to the corner, it felt as if someone were calling him back to safety, to a time where it was just him and Wifies. Suddenly a portal opened up and sucked him in as if a vacuum of air was taken out of the room.
Spoke was sitting in a dark abyss-like room. Their eyes hurt, the void wasn’t responding, his vision was fading from the lack of connection to the void. They felt around the room once more; this time however they felt something different. It wasn’t the void, but it felt like the void. Home, void was safe. Abyss not safe. As they felt the area more in depth, they were engulfed in the light of it as if death was here to take them out of their misery.
Flame was pacing around the barracks Saparata had given him and Lomedy. The bunny hybrid is asleep on their shared bed. He couldn’t get himself to relax, CinderCrest as a civilization felt wrong, too out of place. Looking at the time, Flame sighed as if he doesn’t get any sleep soon he’s going to be moody and Lomedy’s going to lecture him about getting consistent sleep. Feeling the room got stuffier as the barracks had no proper ventilation, the tiger hybrid took off his hoodie which revealed that black long sleeve bodysuit. Instead of going back to pacing around the barrack, Flame knelt down to the ground and knocked on the ground. Something felt wrong. This time it wasn't about civilization or the fact there was a war on the horizon. Before the tiger could properly get a thought process, the ground opened up and swallowed him whole.
Mino flew above the empire to check if he made any mistakes on the castle. A smile drew a spot on his face. Finally he had finished building it. Gliding back down, the voidling saw Daderator and ran to him to tell him the good news, but it seemed the human already knew that the human was holding a cookie for the voidling. He made a few incoherent void sounds; Dade didn’t mind since he’s known Mino long enough to have heard a motley of noises the voidling could create. The Specters base looked so ominous, although every thought about the base had left Mino’s mind as he saw the cookie. Dade chuckled and couldn’t help but tease the voidling.
“The cookie is for Coped. He helped me go out and train the players.” A low whining sound drew forth from the voidling.
“I would have done that, but I was building the base. Dade please can I have it.” Mino had a patience unknown to man for things he wanted, his hope had no end. Something had also happened when Mino went missing that he wouldn’t tell Dade, but that thing had made Mino’s trust deteriorate. Yet the voidling still trusted Dade with his life.
“Mino, you don’t need to do anything. The cookie is for you. Just get some rest please. I’m concerned, you've been working on the base since you got back.”
“M’kay.” The voidling savored the cookie as it was warm and tasted like pure cinnamon, his favorite. He feels like a child, but sometimes that’s what he wanted to be. To be cared for and not trying to make a stave for life.
“I’m going to check up on Coped. We’re planning on a game night. We’ll see you in my room, Mino.” He waved bye to the human. Mino began to walk into the castle. There it was the same feeling as the portal that the Citadel dimension had. That pull was the same, Mino couldn’t help but be drawn. Reaching the area, he felt the sensation of a portal consume him.
Evourai ducked behind a tree, nothing was right. Death was after him. Where was Pierce? Why the fuck did he come back into life? He should have stayed dead. In death at least Pierce and Zolister would have never returned into his life. Why was he a child of the two gods? The phoenix saw a dark abyss. A portal. There wasn’t any godly presence entwined with it. Safety. If that was safety or an escape, he could prepare and come back to save Supzec. Zolister watched from a distance as his son ran into the strange portal. An oddity it was. Evourai felt the abyss take him elsewhere.
The portal took all these people to one place, Strength SMP. Each grouping had some sort of connection to Strength. Wemmbu and Mino were the first to appear. They appeared in Spawn. The star-born looked around and equipped her armor. The voidling snapped out of their daze and stared at the star-born. An angel walked up to them. He spoke up.
“Wemmbu?” She looked at him.
“Sharpness? What the hell is this place?” The blond gave her an incredulous look.
“It’s Strength? Did Tai add you as a guest member?” The star-born did a look over of the angel.
“Not an angel. You’re a swan.” Sharpness nods.
“I am. Are you okay?”
“No. What am I supposed to be doing right now?”
“Uh, we haven’t talked in a few days, but last time we talked you were planning to do something on LifeSteal.” It hit her like a freight train. This wasn’t the Sharpness she knew. This was another universe.
“I’m not the Wemmbu you know. I’m from Unstable SMP.” Sharpness nodded.
“Wait here. I’ll get Tai. He’s the admin, he’d probably know. Although take care of the other dude.”
Wemmbu looked at Mino and gave him a look over. He did the same to her, but saw she had a mace.
“My name is Mino. I assume yours is Wemmbu from the conversation you just had with the other guy?” She nods.
“You look similar to someone I know.”
“Another voidling?” Again Wemmbu nods.
“Yes. Where are you from then?”
“Heartless Horizon and that damned portal took my cookie away.” Wemmbu chuckled, the voidling’s priorities were far different from hers. Looking through her inventory, she found a cookie Egg had given her, but she hadn’t eaten due to having taken her medication. She handed it to the voidling.
“I wasn’t going to eat it. It should be dark chocolate though.” A happy void sound came from Mino. She felt a parental pull to care for him. Wemmbu hadn’t felt this parental pull since Oswald.
“Thank you.”
As their conversation faded away into silence, another group appeared in front of them. Evourai, Flame, Parrot, and Spoke appeared. Each one looked disheveled in their own way. Mino noticed Evourai’s panicked expression. The last time the voidling had seen Evourai was during the Wither Storm fight. What had happened to the phoenix afterward? Wemmbu looked at four people who had just appeared. What is happening right now?
Flame looked too aware in the current situation, his breathing too controlled for someone who just appeared on another server via a strange portal. Spoke looked as if they had been tormented for the last few days, their breath, and body shaking uncontrollably. Parrot in a daze that only past memories could hold onto, his breathing sounding shallow and hopeful. Then she turned her attention to the one person she didn’t know, the phoenix had shaking hands. When she looked at Mino, the voidling clearly knew who the phoenix was.
The voidling who was silent much before this spoke up, “Evo, you okay?” The phoenix shook his head and collapsed. Parrot caught Evourai instinctively.
“Gods. He weighs like a small sack of potatoes.” Flame turned and looked at Parrot with a confused look as a small sack of potatoes shouldn’t weigh that much. The macaw looked at him back with an expression that said “don’t question it” and the tiger did just that. Instead, the tiger turned his attention to the voidling on the ground shaking. Spoke clung unto the tiger as soon as Flame sat down next to them.
“Oh my stars, we’re a mess and we don’t even know each other.” The star-born helped Parrot lay the phoenix down on the ground and looked toward Mino, “You know what happened to him?” The voidling shook his head, “I haven’t seen him in months. The last time I saw him was after we killed a Wither Storm.” She didn’t even question it, instead lightly kicking the tiger in the ribs. “Yo, you’re the only one who knows proper first-aid. Check on this dude.” A grumble could be heard, there were so many valid reasons Flame wasn’t happy to do this. Firstly the tiger didn’t have his hoodie to hide in meaning his upper body was open for anyone to look at. “Then you tend to the prick who’s holding onto me.” The star-born sat down and took Spoke off of Flame then the tiger moved to do a medical check of Evourai.
Mino sat down next to Wemmbu and Spoke. He hasn’t seen another voidling before. Airo didn’t count as a voidling since he was a being of ice not void. “Is he made of void?” Wemmbu gave him a look, “What else, dirt?” The voidling picked up on the fact she had an attitude and that he probably shouldn’t push too hard.
“Can I at least know their names?”
“The macaw hybrid is Parrot. Flame is the tiger hybrid. Spoke obviously a void creature. Now you tell me about your guy over there.” Mino nervously fiddled with the Specter shield.
“As I said, I haven’t seen him in months and last time I saw him was right before the Wither Storm was destroyed. But I know he has some weird connection to the gods of our server.” When the gods were brought into that conversation Wemmbu gave him her attention.
“Gods? As in actual divine beings and not the word tossed around?” Mino nods. He didn’t know much about them. All he knew was from what Napa told him before the Viking Leader had been revived. Napa had mentioned there being two admins although he hadn’t mentioned what each admin did or why people only referred to one admin when he joined. Around the same time, Spoke regained their awareness and began to speak, “Wait… This isn’t the abyss, it worked..” Wemmbu looked at them, “Great, you can make conversation with Mino. I need to see where that damned swan went before I lose it here.” The star-born got up and equipped her elytra. She flew up into the sky to get a vantage point before floating back down. She was mumbling, “There is no connection to the stars here. I need it to be night to ask them.”
The voidling with a blue mask looked at the voidling with a rainbow bandana.
“My name is Mino, what’s yours?” His voice was confident. No shakiness. You’re doing good Mino. Airo would be proud. Airo wouldn’t be proud, he doesn’t want you even near him. Snap out of it Mino, Airo’s not here and can’t harm you.
“Spokeishere. Spoke for short.” Their voice was hollow. Almost as if the energy had been carved out selectively.
“What type of voidling are you?” That question sparked something in Spoke. They were also morbidly into the void as well.
“Twilight void. What about you?” Almost overlaying the other.
“Same! I haven’t met another voidling yet. The last person I thought was a voidling was an ice being.” Spoke had a curious expression.
“Do you not have a guardian?” Mino shook his head no.
“I don’t. I wandered alone until I met my friend, Dade. How about you?”
“Similar, but my papa found me in the end and took me. I don’t think he wants me back in his life though.” Their voice diminished as they said that. Mino felt connected to Spoke. His father figure, Airo, probably didn’t want to see him again either.
“Maybe it’s a shared experience? My father figure probably doesn’t want to see me again.”
“What a coincidence. By chance did you start something that could end the server by helping the leader of a big civilization?” This was getting eerie. How would this person, who Mino has just met know about the Vikings?
“How do you know about the Vikings?” His voice panicked as he was manipulated by Napa and didn’t know that Napa led the fucking Vikings with Extra, that damned follower. Extra would do anything for Napa, he was practically the leader’s lap puppy. Mino would use the word dog, but dogs would question commands while puppies mindlessly follow.
“Woah, we’re really similar. Oh my server, I helped the leader of a big civilization.. I guess more team, but they had a home base. The team was called the Invis Mafia.” Mino looked into Spoke’s eyes. They were just as drained as his. Why were they so similar? Was Evourai going to be similar to someone else here as well? Spoke looked up at the sky and back at the ground.
“It’s bright here.” Following this comment, the voidling pulled the hood of their hoodie up and curled into themselves. Mino moved closer and leaned against them. It felt natural. Being with another voidling was new and comforting, to know he wasn’t the only one out there.
“Spoke, besides your guardian do you know other voidlings?” He needed to know if Spoke knew more than one voidling.
“I know the existence of two more. One is my brother and the other is someone I was told about.” Oh, so they lucked out more than Mino had. Four voidlings on one server while Mino was the only one on his.
“Nice.” Curiosity finally satiated, an exhaustion settled into the voidling’s body. Building the Specter base without rest and whatever the hell the portal did to him was setting in. Spoke looked at Mino who was leaning against them.
“Your mask is made of cloth?”
“No. It’s some weird material. Can’t tell you as I just created with it. How is your bandana different colors?”
“It’s infused with the void.”
“How?”
“I don’t really know. My pa…Sorry Minute gave it to me.” So this Minute guy was Spoke’s guardian. Interesting. Airo would probably enjoy being friends with him.
Sharpness walked back to Spawn with Tai in hand, who was complaining about this being some glitch in the server system. The swan didn’t care, he just wanted to go back to his forest and nap. He didn’t have a base, but Tai did have this flower forest that wasn’t supposed to be disturbed. When they made it to Spawn, they saw Evourai, Flame, and Wemmbu. They were all people who they’ve met, but they looked different from the people they knew.
Tai felt a panic settle in as there hadn’t been this big of whitelist issue happen before. Excluding the LeekLeek-Flowtives situation that happened due to a naming glitch. Sharpness looked at Tai and decided to let the voidling do their thing.
“You got this. I’m checking on that Evourai.” The swan had a spot in his heart for his original team, the Buddy Boys. Despite the fact Evourai and Spongs were both gone from the server, he still would go to their sides if they were on this server.
The swan knelt down to where Evourai was laid on the ground and threw a healing potion onto the ground. Flame looked at the swan with a curious look, or what the sword master assumed was a curious look.
“What is it, Flame?” The tiger gave him a look. He would have been able to read it if the damned blindfold wasn’t there.
“Do you know him?” Obvious question since Sharpness showed more interest in Flame, Wemmbu, and Evourai than every other person who had been transported here. With the fact the swan knew their names.
“Well in this universe, he used to be a part of Strength SMP and was a part of my team before leaving.” A curious little flick occurred in the tiger’s ears and tail. Gods, Sharpness has been around Jude so often that he could start reading into mammal hybrid details.
“Oh… This might be a weird request, but by chance is there any way I could get a jacket or hoodie of sorts. Doesn’t even have to provide warmth, just cover.” He feels exposed. Which is a valid feeling considering the Flame Sharpness knows and has fought with in PvP servers wears baggy and covering clothing.
“I might, but it is someone’s base right now. I can get him to bring it here.” The tiger nods. He wasn’t going to lie, Flame did look good in a black bodysuit and utility pants. The blond texted a trapper on his communicator.
<conexion> By chance could you bring by one of my hoodies to spawn?
<JudeLow> You can get it yourself.
<conexion> walk out of your fucking base and look at the dead center of spawn.
It took a few moments for the rabbit hybrid to message back, but Sharpness heard the familiar buzz.
<JudeLow> I see the people, but why do you need a hoodie? It’s fucking 48 degrees* right now.
<conexion> someone feels exposed and I’m not an asshole so I offered it.
<JudeLow> So empathetic. Why not give it to me when I’m freezing?
<conexion> Bitch you have free reign to my clothes. Now bring it over.
<JudeLow> fuck you.
The swan put the communicator and adjusted the phoenix to sit up instead of laying down. This action woke up Evourai. The phoenix saw Sharpness and backed away in a panic. Flame just sat there watching. The poor tiger had no context.
“HOLY SHIT! Get away from me! I thought you were sent back to the main End Island!?” The blond sighed.
“Evourai calm down. I’m not the Sharpness from your universe. You’re in Strength SMP right now. I don’t know what the Sharpness in your universe has done to you, but I’m not your enemy.” Evourai felt compelled to listen to the swan’s voice. It was soothing and comforting. Better than his parents. Much better than Zolister’s voice.
Jude walked up behind Sharpness and dropped the hoodie onto the sword master’s lap.
“Here’s the hoodie. When did Evourai join back?” Sharpness was about to respond before he saw Evourai’s expression. Panic and regret. Pure regret.
“Evourai. Listen to me. Just me. Breath with me. In.” The phoenix couldn’t comply. He couldn’t. Jude was right in front of him. He was the reason why Jude had died. Although the trapper is right in front of him.
“Out.” Why was this Sharpness still trying to help him?
“In.” Out. In. The voices were subsiding.
“Out.” Out. Evourai’s breathing started to match Sharpness’ speech. The rabbit chuckled with a smile, an unforgettable one. One of pride and confidence. Jude for all his life hasn’t seen Sharpness play a caring role before. The last time it had happened was when money was on the line.
Flame waited patiently for the hoodie to be handed over, although an obvious discomfort was settling into their body. Jude picked up on that and picked up the hoodie that he’d dropped into Sharpness’ lap. He handed it to Flame.
“Very peculiar outfit choice for a fighter.” To this comment, Flame gave a confused look as they put on the hoodie.
“What do you mean by that?” Jude couldn’t help but start laughing. This truly was a different FlameFrags from the one he knew. The last time he saw Flame was during the three pros versus a thousand hunters. Which Flame had somehow escaped the trap he had made.
“Nothing. Nothing that would really add context or substance to the conversation.” Flame didn’t push and was content with no longer having his figure being revealed. It wasn’t a noticeable release of tension, but the rabbit had always been attuned with other mammal hybrids just from Hoplite experience.
“What’s your name then? It’s apparent you know mine.” The rabbit offers his hand out.
“JudeLow. Resident trapper on the Strength SMP.” Flame nods. It’s clear that Evourai and Mino were from one server while the other four are from another one. Parrot and Tai seemed to have sparked up a conversation. About what, that’s for them to know and everyone else to guess on.
The tiger got up from where they were sitting and yelled for Wemmbu to get down. To which the star born listened. Flame explained the information he had to her. His ears dipped instinctively to try and pick up his own voice which was cute. The star-born hummed and mumbled something about EggChan before realising Flame didn’t originally have a hoodie when he had appeared here.
“Where’d you get a hoodie from?” She was curious. It was simply in her nature. Why did the stars decide to make her curious? That question can only be answered by her creators who are bitches that don’t give her direct answers either.
“This universe’s Sharpness. He seems so much better than the one in our universe.”
“I can agree with that. Also you look ridiculous in the hoodie.” Flame let out a huff. He knew he looked stupid. He didn’t wear oversized clothes because his figure was already on the short/small end. He wore baggy clothes to distort his figure.
“Don’t remind me. I should have been asleep instead of pacing. Should have just taken the damned melatonin they got for me.” The star born had been zoning out of the conversation until she heard melatonin.
“You take melatonin?” Concern. Pure concern.
“Sometimes. It numbs my senses enough for me to sleep. I can’t sleep in new places. Remember before the final Law battle? I was constantly pacing and unable to sleep while everyone got sleep. Even fucking Jaden offered to watch for a bit.” Anxiety. Paranoia.
“Is it just the first night, or is it the whole place in general?” She was curious now. Wemmbu herself was able to sleep wherever. That was a bonus from being imprisoned a few times and tossed from cell to cell.
“New places in general. Before being teleported here, I had been staying at this civilization with Lomedy. It’s been a week and I still haven’t slept properly. Whenever it’s downtime, I go back to my base to nap.” Poor, baby. Wemmbu snapped herself out of her thoughts. Now wasn’t the time to mother. Although, she hasn’t slipped back into that mindset in a while even when the stars were present. Perhaps it was the stars speaking through that mindset?
Jude looked up from his communicator where he had been messaging his teammate. He saw Evourai staring at him as if he had seen a ghost. Goodness the phoenix looked like shit. The rabbit wasn’t about to speak up since he had nothing to say. As he turned his attention back to his communicator to continue messaging his teammate, the phoenix decided to speak.
“You’re alive?” Awe. Not good awe. The kind of awe that the hopeless have when they don’t expect the light to return.
“I am. Although from the conversation earlier, you’re not the Evourai from this universe. I wasn’t here for the original conversation with your friend over there.” Jude spoke while gesturing to Mino talking to Spoke. “Mind telling me what server you’re from?”
“Heartless Horizon.” His voice sounded weak. Weak, N00b would probably scold him for sounding pathetic. Supzec would ask what was wrong and try to pull him back up on his feet.
“Interesting. How’s that different from a normal server?” As Jude talked to Evourai, the swan noticed the phoenix’s wings looking unkempt. Sharpness slowly ran his hands through his wings.
“Normally we have five lives. Each time you die, you lose two permanent hearts. Once you lose all your hearts, you go to an afterlife. Although no one really believes me about the afterlife part.” The phoenix’s voice moved into a steady tone and breathing pattern as he kept talking. Keeping the bird talking allowed for Sharpness to preen and clean the phoenix’s feathers.
“How did you find out about the afterlife then?” The rabbit was losing interest quickly as he really should be helping his teammate make traps right now, but now he was stuck talking to a different version of Evourai.
“I died… An admin abused his power. He killed you because you attempted to side with me. Then he killed one of my friends because I hesitated…” Pause. The swan stopped preening the phoenix’s wings and spoke up, “You don’t have to continue if you don’t want to. Let me finish preening your wings quickly and you can go to your friend over there.” Evourai nodded his head and let Sharpness finish. Something the swan noted was how soft the noirette’s feathers were; it meant that Evourai had only recently gotten his wings.
A phoenix, a bird of fire and rebirth. Symbol of hope. A tiger, a fierce predator and isolationist. Symbol of strength. Two void creatures, made of everything and nothing. Symbol of creation and destruction. A star, burning hot and bright. Symbol of guidance and individualism. A macaw, bright and witty avians. Symbol of intelligence.
Each one has some fucked up tale. Where would the story end?