#grian got demoted | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sleepless-in-southlands · 2 years

Text

All Bets Off

Ao3

Summary: The concept was simple: pretend to not be dating for a few weeks, earn easy diamonds. Now, the execution? Turns out that was a little more difficult. Or Five times Luke and Mumbo just barely managed to hide their relationship, and the one time they didn't even try. Content: Fluff/humor, 5+1 things; secret relationship, kissing, pet names, sharing clothes, literal sleeping together, soft gays being soft, obligatory characters not CCs (except for luke, whose character Is a CC) Ship: Lucky Jumbo (Mumbo Jumbo/Luke Carder) Notes: Part two of Lucky Jumbo

1: Grian

Minecraft ground was not any more comfortable than any other ground Luke had ever laid on. Presumably, Mumbo would like to get up soon, and Luke was aware that activities such as ‘kissing’ and ‘finally fully realizing you’re in love’ could continue in more cozy places. It was with this in mind that Luke (reluctantly) pulled back from Mumbo, propping himself up on his elbows and giving Mumbo a chance to sit up.

And what good timing that revelation was, considering it was barely a moment later that they were being whistled at. Both Luke and Mumbo swiveled their heads around towards the source, finding a very smug looking Grian.

“Well, well, well.” Grian had a pick over his shoulder, obviously having been on his way to do some mining when he saw them. “That took longer than I thought it would, unfortunately, but I think Scar hit the money just about spot on.”

Did Luke understand what Grian was saying? Not really. Did he grasp it somehow had to do with him and Mumbo, said by the guy who had primarily threatened to ‘break his heart’ and was currently wielding a pickaxe? Yes.

Before Luke could decide if this was a flight or double flight situation, Mumbo scoffed, looking at Grian disappointedly. “I thought I told you to drop that? Luke just landed poorly and we’re both a bit winded.”

Well then. Dating for all of five minutes before he got demoted back to ‘weird friend who keeps crash landing on me.’ Was his kissing game that shit?

Grian’s eyes narrowed. “I thought he was leaving?”

“Changed my mind.” Luke explained, pushing himself onto his knees and getting up. “What can I say? Hermitcraft and Boatem have grown on me too much.”

Grian didn’t look entirely convinced, seeming to even take suspicion in Luke offering a hand to help Mumbo get up, but after a moment his expression went back to a happy one. “Well, I’m glad to hear that, Luke. I’m not sure things would’ve felt the same without you.”

“Thank you!”

“And Mumbo,” Grian pointed the blunt center of his pick at Mumbo, “good luck.”

The builder then left as randomly as he had arrived, somehow managing to whistle as he went. Luke watched him walk away before glancing back over at Mumbo, raising an eyebrow. “What was that?”

Mumbo laughed. “Sorry; I haven’t told you about Boatem’s relationship betting ring, have I?”

Luke gave Mumbo a look that he felt wordlessly encapsulated ‘no what the fuck is Boatem’s relationship betting ring.’

Another laugh. “Grian started it a bit ago to tease Impulse. If it looked like a Boatem member was getting close with anyone, someone else in Boatem would make a bet on when they’d get together, and typically the others would end up betting as well. Whoever was closest would get the pot.”

“Has anyone ever won?”

“No, BTM Inc. is filled with workaholics; no one really gets together. Luckily, the janitor’s a bit of a slacker.” Mumbo joked, leaning over and kissing Luke’s cheek. Ah, they were boyfriends again, wonderful, Luke had missed this. “However, it did become riddled with scammers fairly quickly.”

“Oh?”

“Someone- usually Scar- would start flirting with someone outside of Boatem, noticeably enough betting would start. Then they’d keep flirting until all bets were null, and claim the pot on a technicality.” Mumbo mournfully patted his pockets. “Many a diamond I lost to that time of risk. Something had to be done!”

“Yeah?” Luke prompted. “And what was that?”

“A rule-change. Now you only get the pot if you beat out all bets and end up together.” Mumbo answered. “Which means if we want some very easy to earn diamonds…”

“...we don’t mention the fact we’re already together until the bets are timed out.”

Mumbo nodded with a smile. “Sounds like Grian’s already out and Scar is about to be, so we only need to really worry about Pearl and Impulse. They won’t tell us their bets, of course, but we’ll figure it out somehow.”

Luke grinned, though it faltered a touch a moment later as he asked, “Do you think we can maintain that?”

“Well, you only realized I love you and vice versa fifteen minutes ago, so… just act like you were before then.” Mumbo said confidently, patting Luke’s shoulder before turning and walking in the direction of his house.

Luke stayed in place for a moment, considering Mumbo’s words, before he began rushing after him. “Wait, but I just figured it out, I can’t keep- Mumbo this is a terrible plan-”

2: Scar

For the record? Luke still thought this was a terrible plan. He didn’t want to pretend to not be dating Mumbo! He wanted to pretend to be dating Mumbo! Except it was real! Because he was dating Mumbo!

But the temptation of diamonds, gaming the system, and saying yes to the aforementioned Mumbo he was dating eventually won out, and he agreed. Of course, this brought a second concern to light: Luke and Mumbo were bad at hiding their relationship.

Very, very bad.

A good example? The fact that it took all of two days for someone to catch them obviously flirting with each other.

They had thought they were alone, sure, but they were also standing right in front of Harmless Harvests, a public store that anyone could purchase from at any time. Mumbo was taking his stock into the shop while Luke sorted his supplies and diamonds in some shulkers outside.

Each time Mumbo would come out to deposit diamonds and grab materials, their hands would inevitably brush in the handoff, and they would inevitably grin at each other like dopes, and inevitably one of them would say something sweet to the other.

Well… perhaps it was less ‘inevitable’ and more ‘they refused to stop doing it’, but potato-potato.

And really, any of the things they were saying would’ve had them in trouble with the eagle-eyed betting group. But the specific thing that got them caught out just had to be Luke, feeling much too caught up in the casual peace of helping his boyfriend stock his store, had called him ‘babe’.

Listen, he was allowed to be a bit cliché, alright? He was allowed to use petnames. Mumbo blushed at it anyways, clearly he accomplished his goal.

Only to have Scar wheel up out of nowhere looking like the Jellie who had gotten the cream.

Mumbo had managed to slip back into the shop before that, which left Luke alone to face the oncoming storm of a capitalist trying to get his capital. “Oh, hey Scar, what’re you up to?”

“Winning bets, it seems.” Scar answered, coming to a stop in front of the shulkers Luke was managing. “My congratulations on your new relationship! Many well wishes for your future.”

Luke did his very best to channel the Luke of a week ago, who was so (purposefully) unaware of his own feelings he hadn’t given a second thought to the fact he didn’t want to stop holding Mumbo’s hand, and other such obvious tells. “What do you mean?”

Scar, one of the few Boatem members with a full face, smiled at Luke in a way that suggested he knew Luke was playing dumb. “Unless you’re going to tell me that ‘babe’ is just a standard nickname where you come from, I think you know.”

Well. It was as good an excuse as any.

“Oh, it is a standard nickname, for uh…” Luke glanced as inconspicuously as possible back at Mumbo's store, “...business people who are leaving.”

Scar took a very long moment to blink. "What?”

"Y'know, the first 'b’ is for business, and second is for bye. Business-bye. Babe.”

"...You've never said it to anyone else before. And everyone in Boatem is a business owner."

“I just don't say goodbye very often, that's all.” Luke did his best to look like he was bullshitting nothing, flicking through shulker contents and pretending he was still organizing them completely casual like. “It's more common between business people anyways, non-business owners don't use it a lot.”

Luke thought he was doing fairly good so far in the lying department, though Scar seemed conflicted as to whether or not to believe him. On one hand, it was a complete lie, and a poor one at that. On the other hand, most of the hermits seem to have accepted that Luke often spouted what they considered to be nonsense, such as 'punching trees isn't natural’ and 'what do you mean you don't know what a peanut is.’

“Alright, I- customs are different in each server.” Scar finally settled on, seeming to not believe his own words. “That's uh. Typically an affectionate nickname here, however.”

"Noted.” Luke said with a nod, trying to look like this was new information to him. “I'll be careful how I use it in the future.”

“Alright.” Scar repeated, now looking crestfallen that he had been wrong and would not be getting the pot. He turned away from Luke and the shop, beginning to wheel away.

“Babe!” Luke yelled after him, because he was committed to this part now, giving Scar an apologetic shrug when he glanced back. He had gotten a fair ways away when Luke heard someone clearing their throat behind them.

"Was I gone too long for you?” Mumbo asked teasingly, leaning against HH's doorway and looking mildly confused.

"Don't look at me like that, I was saving our skin. And diamonds.” Luke replied, checking to make sure Scar was truly out of hearing range and that no one else was lurking before continuing, “Scar overheard me calling you babe, I told him it was how we said goodbye to business people in my old place.”

Mumbo chuckled. “I suppose I'll let it slide, then.” He joked, coming to crouch beside Luke, bumping his arm with his own. "Let's just be more careful from here on, hm? I don't need you calling the whole server 'babe’ just to cover our ruse.”

"Careful, yes.” Luke agreed, bumping Mumbo's arm back. “I like the sound of that.”

3: Pearl

They were not more careful.

Arguably, it shouldn't be that hard. If Mumbo just stuck to his own projects, and Luke stayed messing around his house, they could easily kill a few weeks of time with absolutely no chance of being caught. And Luke wasn't really sure he'd call either of them too overly 'sweet’ or stuck in any sort of 'honeymoon stage', anyways. The Harmless Harvests incident was an exception to the rule.

This, of course, may have made one question why Luke was wearing one of Mumbo's ties. It did not match his outfit. It did not have a practical value. It was definitely going to get him into another incident.

But when he stopped by the site of Mumbo's most recent redstone endeavor, looking somewhat ridiculous and somewhat wonderful so hard at work in a full suit, he had no choice but to tease Mumbo on being so dressed up, which meant Mumbo had to tease him on not being dressed up enough, and clearly the next logical conclusion of this issue was for Mumbo to give Luke his tie so that they were evened out, and- it doesn't matter, okay, the tie was important.

So important that Luke nearly didn't actually come up with a proper lie for ready-to-be-a-winner Pearl.

"You're wearing it because it's ‘important'?” Pearl repeated with a grin, looking like she wanted to laugh, which Luke both considered insulting and understandable. “And why's that?”

"...Easy bandage.” Hopefully Pearl would magically forget that Luke nearly always carried a farm's worth of golden carrots on him. "Just in case.”

Pearl still looked like she wanted to laugh, but now in a confused way, which Luke hoped helped his case. "Do you really, uh, need that?”

"Yes.” Luke said as seriously as he could manage.

A moment passed, during which Luke did his best to maintain his face while Pearl considered what he had said. It ended when she reached into her pocket, pulling out a small bundle of wool washcloths and handing them over to Luke.

"We don't really need bandages in Hermitcraft.” She said as he accepted the bundle. "But if you like to have them anyways, these'll work better than your boyfriend's tie.”

“Oh, thanks, I- wait- uh- boyfriend?”

Pearl laughed. “I had to try.” She said with a shrug before heading off again, having only stopped on the way to one of her builds.

Luke waited a full minute after she left before letting his expression of bewilderment shift to a soft smile, hefting the washcloths in one hand and straightening out Mumbo's tie with the other. Was the tie a risky move? Obviously.

Maybe it was worth it to hear someone else call Mumbo his boyfriend, however.

4: Impulse

Pearl's attempt at catching Luke and Mumbo out had given them an idea on when her bet must have been placed, meaning they had come to the conclusion the only person they still had to beat out was Impulse. Mumbo had warned he had a bit of a tendency to bet like an outlier, further out than the other guesses, which meant they weren't entirely out of the woods just yet, but they were getting close.

So, again, the simplest and safest thing would have been for them to both focus on their own things, separately, for a week or two.

Instead, they decided to work on Mumbo's ability to catch a falling-out-of-the-sky Luke. It had already happened twice, and Luke hated flying enough to generally avoid doing it alone, so clearly it was a pressing concern and not an excuse for Mumbo to hold and carry Luke some more.

All things considered, he was surprisingly good at it, so long as he knew Luke was coming in for a crash landing. Their first test wasn't wholly successful, Mumbo only partially grabbing Luke before losing his balance and sending them both tumbling, but by the second take he had it down, catching Luke with only a slight stumble.

"Well, it's really my fourth try.” Mumbo pointed out, readjusting his grip so that he wasn't crushing Luke's elytra.

"Still impressive.” Both of them ignored the fact that Mumbo had no reason to keep holding Luke now, Mumbo making no move to let him go while Luke busied himself with getting Mumbo's hair out of his face. “Does redstone exposure give you super strength or something? I still don't think you should be able to do this so easily.”

“It’s actually rather hazardous to health.” Mumbo answered with a smile. Luke could have chosen to worry about that comment, but he had grown used to hermits cheerfully going about their days in manners that were hazardous to more than just themselves. “I suppose you’re just too important to drop.”

Luke tried to smirk, but he had the feeling it was a bit (read: a lot) too soft for that. “Well someone’s a charmer.”

“I try.” Mumbo joked, his own smile softening as Luke finished with his hair, leaving his hands to rest on Mumbo’s cheeks instead, and perhaps it was a very good thing Impulse opted to jump them then rather than five minutes later, because Luke felt it could've been a much more damning scene to walk in on if he had.

"You two know you both have houses, right?” Impulse teased, looking much too up-beat for someone who was supposedly upset by what he had 'stumbled’ upon. "Young love, tsk tsk."

Luke tried not to look too guilty as he dropped his hands to Mumbo's shoulders. “We're practicing my crash landing skills. I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Indeed.” Mumbo confirmed, letting Luke get out of his arms, both of them doing their best to not look reluctant about the motion. “And I think that’d be rather hard to practice inside, don’t you?”

“Ah ha ha, don’t act like that was all this was.” Impulse made a vague circle gesture between Luke and Mumbo. “Unless it was direly important to crash practice for Luke to be holding your face, of course.”

Apparently Luke had not dropped his hands fast enough. He was fairly certain that made this his situation to get them out of.

“I was just seeing how hot he was,” No wait that’s horrible phrasing shit that sounds worse fuck try again, “in case he had sunburn, or sunstroke. We’ve been at this for a bit.”

Impulse looked baffled by this explanation. Couldn’t Luke tell even one lie that didn’t make the opposite party confused? Couldn’t they just accept what he said as truth for once? “You… Luke, the sun’s too far away to burn Mumbo.”

“And a tad out of range to hit me, either.” Mumbo added, also looking bewildered and somewhat worried.

Luke glanced at the both of them. “Wait, I… you guys… does Hermitcraft not have sunburn or sunstroke?”

Two head shakes.

"Well there- it's just if you spend too much time in the sun, on my old server, you'd start to feel faint, and your skin would turn red and would be hot and hurt every time it was touched, and- and you're both looking at me in horror, man, I should've come here way sooner there's so much sh- stuff none of you have to deal with.”

Impulse himself seemed particularly affected, attempting to straighten his jacket and managing only to rumple it even further. “I see. That, uh, that does sound like a dire concern. So. I will leave you to it!”

The factory owner then rushed off, glancing warily upwards as if, simply by knowing it existed, he would soon fall to terrifying threats of sunburn and stroke. Luke watched him leave before glancing back at Mumbo, who seemed to be torn between looking amused and distressed.

“Are those, ah, real things your old server had? Or did you just want an excuse to call me hot?” He asked, not entirely looking like he wanted the answer.

“Both.”

“Ah.” Mumbo’s expression didn’t change much at the answer. He stepped closer to Luke, holding his shoulder tightly. “Have I mentioned before how glad I am that you don’t live there anymore?”

Luke laughed, risking a light kiss to the back of Mumbo’s hand. “It wasn’t as bad as it sounds, but, for the record, I am very glad to be here now, too.”

5: Boatem

Luke and Mumbo knew they still had to wait a bit before they could be sure Impulse’s bet was no longer playable. They knew this. But they had been approached by everyone at least once by now, and, yeah, alright, it might have given them a bit of a false sense of security.

And by ‘a bit’ Luke might have meant ‘a lot’.

And by ‘a lot’ Luke might have meant ‘shared a kiss as they were walking right into a Boatem meeting’.

In their defense, they thought they were early and that no one was there. Completely against their defense, they could have very easily done a single head-check before they nearly ruined their entire con so close to the finish.

And given the ‘really?’ looks they were getting from three-fourths of their competitors, and the practically diamond-shaped eyes Impulse was watching them with, they were going to need a really, really good excuse for this one.

So Luke shoved Mumbo.

He immediately felt bad about it, given Mumbo suddenly looked like a kicked puppy, but he had committed now. He crossed his arms and turned away from Mumbo.

“Uh, lovers’ quarrel?” Pearl asked after a moment, an awkward silence filling the meeting room.

Luke scoffed at the suggestion, took a moment to feel bad about scoffing, and then replied, "Lovers? Hardly. Don't you guys know what a kiss of death looks like?”

"Kiss of death?” Oh Luke was going to have to say so many apologies. Even if he was just doing a very good job of acting in the moment, Luke could not stand the quiet distress of Mumbo's tone.

“Is that another thing you don't have here?” Luke asked, glancing around, happy to find no one seemed to know what he was talking about. “It's a threat. Kind of in the name, really."

Luke took his seat at one end of the half-circle of Boatem members, trying not to react to the eyes on him, continuing to act upset. Impulse asked after a moment, "What did Mumbo even do?”

“Oh, you don't want to know.” Translation: Mumbo was still looking too much like Luke had personally taken away all his redstone and Luke could not physically bring himself to make that worse.

"Well… we all fight sometimes.” Scar said after a moment, shooting Grian a look. Grian himself looked as though he currently wanted to kiss-of-death Luke, which Luke couldn't entirely blame him for this time. "Why don't you two just sit at opposite ends today for the meeting, and then talk it out afterwards? We have numbers to go over."

The 'numbers’ they had to go over were actually prank plans, which Luke had equally little to say about. He was still figuring out how Boatem- and Hermitcraft in general- pranks worked. Sometimes they were harmless, sometimes they involved massive amounts of murder… it was complicated.

He spent the meeting primarily keeping up an annoyed facade, doing his best to not look at Mumbo for three reasons. One, for the aforementioned facade. Two, the dejected expression he wore the entire meeting made it very hard for Luke to keep pretending he was annoyed at him. Three, Grian still seemed only partially convinced to not go after Luke, and Luke didn't need to make that situation any worse for himself.

The meeting ended sooner than usual, the 'kiss of death’ situation clearly remaining on everyone's minds the whole way through. Grian left first, Mumbo coming with him, likely so Grian could offer his totally-not-boyfriend heart-breaking services to the redstoner. The rest of Boatem followed shortly after, discussing builds with each other, leaving Luke to plant his face in his hands and regret many things. He was fairly certain no amount of diamonds were worth that hellish experience.

Luke looked up when footsteps signalled someone returning, expecting to find Grian with sword and/or long-game roses in hand. Luckily for his health, it was Mumbo, not looking nearly as upset as he had during the meeting (but not looking entirely happy either).

"Mumbo, I am so sorry.” Luke said before Mumbo could begin. “That wasn't a kiss of death, I promise, I was just lying for the diamonds.”

“I guessed.” Mumbo admitted as he walked over to Luke, coming to stand in front of him and leaning back against the table. “You did a very good job of seeming serious, though… is kiss of death a real thing?”

"Kinda, but not like that- it doesn't matter, I promise I wasn't threatening you for real, I'm sorry.”

Mumbo half-chuckled. "You're apologizing an awful lot for someone who hasn't done anything wrong.”

“You looked like someone had destroyed your redstone circuit the entire meeting, Mumbo! I felt terrible.” Luke explained, rubbing his hands harshly against his face. “I really am sorry for that.”

“It’s okay, Luke, I forgive you.” Mumbo assured him, taking Luke's hands in his and swinging them between the two of them. They were silent for a moment before a spark entered Mumbo's eyes as he slyly asked, "Could I possibly get a non-kiss-of-death for my troubles?”

Luke grinned. “We might get caught again, you know.”

Given Mumbo had already moved to sit in Luke's lap, letting go of one of his hands to gently brush his knuckles across Luke's cheek, Luke could guess how much Mumbo minded. "We can always tell them it's another kiss of death.”

Luke wasn’t sure anyone would believe them about the kiss of death thing that time, all factors considered, but Luke would be lying a bit if he said that it mattered very much to him in the moment.

After everything they had gone through, Luke had to admit, the way they got caught was a bit amateur.

It was somewhat-early morning when Luke woke to someone knocking too loudly for the hour on his front door. Absolutely none of him was inclined to get up- the bed was warm, he was still tired, Mumbo was cute in attempting to use Luke's chest to block out the knocking and maintain his own state of sleeping peacefully- but the knocker clearly had no intentions of leaving soon, and Luke really wanted the sound to go away.

So, with great reluctance the whole way, Luke managed to stumble his way to the door, managing to pull it open and get halfway through, "What do you want?”, before he remembered one very important detail.

This wasn't his house. This was Mumbo's.

And given the way Grian's brief surprise quickly faded into a smug expression, he seemed to know it as well. "Sleep well?” He asked, sing-song.

If Luke had been more awake, he might have been able to talk his way out of this one. But he wasn't, and he didn't really want to try anyways, so he opted to simply shut the door in Grian's face without a word.

"Mumbo!” He called out as he sank tiredly to the floor next to the door, leaning his head back against the wall and trying not to fall asleep again right there. “Grian's at the door!”

It took a few more minutes before Mumbo actually appeared, shuffling in tiredly as he rubbed at his eyes. It was unfair how close he looked to put together, his suit-looking pjs and not nearly bedhead-y enough hair giving the impression he hadn't only just barely dragged himself out of bed.

He leaned against the frame of the doorway as he pulled it open, Luke unsurprised to see Grian's expression was unchanged.

"Who won?” Mumbo asked without pretense.

Grian laughed. "You guys did, bets have been off for a week now. We just thought it was more fun watching you try to hide it.”

"Why didn't you call us on anything?”

"Funnier that way. Plus, some of Luke's lies were… kind of terrifying, from what I heard.” Grian paused for a moment. "They were lies, right?”

“Only some of them.” Luke answered from his spot on the floor. "Sunburn and sunstroke are very real.”

Grian shook his head a little. “Remind me to never visit your old server.”

Luke gave him a lazy thumbs up.

“Drop the diamonds off later, would you?” Mumbo requested with a yawn. “I'm going back to bed.”

“Of course.” Grian said with another laugh. “I'm happy for you two, by the way. Now that you're not pretending to just be very awkward friends.”

Mumbo paused in his closing of the door, smiling. "Thank you. I'm happy for us too.”

And with that, he closed the door fully, the quiet sound of Grian's footfalls growing only quieter as he walked away, likely off to tell the rest of Boatem that the game was truly up. Meanwhile, Mumbo joined Luke on the floor, slumping against his chest and nuzzling his face into Luke's neck.

“I thought we were going back to bed?” Luke asked teasingly. Mumbo hummed an affirmative at him. “You know, using me as a bed only works for one of us.”

Mumbo offered no reply for that, managing to have already fallen back asleep. Luke sighed with no heat, running a hand through Mumbo's hair.

"You're impossible, babe.” He commented, smiling at the sleepy noise Mumbo made at him in response. Giving up on the one-sided conversation, and giving in to his desire to also be back asleep, Luke pillowed his head against the top of Mumbo's, lazily resting his arms around Mumbo as he closed his eyes.

The diamonds may have been a good prize, but for moments like these, Luke would've paid out of his own bankrupt pockets.

#lucky jumbo #luke carder #lucky carder #mumbo jumbo #boatem #hermitcraft #inscryption #m.y funky words #luke every time he's trapped in a corner: hey guys wanna hear about my 'server' that uve never been to

11 notes · View notes