Grian POV-
I glide into Xisuma's base and quickly ditch my elytra on a nearby armour stand, switching it for the chest plate X had made for me specifically. Once it was on, I allowed my wings to reappear, and they fit snuggly in the holes of the back of the chest plate.
I pace along the white concrete, stretching and flexing my wings, until I see Xisuma diving towards me.
"I see you got my message Grian."
"It sounded urgent."
"Yes, we have a glitch forming in the sky just above the gravel biome beside Iskall's industrial district that I can't fix. I checked where Iskall is and he's currently with Mumbo at Iskall's tree."
"Okay. I'll get on it immediately."
X stops me just as I'm about to shoot up into the sky, "I fear this may be the closest EX as been."
My heart drops but I shake off the fear and jump into the sky anyway. I make sure to be above the clouds before angling off to fly towards the area Mumbo and Iskall had begun their industrial districts. Sure, the nether would be faster but I needed to stay hidden. No one, except Xisuma since he is the admin, could know that I was the watcher of Hermitcraft. I had actually replaced Biffa in Season 6 since Evil X had found his weakness.
Evil X was a glitch in the Hermitcraft code that believed itself to be Xisuma and X and I had been working extremely hard in Season 6 to keep him at bay and now with the switch to Season 7, he has doubled his efforts. X has been working night and day to seal off the server from his glitched counterpart but EX has been working his way through the fresh code. I, on the other hand, have been spending almost all of my free time fixing the glitching code, with watcher magic, when EX gets close to breaking through.
I can feel the glitch as I near Iskall's build. It is raw and sickly and I fear I am too late to close it. I glide just below the clouds and am immediately hit with a blast of red energy. I gasp in surprise and pain as my right wings takes most of the damage. My left flaps desperately to stay in the air as I see EX walk out of the glitched air. He's already in the game so I do the only thing I can possibly think of. I gather every drop of magic, every drop of energy, and every drop of concentration to fire one blast at the glitch. He watches as the purple magic forms in my hands and he shoots another shot at my good wing.
I feel myself falling but I shoot the magic at him, he gasps falling back into the glitching air as the code repairs itself. My wings are to injured to catch the air so I continue to freefall as my world turns black from exhaustion.
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Iskall POV-
"... and that's why my industrial district is so awesome!"
"Oh, good. Are you done talking yet," I mumble at the very excited moustached hermit in front of me. He has been talking about is district for about 20 minutes now. We were supposed to be heading over there to compare progress but nope, he just wanted to brag.
"Yup! Now let's go see them!" Mumbo's beaming smile made it impossible for me to stay annoyed at him and I sigh and can't help but grin back. He turns and runs into my Nether portal and I follow him to my industrial district portal. I hop in first and the first thing I notice is some very colourful flashes of lights. One was red and the other purple. I immediately take off towards the lights just in time to see some glitched area of the server close and Grian plummeting from the sky. I dive towards him, using more rockets than necessary and catch his hand as I leveled off and angling back towards the sky to compensate for the extra weight. I fire a couple rockets and turn back to my industrial area and a very confused Mumbo.
The moment Mumbo realizes what is happening, he runs towards me and I drop Grian gently into his out stretched arms. I land and turn back to see Mumbo sitting on the ground with Grian in his arms. I finally get a chance to really study Grian. His clothes look a singed and his arms have odd purple particles coming off of them but the strangest thing is the golden feathers that made up a pair of wings. As I get closer to Mumbo and Grian, I can see the sweat beading off the smaller hermit's face. I ache to know where the wings came from, but we need to get Grian's healed first.
"Iskall?" Mumbo glanced up at me, worry etching deep lines in his face, "what are we supposed to do?"
"Is he breathing?" Mumbo nods at my question. "Okay. Let's start with taking him somewhere more comfortable and then figure it out..."
Mumbo struggles to stand while still holding the winged hermit, "okay. Let's go to Grian's hobbit hole."
The walk to Grian's base was quiet as Mumbo and I are both lost in thought. I just keep hoping that he will be okay. I don't know what I'll do if he isn't. I wouldn't know what to do if either of my partners died.
"Iskall? Please open the door." I am dragged out of thoughts as Mumbo stands in front of the hobbit hole, straining under the continual weight of Grian. I quickly grasp the handle, opening the door and follow Mumbo into Grian's starter base. I go search in the storage for some healing potions and bandages while Mumbo set Grian on the bed. I turn towards them and my heart just bursts at the sight, even with Grian being injured. Mumbo was gently stroking his hair, gently smiling and mumbling something.
Mumbo looks up as I walk towards him, "Grian's starting to wake up."
I hand him the healing potions and sit down beside Mumbo, resting my hand on his leg. Mumbo had turned towards Grian, gently coercing him to drink the potion. A moment later, Grian's eyes blink open completely and he stares up at the two of us. He sits up stiffly and stretches his injured wings. His eyes immediately go wide in complete panic as he tries to get off of the bed. Mumbo grabs him, pulling him gently into his arms in a cradle, one arm just under his wings and another under his knees. I slip off the bed to kneel at Grian's height as his eyes fill with tears.
Concern is rising in my throat as I gently run my fingers through Grian's hair, "what's wrong Gri? Do you want more healing potion? Do you want us to bandage your wings?"
At the mention of his wings, Grian's tears fall and he turns to bury his face in Mumbo's suit jacket. I reach up and gently pull his close hand off of Mumbo and I hold it against his chest and Mumbo releases Grian's knees to cover my hand with his.
We stay that way until Grian stops crying. Mumbo and I stay silent waiting for Grian to say something to us. When he finally does, he stutters and mumbles most words, "You guys weren't supposed to see my wings."
Wings... Only one type of player has wings... Grian's a watcher. I'm not surprised but I truly wish he had told us earlier, we could have helped, but I guess all I can do now is help him heal. I begin lightly pouring a potion on the worst of his burns and bandaging the rest while watching Mumbo and Grian. Mumbo was rocking back and forth with the smaller hermit, trying to settle Grian's nerves. I see Grian say something quietly to Mumbo, who smiles and leans down to gently kiss Grian's lips. I felt my heart shatter as I watched the two people I loved kiss in front of me.
I turn away from Grian's freshly patched wings, tears threatening to fall from my eyes when I feel a small rough hand grab mine, "thank you for bandaging my wings Iskall."
I didn't turn back towards him but gently released his hand and began walking away. The tears flowed freely but I didn't want to ruin their moment. They would be cute together and I would learn to hide the pain. As I reached the door of Grian's bedroom, I felt a hand on my shoulder roughly turn me around. Mumbo stood in front of me, his eyes furrowed. I tried to duck my head but he had already noticed the tears and wrapped me into a bone crushing hug.
"Iskall... Grian's going to be okay. No need to cry."
I looked over Mumbo's shoulder to see Grian seated on the edge of the bed, smiling at me, his wings folded gently against his diamond chest plate. Seeing him like this, happy, just made the pain in my heart worse and I pulled away from Mumbo.
"I'm sorry guys. This is just not going to work anymore. I love you both too much to be able to stay and watch you have a relationship. I should go and let you two be together." I spilled everything that was on my mind before being able to stop myself and as I finished I looked between the two. Mumbo stood in silent shock as Grian's grin just increased. He hopped off the bed and ran between Mumbo and I to hug me, "I love you too Iskall!"
Then Grian was kissing me. His lips were chapped but sure and I couldn't stop myself from kissing him back. He pulled away, burying his face in my neck as he clutched to my sweater begging me to not leave. I glance up at Mumbo who just stared in confusion at the scene that had just unfolded. He glanced down at Grian, a smile pulling at his lips as he looked back at me, shrugged and joined in the hug. Grian squealed as his wings were pressed into his back and Mumbo backed up immediately. Grian backed away from me, winced in minor pain as he stretched his wings, and I watched in awe as they disappeared.
"I am so sorry Grian!"
"Oh, you spoon. It's okay. Just get back here and hug me again."
I watching, grinning, as Mumbo wraps Grian up in a hug and yelp a little when Mumbo grabs my hand to pull me in as well. We ended up hugging a squished Grian as he tried to free himself from between us and once he had succeeded, he reaches up to both of my heads and pushes them together and I feel Mumbo's lips on mine. I immediately begin kissing him and it takes only a moment before he's doing it back. It was a strange sensation with his moustache but I loved it and sorely missed it the moment Mumbo backed away.
Grian stood beside us, his hands on his hips as he smirked at us, "Good. I'm glad you two enjoyed that. I can't be having my two boyfriends not be boyfriends themselves."