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Branzy stared outside the casino tent, it was pouring rain. He couldn’t see four feet in front of him.
He took at his communicator to message Clown.
You whisper to Clownpierce: hey Clown, is it raining where you are?
Clownpierce whispers to you: yeah, I think it’s raining everywhere across the server, probably the admins experimenting with some weather stuff.
You whisper to Clownpierce: oh- yeah probably, could you head back? I don’t like being alone or the idea of you out there with such low visibility.
Clownpierce whispers to you: awwww~ you care! ♥️
You whisper to Clownpierce: considering your like- the only reason I haven’t been banned yet, yeah! Yeah I do.
Clownpierce whispers to you: you’re right, the visibility is sh!t, I was heading back when you messaged me. I’ll be there in 15.
Branzy sighed and put his communicator away. It was funny how quickly Clown could switch from silly to serious.
He stretched and made his way back into the tent, he’d try and get some work done on the casino games, and take this opportunity to make sure there weren’t any water leaks.
Water leaks were the worst when it came to redstone, it broke and waterlogged so many things, and it was so difficult to make sure you repaired every tiny piece of redstone.
Branzy was usually pretty good about keeping his redstone airtight, so hopefully there wasn’t any leaks.
Branzy was deep in the noodles of the roulette wheel, turns out that there was in fact a small water leek, and Branzy was trying to fix all the broken redstone.
He looked over and saw a busted wire behind some other lines, gotta go fix that. He hosted himself over a line with one hand jumping to the other side- jumping always felt weird to him.
Branzy reached out to examine the wire- that’s when he saw the redstone burn on his hand- shoot!
He whipped around to see that the redstone line he just jumped over was in fact, active.
Stupid non working pain receptors…
Branzy was self taught in the art of redstone, because of this when he was younger he would mess his hands up, a lot.
To the point where his fingers and palms of his hands had essentially no feeling left in them, this is why Branzy almost always wore gloves.
He tried his best to wipe off the lingering redstone dust before messaging Clown again.
You whisper to Clownpierce: heeeyyyyy… so where are you exactly at this moment? Specifically in comparison to the casino?
Clownpierce whispers to you: I just stepped inside, why? What’s going on?
You whisper to Clownpierce: oh good! Um, I just got a nasty redstone burn on my hand and I’m at like, the very bottom of the roulette wheel’s and noodles. Could you please get me the first add kit? :3
Clownpierce whispers to you: yeah, course. Did you see the admin message?
You whisper to Clownpierce: noooo… I’ll go check now!
Branzy went to his general server messages and there was the alert from the admins.
Alert: !ATTENTION! The server is going into a sudden emergency maintenance mode! We’re having difficulties with some code, STOP ANY COMBAT OR TRAPPING ATTEMPTS IMMEDIATELY!!!
Oh, well that was a little concerning.
Just then Clown climbed down into Branzys view.
“Be careful jumping that line! That’s how I hurt myself.” Branzy warned.
Clown looked over the line and gracefully jumped over. He then held out his hand, wordlessly communicating that’d he’d patch up Branzys hand.
Branzy sighed and handed it over, he expected it. Clown usually insisted on helping Branzy with hand injuries.
“So, why do you think they called a sudden stalemate?” Branzy asked as he watched Clown clean his hand.
“Dunno, maybe they lost control of the whether and that’s why we have this giant storm.” Clown replied.
Only then did it occur to Branzy that Clown was thoroughly soaked. His outermost layer of clothing was like a rain jacket so Clown was likely dry underneath, but still.
Clown finished bandaging Branzys hand when a giant SNAP ran through the building.
Branzy looked up at Clown who had drawn his scythe and had frozen in place.
“What was that?” Branzy asked looking around.
“I don’t-”
Another booming snap echoed across the building.
“Should we leave?” Branzy asked hesitantly.
“I’m not sure- I don’t know what that sound could be-” Clown had a sudden realization. “The tent supports.”
Oh no-
Clown and Branzy both went to rush out of the redstone when a third giant snap could be heard, and then various crashes and the sound of rushing water, a lot of rushing water. Then the ceiling caved in.
…
“Branzy? Branzy??”
“Huh- wh… Clown? Oh- OH!”
It took Branzy a minute to realize what just happened, it took him another minute to realize the situation he was in.
It looked like him and Clown were stuck in a small hole underneath piles of rubble, with an extended piston holding a sort of roof over their heads.
Branzy immediately examined the piston, it was stuck in its position. Branzy took a sigh of relief, he never thought he’d be happy about a piston getting position stuck but here he was.
At least he knew the roof wouldn’t cave in on them, the walls, not so much but small victories.
“Branzy, are you- can you move?” Clown asked Branzy glanced over at him, illuminating his mask with purple light. “Oh- oh I am so glad your eyes glow in the dark right now.” He huffed.
Branzy chuckled because, yeah, glowing eyes did come in handy in situations like this.
Branzy was a glow moth hybrid so various parts of his body glowed in the dark when reacting to certain stimuli. But his eyes always glowed.
“But, can you move? Are you stuck or pinned underneath anything?” Clown repeated.
“Oh, uh I don’t think I’m pinned, are you?” Branzy asked.
“Yes. Both my arms are pinned underneath ruble, I’m pretty sure one is broken.”
Branzy tried to pull himself up to dig Clowns arms out, before realizing, he was in fact, stuck.
“Um…” Branzy started.
“You’re pinned aren’t you?”
“Yeah, like my entire lower half is stuck underneath a piston base.”
Clown took in a hard breath. “Can you get to your communicator?” He asked.
Branzy looked to see if he could and… “it’s crushed. Like I can see a snapped circuit board.”
Both of them cursed under their breath.
“Do you think you could get mine? We’re pretty close together.” Clown asked.
Branzy looked over and realized, yeah they were. The hole they were trapped in was only about two blocks long, maybe a little less. Branzy could probably use Clowns chest as a pillow if he really wanted to…
“What pocket is it in?” Branzy asked, he knew Clown kept his communicator in one of the pockets in his jacket.
“Top right.” Clown explained.
Branzy was able to reach it easily enough.
“Please say it’s not locked.” Clown mumbled.
“It’s locked- what’s your passcode?” Branzy asked. Clown let out a groan.
“Before I tell you, I didn’t set it alright? Parrot did and I haven’t bothered to change it yet.”
“Okay?? Dude what’s your passcode?
Clown took a deep breath, “it’s; I like purple eyed boys78 Branzy.” He mumbled.
Branzy felt his face flush a little. “Like my name at the end-”
“Yeah, I- I don’t know why he did it. Changing it is a pain so…”
Branzy decided to save Clown from his embarrassment and just silently plunged in the code to unlock the communicator. He then saw the rest of the server in a voice chat, with messages from people yelling at Clown and Branzy to show up.
Branzy turned the screen around so Clown wouldn’t get jump scared by the inevitable sudden noise.
He joined the call.
“CLOWN!! There you are! Where’s your boyfriend??? We’ve been spamming you two for like ten minutes-” Spoke yelled as soon as he joined the call.
“Um- we’re in a bit of a situation…” Branzy replied.
“Branzy- why do you have Clowns communicator? What situation?” Parrot asked.
“I’m also here- the circus tent caved in on us and now we’re stuck.” Clown called out.
Branzy flinched as about eight different members all yelled various different versions of ‘what?!”’ At the same time.
“Everyone shut up! What’s going on exactly?” Parrot asked muting a handful of people.
“Well, we were in my redstone when we heard some snapping noises- which was presumably the supports for the tent, and then the roof caved in, and now we are very stuck.”
“Like injured stuck?” Rek asked confused.
“Yes. We’re both pinned, at least one of my arms is broken. Branzy can’t tell if he’s injured or not.”
“What do you mean you can’t tell?” Red started. “Are you in pain or no?”
Branzy was about to explain when…
“It’s your lower half isn’t it?” Rek asked, though he already knew the answer.
“Yuuupppp…” Branzy leaned back knowing where this conversation was inevitably going to lead to.
“I’m on my way to see the damage.” Rek commented.
“What does it being Branzys lower half have anything to do with-” Red started to ask.
“You know how Rek and I grew up together?” Branzy cut him off, he was glancing at Clown giving him light as he tried to unstick one of his arms.
“No, but I’m not surprised…” Red replied.
“Well, uh we grew up on a ranch out in the middle of nowhere.” Branzy explained.
“It wasn’t in the middle of nowhere, there was college town like fifteen minutes away on horseback.” Rek cut in.
“Yeah well, not all of us are horse girls Rek Rap.” Branzy huffed, Clown let out a small chuckle, Branzy had told him this story before.
“Let me guess, you liked chickens?” Parrot commented. “Anyone within reasonable range of the circus tent head over there.” He continued.
“Yes, yes I was! And I probably should’ve stuck to chickens.” Branzy explained.
“I am so sorry.” Rek apologized for what was probably the literal millionth time throughout their lifetimes.
“One day, Rek kept pestering me to ride with him, and eventually I agreed. Which turned out to be a big mistake.”
“And um, I didn’t realize the horse he was riding was… temperamental.” Rek mentioned.
“Uh oh.” Spoke cut in.
“Yeah, surprise, surprise she got spooked and threw me off of her, and then literally trampled me. And now I don’t have basically any felling below my hips.” Branzy mumbled.
“But you can walk pretty much fine?” Red asked.
“It’s literally just a pain sensory issue, the rest of my nerves and muscles work pretty much fine.” Branzy explained.
Red was about to say something else when Rek cut him off. “Oh St pearl.” He muttered.
“What?” Clown asked, he was unsuccessful in freeing himself.
“Um, I’m just going to send a picture of the damage…” Rek mumbled.
A picture soon came in and Branzys eyes went wide with horror. Half of the tent came down, and was full with water. Destruction was everywhere, mountains of rubble laying every which way.
“Oh- oh no.” Branzy stuttered showing the picture to Clown, who promptly started cursing under his breath.
“Uh, hmmmm… please tell me y’all are like, near the top of that stuff.” Spoke commented.
“We are like- near the bottom of the redstone.” Branzy mumbled.
“Right- I think we’re going to have to cut our losses and respawn-” Clown started before there was a million “NO! No no no!!!’s” Coming through the communicator.
“Right- y’all weren’t there when we explained this… server respawn, isn’t working.” Parrot explained.
“What do you mean, ‘isn’t working?’” Clown demanded.
“We mean, there’s a respawn glitch, if you respawn the server might recategorize your code, to the point it might not be recoverable.” Spoke jumped in.
Both Branzy and Clown cursed under their breaths.
“So- what’s the plan here?” Clown eventually asked.
“Well, it’s still raining pretty heavily, we can’t get the weather under control either, so digging y’all out safely probably wouldn’t really work- I think all the admins are going to focus on getting the respawn fixed.” Parrot decided.
“How about the rest of us try to dig y’all out in the meantime?” Rek suggested.
Clown and Branzy heard some mumbles of agreement through the comm.
“Does that sound good to y’all?” Parrot asked.
“Well, we don’t have much of a choice now do we?” Clown replied.
“I’m going to try and unpin myself now, I’m going to mute while doing so.” Branzy explained.
“Why exactly?” Spoke asked.
“Because I just realized I was wearing cargo pants with all my redstone materials and tools in them, and no one wants to hear the amount of profanities about to be screamed as I figure out what’s broken.”
Clown chucked as Branzy muted the comm.
“So, why did you actually mute? You don’t care if people here you curse.” He asked.
Branzy fidgeted with his hands looking over how exactly to free his legs.
“I know you don’t like people seeing- or hearing you get help, and I was thinking I’d try to free your arms first.”
Clown went silent as Branzy reached over to try and dig his right arm out.
He was trapped at an odd angle, his arms were pulled away from each other leaving his chest fully exposed. Clown was also down on one knee, but his legs weren’t pinned in anyway so that was likely just for comfort.
The way Branzy was pinned put him at an awkward angle to help Clown, he stretched out upside down to be able to reach, so it felt a bit like fixing something under a car.
“Branzy, do you think you can get it out?” Clown asked quietly.
“Yeah, might take a minute though- why?”
Clown heaved a sigh. “Then- well, I think I have some kind of gash above my eye. Blood has started to drip down into it, and it seems like it needs immediate treatment.”
“Oh ummm- so you want me to..?”
“Take my mask off and treat it, yes.”
Branzy had never seen beneath Clowns mask before, he’d asked once why Clown always wore it, he said it was for multiple reasons, but mostly because it made him feel safer around people.
“Ok… um… how do you remove it?” Branzy asked.
“You have to take my hat off first…” Branzy clumsily fallowed Clowns instructions to get the mask off, it was actually a fairly long process.
He was wondering how Clown even managed to get a head wound with it on but as he was removing it a fairly big crack became visible.
“What’s this made of anyway?” Branzy asked fiddling with the last latch.
“Quartz resin, I’m a little surprised it broke.” Clown replied.
“Yeah- I’ve seen this thing take an axe hit.” Branzy laughed.
“Oh trust me, I remember.”
Branzy was about to try another joke when the mask finally came off and- wow.
Clown was hot- like super model hot, like mouth hanging open if you pass him in super market hot.
His eyes were a deep blue and he had wavy black hair with braids pulling his hair up into a tight bun.
One of his eyebrows had a small slit in it and he had a scar across his nose.
“Branzy?” Clown asked, he had a goofy half smile half smirk on his face.
“Oh- oh right yeah, where’s the med kit? There it is.” Branzy grabbed the half smashed med kit that luckily landed in the two’s small pocket of space and started treating Clown.
He only had a small cut on his forehead, relatively minor but it bled a lot, dripping into Clowns eye.
Branzy gently cleaned and patched up the wound first before moving on to clean the eye.
“Told you adding a bottle of saline solution to the med kit would be a good idea.” Branzy joked carefully poring a small amount into Clowns eye.
“Yeah, yeah, but that kit was supposed to be for redstone burns- speaking of which how is yours?” Clown asked and- wow seeing Clowns actual facial expressions was… something else.
Clown didn’t actually move his face a lot- very stoic, vary in character, but one of Branzy’s only survival skills was his ability to read people like a book.
He’d do this with body language sure, but that was more difficult. A lot of things determined body language besides just emotion.
Upbringing, injuries, job… it was also easier to control, but on top of all of that… people had different reactions to different scenarios.
If someone was scared they could get tense, start readying for a fight, instinctively reach for a weapon… or they could shrink into themselves.
Faces, or specifically eyes were easier.
Of course you absolutely could learn how to school your face, Branzy himself was brilliantly good at it, assuming he was trying to, but it was far more difficult then body language.
“My hands are fine, or about as fine as they can be in this situation… let me try and get you’re arm out again…” Branzy mumbled returning to the awkward position he was in earlier.
He luckily had plenty of light from his eyes…
Soon enough Branzy managed to move the rubble enough for Clown to drag his arm out.
Clown heaved a sigh of relief flexing and stretching his arm.
“I assume that’s the non broken one?” Branzy asked.
“Yeah, I have a high pain tolerance, but not that high.” Clown responded, he had a smirk on his face. Branzy wouldn’t of guessed that Clowns seemingly default expression was a smirk, but it sure seemed like it.
With a little more of a struggle between Branzy and Clown they managed to drag Clowns broken arm out, freeing him.
Branzy saw Clowns face distort with pain, but he didn’t make any kind of sound.
“Ok- we can probably make a split for that… hold on a sec…” Branzy mumbled looking for something that could work to stabilize Clowns arm.
“Are you sure you don’t want to try and dig your legs out first?” Clown asked. His face was still contorted with pain, even though his voice was steady.
He clearly wasn’t used to having to control his face, only his voice.
“Clown, you’re clearly in pain- even if both my legs are broken in sixteen places I won’t feel it.” Branzy half joked, finding a long copper rod to make the splint.
Branzy had patched up Clown before- had even splinted his arm, but it was a weirder experience without Clowns mask.
Clown would flinch, quite a bit actually… but only the lower half of his face, his eyes stayed unmoving.
It’d be kinda cute- if it wasn’t flinching in pain.
Soon the split was on.
“Thanks Branzy.” Clown said once he was done. It sounded gruff, but he was smiling a warm smile.
Branzy felt his heart race a little, and Clown’s smile grew like he could hear Branzy’s heart beat.
“So, let’s get this piston off your legs, shall we?” Clown asked, moving his good arm underneath the hunk of stone atop Branzy’s legs.
“R-right!” Branzy exclaimed. Gosh, how much oxygen was in this hole? Something was getting to his brain.
With a little struggle Branzy managed to drag his full body out.
“No pain I assume?” Clown joked.
“Well, doctors tried to revive my nervous system for twelve years, I’d be a little mad if a bolder managed to do it.” Branzy joked back.
Somehow, after testing to see if Branzy could move, bend, and twist x y and z it seemed like the worst injury he got was some severe bruising.
“Well, that’s surprising.” Clown huffed once they came to that conclusion.
“Yeah, welp, I guess the force was just evenly distributed.” Branzy laughed.
Clown then slid from his knees down to a sitting position, and Branzy realized just how close they were, or rather just how small a two block hole was.
Clown’s smirk grew across his face again.
“Do you know you smirk a lot?” Branzy asked.
Clown chuckled. “I’m pretty sure it’s just you noticing small facial changes.” He replied.
Branzy huffed because, it definitely was.
Clown titled his head slightly looking at Branzy. “You don’t have good light perception do you?” He asked.
“Huh? Well- it’s kinda weird but yeah. Glow moth genetics are designed to take in different colors of light, not really there brightness. I can tell when something is being illuminated, but usually not by how much. It’s weird. Why?”
“So- you can’t tell when you glow more?” Clown asked.
Branzy was slightly startled, with that question.
“I mean- depends on what’s glowing- has my glow been fluctuating?”
A really big smirk grew on Clowns face. “Did you know your cheeks glow when you blush?”
It took a minute for Branzy to process the question.
“My cheeks are glowing right now aren’t they?”
“It looks like a purple themed disco in here.” Clown laughed sliding closer to Branzy.
“Huh.”
“You know, I was planning on taking my mask off in front of you for a while- as an act of trust but I was scared about how you’d react to my physical appearance… if I knew it’d be this I would’ve- well, you’d probably know how to take my mask off faster then I do by now.”
Branzy could only imagine how bright the room was at that moment, but Clown face was being illuminated beautifully with bright purple hues as he leaned in closer and put his hand on Branzy’s chin.
“Can you control that glow like how you control your face?” Clown asked.
“Wh-when I’m trying…”
“You don’t feel like trying right now?”
“Do you feel like putting that mask back on?”
“Not in the slightest.”
Then Clown kissed him, and oh it felt so good. Slightly embarrassing to admit but Branzy had imagined kissing Clown quite a few times and boy did it live up to expectations.
Clown was firm, almost greedy in a why when kissing him, like he was trying to get more. It felt good, it also felt good doing it in such an in closed space.
Soon the kiss turned into making out, Clown sliding his hand up Branzy’s shirt, rubbing his hand up and down the small of Branzy’s back.
Branzy did, unfortunately, stop him when he started to tug on his pants.
“Wait.”
Clown immediately pulled away from Branzy, much to his annoyance.
“I didn’t mean to pull away completely-” Branzy huffed.
Clown looked very confused on what to do at that point- it made Branzy laugh.
“I’m just going to give the guys an update that we managed to un-pin ourselves, and check how long until they think they can dig us out… so we know how much time we have.” Branzy smirked and Clown leaned back in the wall with a goofy smile.
He grabbed the comm and hit the ‘unmuted’ button. He immediately heard yelling and crazed laughter.
“BRANZY YOU DIDN’T MUTE THE COMM!!!!!!” He heard Rek yell.
“What..?” He asked confused.
Clown started absolutely cackling to the point he was struggling for air.
“Y-you seemed to have muted us, but we could still hear you!” Rek explained in horror.
Branzy could hear Red laughing so hard he was probably going to pull something.
“How- I- I didn’t even realize that was a feature how..?” Branzy began to ask.
“I have my comm modified to do that, so I don’t have to listen to dumb jokes when explaining plans- you have to hold the button for three seconds to mute yourself, and five to mute everyone.” Clown wheezed.
“Ah.” Branzy replied slapping his palm into his forehead. “Why didn’t you mute?” He asked.
“I did. Everyone else was listening to it like a soap opera!” Rek grumbled.
Clown continued to laugh hysterically.
“So, how long until you guys reach us?” Branzy asked bluntly.
“What, do you still wanna know how long you have?” Red teased.
“Yes.” Branzy answered just as bluntly.