Missing (Third in An Old Friend Series) //Hermitcraft & Yhs Crossover\\

3

        "Come on, that can't be true," Jevin said, and Ren shrugged his shoulders. 

        "It's what I heard." He sighed, and the rest of the hermits that stood in front of him sat thoughtfully. Ren had messaged every hermit except the Architechs to meet him in Hermitland to talk, but when they got there, they were not expecting to hear of how their friends might have murdered someone. 

        "I mean, it's hard to believe, but I guess not impossible." Doc decided, but False disagreed.

        "No, It's very hard to believe. And who is this Sam guy?" She asked, and everyone shrugged. Everyone, but Stress. She had been especially quiet, and they were starting to notice. 

        "Stress?" Joe asked carefully, and she looked up from the ground to see them all staring at her intently. 

        "Look, I only know a little of what happened. And it's not what you think. But it's also not my story to tell. I promise you that what happened was probably in self-defense, but in order to really find out what happened, you have to ask Grian." She blurted out, and everyone looked surprised. They all turned to Ren, who they all believed to be the temporary leader, and he sighed. Without saying a word, he typed something into his communicator and waited for his "friends" to show up. 

Grian, Iskall, and Mumbo's meeting hadn't gotten anywhere from when Ren listened in, and they all sat and thought of possibilities of what was happening when Grian's communicator went off. He looked down at the device and read the message aloud to the other Architechs.

        "You three need to come to Hermitland. Now." He read nervously. They looked at each other in fear before all standing up and going to the portal in Sahara. 

        "What if they think we did this?" Iskall asked, but Mumbo shook his head. 

        "Why would they think that?"

        "I don't know!" 

        "Alright, calm down. They probably just found some new info, which is good. And, they are our friends. Even if they do suspect something from us, they will give us the chance to explain." He added and registered Grian's unsure face wearily. 

        "But that would mean telling them all about Sam and what he did. Weren't we trying to avoid that?" Iskall asked, and Grian stayed quiet. Mumbo shrugged his shoulders in defeat, and they made their way to Hermitland. As they walked toward the entrance, huddled just below the large sign was a group of their fellow hermits. Stress had been the first to notice their approach, and as she watched them, more Hermits began to notice too. Slowly they all turned to see the group of their friends walk nervously toward them, Ren being the last to turn around. 

        "What's going on?" Mumbo asked casually, and Doc scoffed. 

        "We have heard some pretty interesting information about you three that we believe requires explanation," Ren spoke confidently, but deep down he knew he was terrified to hear what they had to say. 

        "What kind of information?" Iskall asked, and Stress blurted out,

        "They know you killed Sam. Kinda." She said, and all eyes were placed back onto the Architechs. Grian seemed to shrink away from the name, and Ren caught it. 

        "Grian, who is Sam?" He asked seriously, and Mumbo puffed his chest a bit. 

        "Guys, this isn't what it looks like. Sam was-" Mumbo tried, but Doc cut him off.

        "I'm sorry, but I believe he asked Grian who Sam was." He snarled, and Mumbo tried to defend them again, but Grian placed a hand on his shoulder. 

        "It's alright Mumbo, I got it." He said quietly, and Mumbo looked at him confused.

        "But you said-"

        "I know. But with everything that's going on right now, they have a right to know." He reassured him and took an unsteady breath. Mumbo nodded and gave Grian a smile to tell him it was ok. "As some of you may have heard, there was a man by the of Sam here. Sam and I... had a history together. Before I lived here, I lived with Sam. We went to high school together with our other friend... Taurtis." Grian's voice broke a bit as he said his name, and felt his eyes start to water a bit. "Sam, Taurtis and I were best friends. Until Sam began to unravel. He became more and more toxic every day, with help from his awful girlfriend Yuki, but Taurtis and I couldn't escape him. It all had seemingly ended the day he had such an outburst that it ended up with Taurtis dead and I... He made me help him hide the body. He never understood that what he was doing was bad, though. But what he didn't know is that one day, I called the cops on him. He kept screaming at me to help him and that he hadn't done anything wrong, and that I had betrayed him. But last I knew, he was in jail." Grian looked up for a second to see his friends' faces, who all looked bewildered and confused. Mumbo sensed his inability to keep going, so he took over for him.

        "But that was until two or so years ago. Just before the opening of Sahara, Sam came back. He took me and... well Grian came to rescue me. The rescue didn't go as planned though, but eventually, we got out. We thought we had killed him, but Grian had missed. And for the next few years, Sam had been plotting and scheming against us again, until finally, he had his serum ready."

        "Serum?" False asked hesitantly, and Grian took another breath. 

        "Yes. In those two years, Sam had created a serum. A sort of hallucinogen that made whoever was injected experience death in countless different ways. Not only did you experience death, you felt it. Every prick of a knife, every starving grumble of a stomach, every drop of water filling the lungs, I felt. Every death, I felt. Until these two came to my rescue. But before we escaped, Mumbo..." Grian looked over at his friend, who smiled another small smile of reassurance.

        "I killed Sam, once and for all." He stated, and all of the hermits stood quietly. Finally, after a while, Joe spoke up.

        "Why didn't you tell anyone about this?" He asked, and Grian sighed. 

        "Because I was trying to avoid this." He motioned to the group of hermits that all stared in shock and pity at him. "I didn't want anything to change. I didn't want every time you look at us, your first thought be 'Oh they've been through so much, poor them.'"

        "But Grian, you did go through so much," Cleo said,  and Grian sighed. 

        "I know. I just didn't want to be known for it. But look, now that you know everything, can we all work together again? We know it's not Sam doing all of this, but it's someone. We all need to work together to figure it out and help everyone else." He said, and Ren looked up for the first time since Grian had begun his story. 

        "Grian, I am sorry for making you say all of... If I had known I never would have..." He began, and Grian walked over to him, resting a hand on his shoulder.

        "Ren, it's ok. But I need to know that we are all in this together. So are we?" He asked and looked at all of his fellow hermits. They all nodded slowly, and Grian nodded back in reassurance. 

Yay content. I guess it was just that one scene I had trouble writing cause now that I'm past it, this took me like an hour. But, I hoped you liked it. Sorry it's all kinda exposition and stuff you already knew, but at least now the rumors are dealt with. Anyway, I hope you have a good day/night, and you are lovely. 

PS. JUST BECAUSE THE FIGURE WEARS A MASK DOES NOT MEAN THAT THEY ARE A WATCHER. I mean, it's not the worst theory, but it's not the watchers.