#Also Grian got less sad seeing Scott's death in chat too

[mangofanarts]

Joel cheering at the end of his video because someone had killed Scott, he has no idea that it was Scott giving up his life for Pearl

[theres-an-impulstor-among-us]

3rd life, Tango and Impulse are the last two standing?

this was the first 3rd Life request i received and oh boy have i wanted to work on it for so long. apologies for the older ones i havent touched yet; i’m getting to them! i’m just in more of a 3rd Life mood atm :)

...

  Etho drowned

  Impulse stares at the death message on his communicator with wide eyes. “Oh my gosh,” he whispers hoarsely. “He did it… Tango got him…”

  He checks the tab list. Etho is gone. Only two red names stare back at him: his own and Tango’s. The endgame he’s been avoiding for weeks is finally here. 

  Impulse continues trading with his villagers, though there doesn’t seem to be much point anymore. Tango is undoubtedly on his way here right now, and he’ll probably want to end things right here and now. There’s only two people left, both on red. One more death will end the game, no matter who dies. 

  He finds himself hoping that Tango will fall into a ravine or get exploded by a creeper before he even makes it here. But he knows it won’t happen. There’s only two ways this could end, and neither of them are very appealing to him. 

  All too soon, he hears the familiar voice of his best friend call his name. Wincing briefly, he turns and finds Tango standing in the entrance to his villager trading hall. “Hi, Tango.”

  “You saw in chat, right?” Tango’s red eyes are glowing bright, as is the red heart on his neck. “I got him. My trap worked!” 

  Impulse nods. “I saw. Heck of a way to kill your close friend.”

  “Yeah, well, he would’ve killed me with no hesitation, so I did what I had to do to survive.”

  “You’ve done a lot of things like that,” Impulse remarks carefully. “Remind me again who you’ve killed?”

  “Grian, Bdubs, Scott, Jimmy, Ren, and now Etho,” says Tango gleefully. “Etho’s my first red lifer, though. Gotta say, there’s a hell of a rush in taking someone’s last life and knowing they won’t be able to come back and confront you.”

  Impulse slowly shakes his head. “That’s a really… cold thing to say. Remember, we don’t know exactly what happens when we lose our last life. It’s likely we just appear back on our normal servers, but Grian said he didn’t even know that for certain.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Tango rolls his eyes. “Whatcha up to?”

  “Getting some books to enchant my stuff so you’ll have a harder time killing me,” Impulse wants to say. Instead, he opts for the safe answer and says, “Just some trading. You… want some emeralds?”

  “Nah, I don’t need to trade right now.”

  The two fall silent for a moment.

  “So I guess we should address the elephant in the room,” says Impulse slowly. “We’re the only ones left. The last two standing.”

  “Uh huh.” Tango’s eyes are still worryingly sparkling red. “We are. And don’t think I’m stupid, Impy. I know about the traps you put around your base. Plus the ones in Renchanting and the desert.”

  “I didn’t put those there.”

  “Whatever. Point is: I know where all the traps are. So don’t think you’re gonna get the drop on me. And when it comes to PvP, I’m stronger.”

  “Are you trying to tell me to just lay down and accept my death?” Impulse demands.

  “Hell no. Don’t do that! That’d be the worst way to end this whole thing.” Tango pauses a moment. “Who’ve you killed, again?”

  “I… I killed Joel and Cleo.”

  “And?” prompts Tango pointedly. 

  Impulse winces. “And… you. I took your second life.”

  “Yes, yes you did. And I’m not gonna let you take another.”

  “I don’t want to do that, Tango. I may be a red lifer but I don’t want to hurt you again.”

  “Too bad,” Tango says coldly. “This is the moment I’ve been waiting months and months for. Two people left. I’ve done too much and fought too hard to delay my victory any longer. Come to the village with your best armour and your best sword, and if you’re not there in five minutes, I’ll hunt you down and kill you without mercy. Got it?”

  Impulse can hardly hold back a shiver at the viciousness in his best friend’s voice. “G-Got it.”

  “Good.”

  Impulse watches Tango leave, before letting out a deep breath. He can’t deny he’s terrified; this is the final confrontation. Either he or Tango won’t make it out alive. And he has a suspicion as to which one will lose their last life first. As blunt as Tango had been, he’s right. Tango knows where all the traps are, he’s better at PvP than Impulse, and he has the fortune to have known Impulse long enough to be able to reliably anticipate any tricks he could come up with. 

  Impulse hardly stands a chance.

  After assembling his best armour under the circumstances, Impulse takes his enchanted diamond sword and heads out into the village. He can already see Tango sitting atop one of the houses, legs dangling over the side. Tango’s armour is iron but enchanted, whereas Impulse’s is diamond and unenchanted. He doesn’t know which will be better in this scenario but he’s leaning towards the enchanted armour. 

  Tango spots him approaching and jumps down from the house, swinging his own enchanted diamond sword. “Sorry it has to be this way, Impulse. I hope you know that however this finishes, you’ll always be my best friend.”

  Somehow, I don’t think you’ll be very happy with me if I’m the one who somehow wins after all this, Impulse thinks. 

  Aloud, he says, “I’m sorry too.”

  A brief pause follows his words.

  Then Tango charges forward and the fight begins.

  Impulse blocks Tango’s first two blows, but the third glances off his armour. This completely throws him off and Tango lands a few more hits on his armour. 

  Losing his nerve, Impulse scrambles backwards and takes off running, hoping to give himself time to think of something.

  “Hey!” Tango yells. “What are you doing?! Get back here!”

  Impulse sprints as fast as he can towards Bdubs and Cleo’s abandoned castle. Without slowing, he jumps on the ruined planks of the drawbridge and makes it across to the other side. When he dares to look back, he notices Tango skidding to a halt on the other side of the moat. 

  Impulse involuntarily nods to himself. Tango hates parkour, even simple ones. 

  After taking a moment to compose himself, Impulse turns and spots Tango halfway across the bridge, jumping steadily from one plank to another. Panicking, Impulse jumps on the pressure plate in the centre of the room, before bolting for the stairs.

  Tango has just reached the entrance when he hears the telltale hissing noise and he curses. He doesn’t have enough time to follow Impulse to the stairs and he knows it, so all he can do is dive back across the drawbridge. 

  The TNT goes off a second later, sending Tango flying onto the bank. It’s been placed in such a strategic way that it only destroys the lower floor; the second floor, which Impulse has managed to reach, is entirely untouched. 

  He grabs a spare bow and some arrows, and fires a few out the slit window at Tango, who is struck in the leg by one and has to retreat to avoid getting hit by the others.

  Impulse takes a deep breath. This is a good position; he has the high ground, as it were. He has the advantage right now. 

  Unfortunately, that advantage becomes a lot less palpable when he realises his meagre arrow stock has run out. 

  Through the split window, he spots Tango running back across over the drawbridge, clearly realising that Impulse is out of ammunition. His leg is bleeding from where he’s pulled the arrow out but he doesn’t seem to care right now. 

  Impulse rushes for the second set of stairs and bursts out onto the top of the castle. Over the ramparts, he can see the long abandoned village he used to call home and he’s briefly gripped with a deep sense of sadness and nostalgia. 

  A few seconds later, he hears footsteps behind him and whirls round to find Tango charging towards him. With only a split second warning, Impulse ducks under his outstretched arm and rushes for the stairs again, but Tango sweeps his legs out from under him. Impulse lets out a cry of pain as he lands heavily on his wrist.

  “NO!” Tango yells, standing over him with his sword, forcing him to roll over and look him in the eye. “You’re not running away again! I’ve waited TOO long for this; now fight me!”

  Impulse responds by kicking Tango hard in his already injured leg, before rolling to his feet and taking advantage of Tango’s distracted state to shove him away. 

  Tango stumbles back, his mind fuzzy from the pain. His diamond sword dangles in his grasp. His chest heaves as he gasps for breath.

  “Tango…” Impulse straightens up, a sympathetic look on his face. “Please. We don’t have to resolve it this way. Let’s just live together in this world until one of us dies naturally. There’s no reason for us to murder each other just to win this stupid game.”

  “No,” growls Tango softly. “You’ve no idea what I’ve sacrificed to get here. If somehow we do go back to Hermitcraft after we die in this goddamn world, do you think anyone’s still gonna wanna be friends with me?”

  “Then why burn all your bridges like that?” Impulse demands. “3rd Life is temporary but we’ll be on Hermitcraft for decades to come. Why throw it all away?”

  “Y-You don’t understand. I have to win this. Th-There’s no other way to end this.”

  Impulse carefully steps towards his best friend. “Tango. Plea-.” 

  “I SAID NO!”

  Tango charges at Impulse, who intercepts him and throws him away from him.

  What he hasn’t noticed is how close he is to the edge of the parapet. 

  Tango manages to catch Impulse’s wrist, pulling him to the ground, but the shock of the landing releases Tango’s grip on him. 

  Impulse gasps as he realises that his friend has disappeared over the side of the parapet. He hardly dares look, but his communicator going off only confirms what he already knows to be true. 

Tango fell from a high place.

  Tango is gone. 

  Impulse has won. 

  He struggles to a sitting position, wincing at the pain in his arm. It’s over. It’s really over.

  After all this time, all these deaths, he’s the last one standing. The “winner”, if you could even call him that. He’s done so much to survive: things he’s ashamed of, things that will stay with him for the rest of his life. The things he’s witnessed will also haunt him; the deaths of everyone around him, including his best friends, as he’s unable to do anything about it.

  After what feels like hours, he discards his armour and steps up onto the parapet, the breeze ruffling his t-shirt and shorts. At the bottom, he can almost picture Tango’s body, broken on the hard ground below him. He doesn’t know if his death will take him back to Hermitcraft, back to Tango, but anything is better than staying here alone in this world, void of happiness and life. 

  “I’m coming home, Tango,” he murmurs. 

  With that, he lets himself fall.