@flame-izer @theharvestgoddessdemeter @lucky-bug-thing @euni-nyx @nevergonnagiveyaup + all my other moots & the other MS!RP accounts I just don't remember yalls usernames I'm sorry😭
Do not read on if you don't want (very) minor spoilers for my BigB-centric MCYT x kinda-ish-D&D AU! I felt like sharing a bit more of what's going to happen to the guy :)) So read below the cut if you would like a bit of the next chapter, chapter 2/4!
That world's.
"What does that mean?" he asked weakly.
Don't you already know?
Isn't that the kind of twisted logic that makes some kind of sense?
Scratch that. It should have been impossible.
But I am here now.
And where is here?
Tune in tomorrow over on my Ao3 if interest peaked :D Btw I have decided that all the kudos on the current fic give BigB a REALLY GOOD HUG <3 So if you would like this wonder of physical affection to occur then please consider leaving kudos on A Fall, a Facade, and a Flash in the Night. big thanks!!
I literally just posted my very first fanwork ever on Ao3!!.. and it's a crosspost on Q lol
But that's okay! This is my very first longform fic ever, at least kind of. It's going to be broken up into smaller stories for my writer brain's sake and posted when I have them done.
It's a BigB-centric MCYT AU that uses the class system from Dungeons and Dragons sort of. I plan for plenty of other MCYTers to show up, but in the first story there are only a few. I'll give you a small hint: 💚💚💛💛❤️❤️
If that sounds interesting to you, please go check it out! For the first couple of stories, I'll be updating every other day to get them out as quickly as possible. :D Thank you!
His best friend turned to him, fists wrapped in linen, red eyes gleaming with hunger. "Yes?" he asked calmly.
Grian swallowed. "Are you sure you want to do this?" he faltered.
The sun beat down on the duo, but neither wilted under the heat of its rays. They were used to it, after hours spent toiling in them. Spending long days frolicking beneath them. Sometimes alone, and sometimes in the company of their friends.
Friends who had wilted, eventually.
Scar clicked his tongue, adjusting his shawl. "G, how else would we decide a winner?"
"We could... not fight."
"And where would that leave us?" Scar smiled sadly. "Look, I offered to give you an easy out. You chose this way."
"I know." Oh, did he know.
"Why?"
Grian paused. "I don't want an easy out," he said softly. "I just want you."
Cactus spines reflected relentless light. Dust stirred up in clouds, creating miniature tornadoes. They sparkled.
Everything pretty in the desert was just as deadly.
"Me too, G," Scar murmured. "But the Watchers want to see only one standing."
"Forget the Watchers," Grian insisted, stepping forward into Scar's shadow. He looked up into regretful red eyes. His hand strayed to Scar's wrist. "Forget the game. Forget everything. Why can't we stay here together?" (Alone, he didn't add. He didn't need to.)
"Because they'll know." Scar smiled again, a bitter upturning of silt-covered lips. "Because they will know, make no mistake. And eventually, through trial and effort, they will get their one man standing." Scar studied Grian's face, then added gently, "I would rather have it be you than a Watcher. Do you agree?"
"Yes," Grian whispered.
Scar tucked a golden curl behind Grian's ear, then held out strong gray arms. "Then let's make it a spectacle, huh, G."
Without a word, Grian went to Scar's chest and rested his head on the namesake scars. His best friend's arms enveloped him in a comforting hug. (That might be the last hug he ever gets.) "A spectacle," he breathed.
"Yeah," Scar replied quietly.
They stood in each other's embrace for what felt like an eternity. A hundred years could have passed outside their bubble of perfection and they wouldn't have known. Everything that was important to one was holding on to the other. (Maybe for the final time.)
Scar let go first. Grian squeezed him hard once, then stood back. They readied their fists.
Their cactus shone around them.
"Ready?" Scar asked.
No.
"Yes," Grian replied.
They inhaled, in perfect time.
Cactus spines extended.
"Okay," Scar exhaled. (Was that resignment in his voice? Grian would probably never know.)
And then he charged.
They fought like water flowing, each skill fading into the next. Anticipating each other's movements, neither gave an inch. Grian threw a punch. Scar blocked. Scar kicked out. Grian dodged.
For a long time, neither landed a hit. (Too long. Were they trying to hurt each other? Neither knew for sure, and neither would have answered correctly, had anyone asked.)
But time goes on. Competitors grow fatigued. Moves get sloppy.
Injuries happen.
First, Grian hit Scar on the cheekbone. He grunted as the cloth-wrapped fist connected with his face, then backed up a few paces to reset his stance.
A couple more punches hit their targets. One time, Grian picked a cactus spine off the ground and slashed a shallow cut below Scar's eye. "Ow, G," Scar complained. "That feels like cheating."
"Maybe I want this to be over quicker," Grian remarked, voice strained, dancing away from Scar's next strike.
Then, after several minutes, Scar caught Grian's leg in a sweeping movement. His ankle twisted at a wrong angle, and he cried out involuntarily.
Scar stopped advancing. "I'm sorry, G," he started.
He threw another halfhearted punch. Scar blocked it again.
He aimed a kick to his opponent's side. Scar sidestepped.
He tried another punch. Relying too much on his wounded ankle, he overstepped and fell.
Expecting to hit the rough sandstone, arms caught him instead.
He hung limply in Scar's arms, dusty and exhausted, eyes raw with stirred dirt, fists chapped with successful hits. "Just do it," he sighed, closing his eyes to the sand, the sun, the cactus, and his best friend he was sick of trying to kill. "Please, just do it. Stick a cactus spine through my heart, Scar."
"No." Scar's voice sounded weak and raspy, but still surprisingly resolute.
"Please. It's okay." Tears gathered behind Grian's eyelids, threatening a tidal wave on his sunburned cheeks. "You can still win this for me. I'll be fine."
"What's the use now, G?" Scar asked him tiredly.
"You'll be the winner, that's the use!" Grian pulled himself up to stare into Scar's pained red eyes again. "Scar, I can't do this. I can't kill you."
"And what makes you think I can?" Scar shouted hoarsely. "Hearts, Grian, I knew from the moment you rejected my sacrifice that it would still be you who won. Because I knew that no matter what you did to me, even if you hurt me so badly I could barely walk, even if you were completely at my mercy and on your knees before me I still wouldn't have the strength to kill you!" He shook Grian, his face contorting with agony. "I would never betray you, even though it's just us two left. So help me, if you won't kill me I might as well just throw myself off that cliff so I don't have to look at your corpse and know I was the one who did that to you!"
Grian put his hands on Scar's shoulders, grimacing when he accidentally leaned on his injured foot. "Hey, Scar, no. You could never betray me, even if you killed me. I would understand."
"But I wouldn't, G." Scar's hands slipped down to Grian's waist to support him. (Even when he had to kill him Scar was still trying to hold him up.) "I would have to live with myself." He chuckled bitterly. "At least you would be dead, and you wouldn't."
"Hey." Grian moved his hands to Scar's neck and looked into his eyes. "I don't care what you are or what you become. It doesn't matter what you've done here, to me or anyone else. You're my best friend. Nothing could ever change that." He took a finger and scooped up a tear that was on it's way down Scar's face. He accidentally picked up some of the blood from Scar's cut on the way, smearing it across his bruises. "Not even death," he finished softly.
Scar closed his eyes. "Dance with me, G," he murmured.
Smiling sadly, Grian slid his hands back to Scar's wide, rocky shoulders. "Of course, Scar."
They waltzed together in a cactus ring stained with drops of crimson, just two souls harmonizing in every way, from movement to breathing to hearts beating. The sun continued to leave glowing trails across the sky above them, but they didn't care. A little bird flew a circle around their cacti, before deciding the spiny fruit was too dangerous for feeding and flew off to greener pastures.
Their dance was different than their hug, more reckless and rough, less caring and kind. Both ended, however, with Grian's head resting on Scar's mutilated chest, and synchronized swaying in the light of the sun.
"Scar?" Grian whispered.
"Hm?" Scar hummed in response.
"Would you go through it all over again?"
Scar hesitated. "For moments like this?" he asked.
"Yes."
"A thousand times," Scar answered, resting his head on Grian's.
Grian stepped back first. "Ready?" he asked, hands already fisted.
His best friend (and so much more) wiped the blood off his face. "Whenever you are, G," he said.
Grian waited a few seconds, then leapt forward unexpectedly. Scar prepared to combat his punch and-
Suddenly, he gasped. He looked down at his midsection, where Grian's hand remained, seemingly just lingering on his stomach. "I- told- you- that's- cheating," he choked.
Those tears finally spilled over as Grian pulled out his bloodied cactus spine from Scar's abdomen (adding to the slashes already immortalized) and rasped, "I wanted it to be over quicker."
Scar looked at him, eyes narrowing. "That's- not where you- stab- someone- you want to kill."
"I know," Grian whispered. "This is."
He shoved the spine into Scar's chest.
Scar went rigid, then slowly sank to the ground. "That's- better," he laughed.
Grian fell to his knees beside him. He hadn't realized he was trembling until that moment, kneeling over Scar's body. "Scar," he breathed.
Blood soaked through Scar's shawl as he stuttered, "Grian. I- I'm sorry-"
"Shh, no." Grian yanked the cactus spine out of Scar's chest and threw it aside. It rolled on the sandstone and came to a stop.
Cactus spines glisten in the sun.
Especially when they're covered in the blood of your friends.
"G-" Scar murmured.
"No!" Grian took a deep, shuddering breath and wrapped one arm around Scar's midsection. "Save your breath. Just- save it. You'll need it to- to survive."
"G," Scar repeated, a bit weaker this time. His hand found Grian's and held it gently, too gently. "I'm- dying."
"No. No, you're not."
Scar was silent.
"Scar? No, Scar, please." Grian shook him, like he'd been shaken earlier. He looked into his red eyes. Again. (And again and again and again, there, in their depths, he would always return, he had to believe that-)
"G-" Scar whispered. (Was that joy in his voice?)
"What, Scar?" Grian asked quietly.
"I can see Cub."
His eyes clouded over, locked on Grian's still. His grip fell to nothing.
"Scar?" Grian shook him again. Again. "Scar?"
His eyes were open. (Sightless.)
His wounds had stopped bleeding. (Clotted.)
His hand was limp. (Deadweight.)
Scar couldn't hear him. (Gone.)
Lightning struck nearby, signaling the death. But even its thundering crack couldn't shield the desert from Grian's grief.
"SCAR! WAKE UP!"
He sobbed harder, trying to wake Scar from eternal slumber. "Scar, please! Wake up! Wake up for me!"
(Scar couldn't hear him. He would never hear anything Grian said to him, whether it was silly, stupid, or unadvisably affectionate ever again.)
The canary, that little bird, returned to circle, the vulture the victor. It's beady eyes rested on this man (or what was left of him). They reflected the sun, just a vessel for the light made of feathers and talons.
Grian did not see it, because his home was lost in a haze of grief and regret and hate and hearts save him, he had murdered his Scar.
(If it all came to this, if all of the painful before culminated in this second, he wouldn't go through the games again.)
(Not for all the stolen peaceful moments in the world.)
Desert blurred before his eyes, a whirlwind of cactus green and sandy yellow and red, red, red. He looked down in disbelief, in rage, at his bruised hands in the pulsing dizziness that threatened to consume him. Blood crusted under his nails. (Scar's blood, wasted on him.)
"Just let me forget!" he screamed, beating his fists against the hot, hot sand. (Like he'd beat them against Scar's chest, his face, his body.) "He didn't want to, but I do! Just make it all go away! I'll do anything, make it stop, make it stop make it stop make it STOP, please- I can't-" He cut off when everything crashed inside of him, and when he couldn't stare at his broken hands any more, he took his shattered sight to the heavens.
His gaze roamed the sand, the sky, the cactus ring that surrounded him still. The spine (Scar's ultimate downfall), the corpse (Scar's corpse), the sun (their sanctuary, their prison), the canary (the presiding witness to a fading will).
It landed on the cliff.
With the desperate speed of a man fighting for his sanity, he struggled to his feet and ran for the cliff, ran for (safety and surety and Scar and) the cold, sweet embrace of nothing. His home, Scar's home, their crumbling ruins were left behind him to burn forever under the sun. Scar's body was forgotten (it was what he wanted) in the dust he kicked up, sprinting for nothingness or afterlife or whatever waited a broken winner (hands stained, clothes bloody, eyes roving around with no reason to their erratic movements) in death.
(Whatever it was it would be better - it had to be better - than this ghost server and this loneliness and this memory.)
Chest heaving, he paused before careening off the cliff, stared at the sky with his red, wild eyes. "Well, if you won't make it stop," he chuckled, mad (mad, he was mad, but he didn't care, because Scar was gone and he was dead and Grian would never see his smile or hear his laugh or feel his love ever ever again-)
"THEN I WILL!"
He leaped, fell, (flew). Wind rushed past his ears as he plummeted towards the sandstone below. (Was this what Scar had felt on the one-way road to his red life, racing towards nothing more than uncontrollable bloodlust and roughened stone spires?) His wonders about the nature of his afterlife faded.
(He felt some worry, maybe, that he would never see Scar again. He hadn't buried his best friend. He had killed his best friend. He had begged and pleaded and screamed for Scar to stay with him and watched the light leave his crimson eyes, somehow finding beauty in the color for the first time since before because that was his Scar's eyes.)
And as his head cracked against the rocks, and there was unimaginable pain from his brain to his fingertips, (dirty and unreedemable) and his consciousness (harming, not healing) began (he was unfit) to fade (to be near Scar), he did not (wonder) feel (regretful) any (guilt) more (hateful) fear.
No, Grian went down to his grave a madman, a murderer, a ruthless victor. But he did not go afraid.
In his end, all he felt was a spreading, all-encompassing relief, as his sputtering flame was, finally, snuffed out.
(And he was left with the peculiar thought that maybe, in some lifetime, in some universe, he would do it all again.)
(Just to have a few more of those precious and utterly wasted moments with his Scar.)
Hey, I'm Opal (she/her)! I write fanfic for Hermitcraft/the Life Series/MCYT when my very fickle motivation cooperates :D I'm an avid appreciator of all types of fan works, though, and I LOVE. to rant about my favorite aus to whoever will listen hehe
I also have a Quotev (where I post stuff) and an Ao3 (where I... do not) if you want to check them out!
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