Watching and Listening - An Empires SMP AU

Calm before the storm

           False turned her computer off and then started planning her next move. She needed to increase the security around her tower if the other False and Jimena were going to poke around it more often. She'd already narrowly escaped exposure when the other False had built a house attached to the tower the one day that week she'd been away with the hermits. And she'd just missed Jimena sneaking around.

             What should I do about the security system? The first thing that came to mind was to put bars in the windows. That way Jimena wouldn't be able to fly inside again. Or fall out the window again, although since she had wings now somehow it would be less deadly. And maybe I should rig the cameras to alert me if anyone other than me somehow gets inside again.

           False shoved her laptop inside her bag and looked around for other things that she needed to bring with her. She was at Hermitopia, growing up bamboo, and she was pleased that the farm had been working alongside her moss farm. The hermits had efficiently worked together to upgrade their hermit empire with multiple different farms and living spaces for each of the hermits.

           False's room in Hermitopia was cozy, if a bit restricting. The farms took up most of the space in Hermitopia, which despite supposedly being an empire was still just a giant glorified building, so the living quarters had to make do with whatever was left over. They were still good rooms, though. False's had sunmery orange walls and a queen size bed along with a socket that worked well to charge her laptop, so she could still keep tabs on Cogsmeade through the security cameras.

           After unplugging her charger and fishing her elytra out from under her bed, she unlocked the door and headed out, making sure that her elytra was durable and securely attached. Hermitopia was like most of the hermits' builds: it was very easy to fall off of and die. Luckily, False didn't fall off this time; she managed to get safely down to the ground via walkways without railings, rope bridges, rickety ladders, curly slides, and uneven stairs without fluttering a wing.

           "Are you from Cogsmeade?" False looked to see Doc taking some stuff out of one of the many chest monsters that consumed the first floor of Hermitopia. She wondered how he even kept track of all his stuff and not lose anything. Despite how tidy Pearl tried to keep everything, and how sorted the general chests were, chest monsters kept popping up like wildfire and breeding like rabbits.

           "I'm hermit False," False replied, readjusting her elytra. "The other False should be taking a nap in Cogsmeade right now, I think." "You spied on her long enough that you memorized her schedule?" Doc asked. False nodded and headed out of Hermitopia so she could spread her wings and fly without the risk of bumping into any of the compact buildings and all the other things that the hermits had built. She was a terrific flier, but it was always better safe than sorry.

           And then False remembered. Some of the stuff she needed for the security upgrade might already be in Hermitopia. So she turned her attention back to the chest monsters. One by one she opened up a chest or a barrel or a shulker box to see what was inside and if anything in there could be useful. "What are you looking for?" Doc asked, scooting over. "Stuff to upgrade my security system. Jimena was in my watchtower."

           "Jimena's the best friend of the other False, right?" "Yeah, she is." "Do you know why Grian hates her?" "Wait, Grian hates her?" False stopped poking around in a shulker box to stare at the goat and creeper hybrid straight in his robotic eye. For a moment she wondered if she had heard him wrong through his accent, but she realized that she had understood him correctly.

           "Yeah, he does. He's constantly glaring at her and scowling whenever she's around and you don't notice because you're almost always at Cogsmeade." "Has Jimena been to Hermitopia?" False asked. "No, she just spends a lot of time with the sheriff and you know how Grian likes pranking him." False did know. Grian's pranks were legendary. Even if you weren't the one he pranked; his tricks were so big that everyone knew about it.