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There is something truly beautiful about Wemmbu’s orbital cannons. Yes, weapons of mass destruction, tools of devastation, reaped the souls of countless victims, innocent or not—but there is a symmetry. From the moment Wemmbu pulls the fishing rod and lights the air with the choking stench of gunpowder—it clung to Wemmbu now, the smell—when had the taste and scent of gunpowder become so comforting?—a circle of t-n-t falls and lights, ready to blow the moment it touches the ground.
Perfect in air, perfect in soil, perfect destruction.
Wemmbu pulls his mace from the skull of his enemy and takes a step back, shaking out his wrist from a probable cramp. When they get to a good resting stop, Wemmbu will spend hours cleaning his weapons and armor, clean from the grime of blood and bone, coo over and repair any dent or chip. But for the moment, he turns to Egg simple, soft, and bright.
“Let’s get out of here, bro,” comes his best friend’s voice from the wreckage and carnage left in his wake, and Egg can’t help but follow after him.
And after he gets done cleaning his weapons and armor—when they still have time to rest, if no one tracks them down in the middle of repairs—Wemmbu pulls Egg down to lay beside him and closes his eyes and Egg knows he doesn’t go to sleep, not fully, but it’s a nice placebo because Egg closes his eyes and lets a large, feathered white wing fall over them to act as a lofty shield and blanket.
Egg will sleep and Wemmbu will let him, because he cares enough about one of the two of them to let him get sleep. And Egg can watch as his friend loses sleep from dread and love and he can do nothing about it.
Finally, he has enough.
“You’re not leaving this room—no, this bed—for a—for a day,” Egg was pulling the words out of thin air, trying to come up with something. “You’re going to stay in the bed and finally get the rest you’ve been missing.”
Wemmbu—his best friend in the whole world, the most feared player on the server—stared at him like he was crazy, blue-and-purple comforter still wrapped around his shoulders. “Buddy, weren’t you the one to tell me you can’t recover time lost, especially for sleep?”
He was. “Please, bro, it'll make me feel better.”
And to whoever pointed out that Egg was spoiled, well—there might be a kernel of truth in that. Wemmbu was quick to fold, assuring, “I will, I will,” but he was still frowning. “Will you stay with me?”
The image of Egg spending all day fishing while Wemmbu slept peacefully began to waver when he saw Wemmbu’s pout. “I didn’t-I was going to-well, do you want me to?”
“Of course I want you to stay with me, who else will bore me to sleep with those books?” He let out a quieter laugh at his friend’s glare. “But seriously, get back over here, I can’t sleep without you here.”
“What, worried I’ll get kidnapped while you’re asleep?” Egg deadpanned as he came back to the bed, Wemmbu moving to make room for him.
“Mmm, kind of.” The purple fiend murmured as he wrapped an arm around his best friend and pulled him close, cool cheek pressing against cooler shoulder. “It’s just easier to sleep with you around.”
There had been a time when Wemmbu was warmer, before the invisibility potions had leached both the warmth and the vibrancy from Wemmbu’s skin. Now Egg was stuck with a pale purple Ender Dragon hybrid that only got somewhat luke-warm in the best of circumstances. It wasn’t like Egg could complain—Egg had never been warm to begin with and was cold to the touch since the very beginning.
But the two had plenty of comforters, pillows, and blankets to help generate the heat that they both lacked, the fabrics of various sizes and shades being the reason neither had froze to death yet.
“Tell me about one of your stories,” Wemmbu slurred into his shoulder, already halfway to sleep.
Egg knew that it would be pointless to start a story when Wemmbu wouldn’t last two minutes, but if it meant putting him to sleep… “There once was a knight hidden in dazzling blue that had to keep his identity hidden. You see, he was actually supposed to be dead, but in actuality he had faked his death and was keeping his identity a secret–”
Egg didn’t realize he had drifted to sleep until he was waking up with his face buried in a pillow and his wings splayed out. Normally when he slept he liked to keep his wings hidden away, but the sleep must have been so good they came out on their own. And it was one of the best sleeps he had had in a long time, shoulders achy and body weighed down. It was comforting and—
Where’s Wemmbu.
Egg felt a brief moment of panic surge through his body before he lifted a wing and—yup. There was Wemmbu with his face buried in his own pillow beside Egg, sleeping soundly beneath Egg’s wing. It made Egg calm and he let a sliver of a coo get past him before he was covering Wemmbu back up with the wing.
The effect was almost immediate, a gentle noise barely breaking through the white feathers. Egg lifted his wing just a tad to hear Wemmbu purring in his sleep, the angel/avian hybrid watching the gentle rise and fall of his best friend’s shoulders as his body gently vibrated with the purrs. Egg chirped at him, just once, and the purrs picked up in volume as Wemmbu buried his face further into the pillow. He thought that he heard Wemmbu say something, so he chirped again.
And again, and again, until there was a chirp between every breath and the purrs drowned them out.
Finally, Wemmbu shifted, using his hand to blindly swat at Egg’s general direction, causing the angel/avian to laugh. The Ender Dragon hybrid moved his head to let a singular green eye glare at Egg, and Egg finally noticed how utterly messed up Wemmbu’s purple hair was.
“‘op it,” came his voice, rough with sleep and broken with purrs. He yawns into the pillow and the purrs were momentariyly paused before picking back up again. “‘nuff.”
“But this is such a rare occasion.” Egg grinned, Wemmbu burying his face back into his pillow to muffle his groan. “You never purr anymore.”
“Shut up.”