#watcher!grumbot | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

votederpycausemufins · 1 year ago

Text

aaaaaa I forgot to upload the last two chapters of do bots dream of electric lives to tumblr!!! this is why you should also follow the ao3 linked in my pinned post.

When Jrum woke up, he found himself still holding Grum’s hand as they laid in their daddy’s bed. That being said, the bed’s owner was not with them. Mumbo had obviously managed to wriggle himself out and not disturb the kids, which was nice, but it made Jrum curious as to where he had gone.

Thankfully Jrum didn’t have to wait too long as once he rolled over to his other side, he saw his daddy standing in the doorway, fumbling with his comm. He pressed a few buttons on the screen and then there was the staticy noise that had been there last night. When it stopped, Mumbo just pressed a few more before the noise came back, this time making him huff.

Once the noise stopped again, Mumbo put his comm in his pocket and turned back towards the bed, freezing for a moment when he noticed Jrum looking at him. “I’m sorry, did I wake you up?”

“Mmn mmn.” Jrum mumbled, still lying down and unable to shake his head. “Woke up on my own. Grum’s still asleep.”

“Ah. Well I’m trying to call your dad, but it won’t go through no matter what I try. And it’s not like he’s just not able to answer, it just doesn’t seem to be reaching him in the slightest.”

“That’s stupid.” Jrum replied, his arms flopping into being crossed. “Suma said he got calls with Dad, m’be he can do it?”

“I suppose I could try, but it’s still a bit early.”

“Pleeeeaseeee?” Jrum whined, making the eyes in his screen big and watery and his mustache droopy, doing his best at sad puppy dog eyes.

“Well…” Mumbo started after being subjected to the look for long enough. “I suppose this is important enough. I’ll message him, and if he doesn’t respond, I’ll fly over. If I do, while I’m gone can you find your brother’s board. It might have just been a nightmare, but it’s better to be safe.”

Jrum nodded, and when Mumbo did have to end up flying to Xisuma’s base, Jrum dragged himself out of the bed to look around. Unfortunately, with all his looking, Jrum couldn’t find the board. He tried to think of where else it could be before coming to the realization it was probably packed up and in one of the shulker boxes Grum had packed and given to Xisuma.

Once he had realized that, Jrum sent a message to both his daddy and Xisuma, knowing at least one of them would have to see it. With that sent, Jrum went back to the bed to see if Grum was still asleep, which he was. Jrum climbed back into the bed so that his brother wouldn’t be alone, but then he had an idea. Daddy wasn’t the only one with a communicator, Jrum had one too! He could try calling Dad and ask for help!

Unlike the static noise Mumbo had been getting, Jrum’s call seemed to be going through. Dad wasn’t answering, but he might have been busy or didn’t notice. When it finally failed, Jrum waited a moment before trying again, this time the call being picked up. “Hi sweetie, is everything okay?”

“Hi dad! Uh, well first of all we miss you lots. But other than that, Daddy was having trouble calling you last night ‘n this morning so he went to see X. I was trying too to see if it might have just been his comm. If you haven’t gotten a call from X, he might do it soon.”

“Oka- Scar don’t! I’m still setting up the minefield! Stay in the bunker. Sorry Jrum. Things are heating up over here, so if that’s all…”

“It’s not!” Jrum quickly said. “See, Daddy was trying to call because Grum had a really bad nightmare last night. Like really bad. We don’t know what it was, and Daddy might have just been calling when it was really bad but since he tried more this morning, then maybe there’s more stuff I don’t know.”

“How’s your brother doing?”

Jrum looked over to the bed, Grum still sleeping, which while okay, still made Jrum a little worried. “He’s still sleeping. I think it drained his battery so he’s sleepin’ in. He also got his stuff packed and gave it to Xisuma, so all the helpful stuff is not here.”

There was a sad sigh from the other end. “Alright. I’ll message Xisuma to see if he can be a go between for me and Mumbo for now.”

“Okay! Oh, but he might still be sleeping, so if it doesn’t work I could do it!” The other end was quiet, long enough, Jrum wasn’t sure if his dad had hung up. “Dad?”

“Yeah uh, that could work. It just might be better if it’s not through you. Just in case.”

“I guess.” Jrum huffed. “I just want to help.”

“Well being there for Grum should be enough. Now I’m going to hang up and message Xisuma, then make sure Scar doesn’t blow up this entire desert.”

Jrum said bye to his dad, ending the call before sending a message to Mumbo saying he talked to Dad, forgetting the comm probably wasn’t working, then sending a similar message for Xisuma to pass on once Jrum remembered the problem.

After doing all that, Jrum just… sat. He didn’t really know what to do now. Both his dads were away, Grum was still asleep, most of the stuff he could play with was packed away, and… he was admittedly scared. He had been for a while too. This world was his home. It was what he knew. The one exception to that was the world his dads used to build him the second time, so he could be like them. Like other players. But he wasn’t a player, he was a robot. He was built, not spawned.

Grum was too, and he had to wonder if he felt the same way about it all. That could have been what caused the nightmare. Jrum squeezed Grum’s hand in his own before sending another message to Xisuma asking if Professor Beak could be brought over as well. He didn’t have too high hopes with how difficult it had been to take the pet over there, but he could still ask, just in case.

Jrum jumped slightly as he was suddenly getting a call. He thought it might be from Xisuma or his daddy, but answering let him hear his dad’s voice again. “Uh, hello?”

There was a moment where Grian sounded far away, talking to someone else saying something was working apparently. “Hi, sorry to be bothering you. I know you probably want the adults to be handling this, but for whatever reason no one can contact anyone outside of the Third Life world.”

Jrum tilted his head in confusion before responding. “But… you’re calling me?”

“Yes, I am. Which is something we can talk about when I get home, but until then, could you message your daddy or X that I want the non hermits with me to be whitelisted? It’s a bit of an emergency. Just because of the communication issue, that’s all.”

Even with Grian quickly adding on the last part, Jrum could feel some panic rising up inside him. What was going on? And was it connected to his brother? “Um, o-okay I can do that.” Jrum said as he simultaneously sent the requested messages. “A-are you sure nothing else is wrong?”

There was too long of a pause from Grian before he spoke again. “Yes, don’t worry sweetie. I’m sure everything will be fine. Now I need to get back to what I’m doing and- oh we’ve got company. Sorry, gotta run.”

And Grian ended the call, leaving Jrum sitting there anxiously. It helped a little when he got responses from Mumbo and Xisuma, but they were simply regarding his other messages and nothing potentially connecting to the issue Grian had been referring to. Time seemed to fly in the blink of an eye, Jrum too caught up in his own worries. Because of it, he didn’t notice as Grum woke up, nor when Mumbo and Xisuma arrived with the items that had been requested. Even Professor Beak being placed in Jrum’s arms didn’t fully register to him.

He vaguely comprehended the worried noises of his daddy, who was concerned with the fact that Jrum was now also in a bad state. But Jrum didn’t register it as worry for him, but just worry in general, which built upon his own anxieties. And it likely would have continued if not for the fact that something completely new and unfamiliar shocked Jrum, finally grabbing his attention. “I’m here I’m here I’m here! I know you’re Mumbo so I suppose you’re Xisuma?”

Jrum looked over to see someone completely unfamiliar to him. They were a bit shorter than Xisuma, though that wasn’t saying much as the admin was on the taller side. The person was at least on the shorter than average side, though not by much. If anything, that technically made them taller than average due to the fact they were an avian, and they tended to be smaller to help with flight. Their wings were a sort of golden color, which seemed to match up with their hair. Though unlike his dad, this person didn’t have wing ears, and did their real wings look smaller than average? Perhaps they were only half avian. Was that even a thing?

Jrum was pulled out of his thoughts as they suddenly looked over towards Jrum, making him jump a little in shock. The jump made Professor Beak squawk, and Jrum looked down to finally realize the parrot in his arms, only to look up and find the maybe avian was now right next to the bed.

“So, which one of you is Grum and which is Jrum?”

“I’m Grum, he’s Jrum, that’s Professor Beak, and you’re Timmy.” Grum spoke from next to Jrum, making the younger bot briefly look in that direction before looking back as ‘Timmy’ frowned.

“Oh for goodness sakes, he’s already got you two calling me that?!”

“Uh, what do you mean?” Jrum spoke up, carefully petting Professor Beak’s beak to calm him down. “I don’t really know who you are, I guess other than Timmy?”

The person sighed, sounding frustrated. “My name is Jimmy. Not Timmy. Grian just likes making fun of me using that name. And I shouldn’t have said that part, should I?”

“I’m sorry Jimmy.” Grum responded, sounding truly apologetic. “I didn’t know you had a different name.”

Jrum saw that Jimmy looked surprised, wings even fluffing up after Grum used his real name. “I uh, huh. Well I suppose apology accepted.”

“Wait, how do you know Timmy and I don’t?” Jrum asked, both curious, but also holding back a smile as he saw Jimmy deflate slightly out of the corner of his eye.

“I um…” Grum started, hesitating, and Jrum saw him briefly glance over to where Mumbo and Xisuma stood. “I don’t know?”

“You don’t sound so sure of that.” Mumbo spoke, sounding a bit accusatory since it seemed obvious that Grum was lying. “How do you really know?”

“I don’t know.” Grum repeated, sounding more sure of himself this time. “I just do after sleeping and it doesn’t make sense.”

“Grum.”

“I don’t!” Grum argued back, Jimmy getting in the middle to try and ease tensions.

“So I might sort of actually know why, though that’s mainly because Grian thinks he does and so sort of told everyone that whoever died first needed to come here to check on these two and wait! I haven’t even checked if I can message him.” Jimmy paused, pulling out a communicator of his own and typing out a message. “Hmm, no I can’t. That’s not a good sign.”

“Is everyone’s comms broken? Because I could contact Dad just fine.” Jrum asked, before thinking a moment about what his last conversation had mentioned. “Though… he did say they couldn’t reach anyone else offworld.”

“Well, technically we could.” Jimmy pointed out. “But for whatever reason it stopped working. Well, I say for whatever reason, but through some taking Martyn thought he could pinpoint when it happened. Though there was also the incident with Scar.”

“Does my dad have Stockholm syndrome?” Grum asked, drawing everyone’s attention.

“Does he what?!” Mumbo asked, looking a little nervous.

“Oh man, there’s a lot more going on here than we thought.” Jimmy sighed. “Okay, one of you call Grian and we’ll take it from there.”

It took a while for Jimmy to explain. Half because he didn’t seem to fully know what exactly he was trying to explain, and half because between the four people he was trying to explain to, one of them always seemed to have a question about whatever he had just talked about. By the time everyone seemed to understand, Cleo had joined the world again and said she was on her way.

“So, let me see if I understand.” Grum said, Jimmy looking a little tired and worried he would need to explain all over again. “Dad is a Watcher, some other Watchers are helping run the game, they’re probably the reason that communication is cut off… and Jrum and I are Watchers as well?”

Jimmy sighed in relief before nodding. “Yeah, that’s pretty much it.”

“So, my weird dream was probably me watching what was going on?”

“That sounds like it’s probably the case.” Mumbo agreed as he walked back into the room, having stepped out around the time Jimmy had mentioned the connection between the bots and the Watchers. “Your dad might be a little upset at me giving these to you two, but with the current situation it seems important.”

Grum watched as a box was set in front of him and Jrum. It was fairly nondescript, a simple and shallow long white box. Opening it up were a pair of white… things, each featuring a black symbol that looked like a broken rectangle, two of the corners replaced with disconnected squares. Though Grum didn’t recognize the items, it was something that Jrum seemed to know about on some level as he gave a gasp upon seeing them. “That’s one of the things that was flickering on your screen after you had your nightmare dream thing.”

“Really? Huh.” And Grum carefully pulled one of the items from the box, Jrum picking the other up a moment later, though not as carefully. “So what are these?”

“Uh, masks I think?” Jimmy answered, Mumbo shrugging when Jimmy looked at him, apparently not knowing as well. “Your dad knows better than me. And I think also Martyn? The other Watchers and I have a… slight history, but I’ve never really seen them. And Grian’s never worn one of those around me.”

Jrum flipped the mask in his hands around and placed it on his face. Though it seemingly had nothing to hang onto, it stayed on Jrum’s face even when he moved his hands away. “Hey look! It fits!”

Grum gave a small laugh before doing the same as his brother. The top of the mask seemed to line up perfectly with the top of the front of the monitor that was his head. It covered up both the digital eyes on his screen, but also the camera that acted as his real eyes and let him see. Despite that, Grum could see just fine, almost like he was able to see through the mask. Surprised, Grum lowered the mask before putting it back on, repeating it a few times to make sure he wasn’t crazy. “That is… really weird.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s like I can see through it?”

“Oh hey! You’re right! I can too!” Jrum realized, messing with how he wore the item as well.”

“That’s probably something else you’ll need to ask Grian about. I mean your dad.” Jimmy said, correcting himself at the end.

“It’s okay, you can call him Grian around us if you want.” Grum said, placing his mask back in the box. “Our other uncles do too. And aunts. And auncles.”

“Oh, okay, that should- hang on, other uncles?”

“Yeah? You know our dad really well, so that makes you another one of our uncles. Unless you want to go by a different name.”

Jimmy looked shocked, not saying much until Mumbo nudged him slightly. “Oh uh, yeah! Sure, I guess I can be your uncle.”

“Yay! Uncle Timmy!” Jrum cheered, running over to hug Jimmy.

“No he’s Jimmy.”

“Timmy”

“Jimmy.”

“Boys, please don’t argue and give me a headache.”

“Okay Daddy.” Both bots answered simultaneously.

“Well, I guess I’m all done here? I should probably head back to Empires…”

“Wait no. Can you maybe stay a little longer?” Grum asked, grabbing Jimmy as he tried to walk off. “A-at least until Dad gets back?”

“Uh, yeah I guess I could.” Jimmy said, looking over toward Xisuma to see if he approved, which thankfully he did. “And I know Scott will be on Empires too, but I might try checking on him before we head back. So yeah! I’ll stay for a bit longer. Grian probably won’t take that much longer.”

“Yay!”

#hermitcraft au #hermitcraft #third life smp #3rd life smp #jrumbot #grumbot #mumbo jumbo #grian #xisuma #xisumavoid #jimmy solidarity #watcher!grian #avian!grian #watcher!grumbot #watcher!jrumbot

4 notes · View notes

votederpycausemufins · 2 years ago

Text

Another chapter of the fic for the metal hearts series. A good chunk of it might be familiar to people who have watched a certain series. the title is 'electric lives' for a reason

“Steak or Carrot.” Asked an unfamiliar voice, posing a choice between the two. Another more familiar voice chose steak while Grum liked carrots better due to their golden and thus more edible (for him) variety.

“Sail or Swim.” The first voice asked again with the second responding swim. Sail was better for Grum since redstone and water didn’t mix all too well. Grum may not know redstone well, but he knew enough to know he was made of it, and thus redstone’s weaknesses could also be his.

“Underground, or Mountain High.” The second voice immediately responded with underground, which made Grum pause to think. He was pretty sure underground seemed better. More resources than the top of a mountain.

“Green or Red.” Both Grum and the second voice immediately came to the same conclusion of red. Who knew why the other voice thought that, but Grum’s color was red. Most of his family, or rather, immediate family, used that color. So it made sense.

Then suddenly the unfamiliar voice was calculating results from the answers. Grum was caught off guard and tried to do the same. But he didn’t have enough information. What could the results be? What did the answers mean and how did they calculate the results? Was it a matter of proportion of A to B, or did the answers have values added together or-

“You have been sorted into Carrotyn!”

Oh. For the seriousness of the tone the calculating was announced in, Grum assumed it was going to be more important than just assigning Impulse into a- wait a second.

No longer distracted by the quiz, Grum had been able to focus enough to realize that the familiar voice belonged to Impulse. Not only that, but there were other people around.

Grum didn’t get much further than that, though. He wasn’t sure how his redstone didn’t break when he tried looking around. Grum seemed to be looking out of the eyes of one of the people present. Well, he was, but he was also simultaneously just behind them looking down at them. And then he was also in front of the person. Oh and also seemingly moving around them. It wasn’t that Grum was moving from place to place, but more like he was in all four places at the same time.

Grum tried closing his eyes, or his equivalent to that. Since this whole thing wasn’t truly real, it didn’t entirely work, but it did manage to limit what Grum was seeing and make it easier to process.

“Let’s- I’ll tell you what. Let’s follow Impulse and we’ll splice off and go to Joel’s just to see what’s going down.” The unfamiliar voice spoke up by the time Grum was more comfortable with what he was seeing. The ‘we’ being mentioned seemed to be a group of about six people, half of which Grum recognized. Or well, mostly recognized. Impulse of course was one of them, but there was also Etho and maybe Ren. Grum and his brother had been told about Renbob and how it was someone different and not Ren. From a few pictures, they had understood the confusion, and now this person and Ren looked even less similar. Though mainly that was from the ashy gray skin this Ren-like person had.

As for the other three, Grum had no clue. There was a person with similar gray skin to Maybe Ren, though there weren’t sunglasses to hide the piercing red eyes this person had. Also their arms weren’t entirely gray, fading into a purple as it got closer to their hands. The second unfamiliar person wasn’t ashen like the first and Maybe Ren, but their skin was similar to spruce, or maybe dark oak. They also had a beard that was similar in style to Iskall, though not as thick. The last unfamiliar person was the one who had asked Impulse the questions. They seemed to have blond hair held out of their eyes with some sort of headband, and then wore a lime jacket vest thing.

As Grum tried to figure out who the unfamiliar three or four were, the group headed out towards what the bot assumed was Joel since that name had been mentioned. Unfortunately most of the travel was quiet, so there weren’t many clues to go off of. To make it worse, when they finally arrived at a house, apparently Joel’s house, there were even more unfamiliar people standing on top of it. Well, mostly unfamiliar.

Someone with bright cyan hair stood closest and even looked back for a moment greeting another person and calling them Joel. While it seemed like they had been talking to someone else on top of the house, it may have been in a general direction as someone seemed to come from behind the house and that person seemed to be Joel as he responded to someone else using that name. They were yet another person with gray skin and also had red eyes, their one distinguishing feature being a red streak of hair that stood out from the black and dark gray covering the rest of their head.

As the main group started questioning Joel, Grum looked back up at the roof towards the three other people. Along with cyan hair was yet another ashen person, but they were a bit different. Their skin seemed to be a shade or two darker and instead of red eyes like the other two, they seemed to be a normal looking brown. They also had dark blond hair that had a singed portion, which matched other almost sooty patches that the person sported elsewhere.

The last person on the roof was thankfully someone Grum recognized, that being Cleo. It wasn’t much, her only being the third person Grum was sure he recognized out of ten, but it meant he didn’t have yet another person to try and figure out.

Grum tuned back into the conversation right around the time Cyan hair turned to Joel with a question. “Also Joel, speaking of burning stuff down, did you happen to have a meeting with a flint and steel and our wall?”

“Uh, no. I saw it burning though. I was walking past and I was like-”

“Why do so many people walk past and not decide to pop a message in chat, like ‘Hey, by the way, your wall is burning’. Twice!” Cyan shouted, obviously upset about the mentioned problem. As they continued to talk about it with the others, Green Jacket went into the house and up the stairs, joining the people on the roof.

Joel, who had also gotten to the roof a minute ago, noticed Green Jacket and pointed a crossbow at them, asking “What are you doing Martyn?” As Martyn tried to explain, Grum mentally checked them off from the list of unknown people. Four and six was more manageable.

Joel then spoke up, saying he had no allegiances, which had Singed Hair upset, claiming they thought he was with Martyn and crew. Apparently it was also news to Martyn who was now saying to the rest of their group that Joel had forsaken them.

Maybe Ren then claimed Joel was being added to some sort of book, saying so in an accent that made it seem even less like Ren. That got Joel to explain he apparently took down the banner signifying their allegiance when Scar said he would fix Joel’s roof in return.

Martyn and his group were upset by that, and Grum agreed. Turning around so easily just because Scar was promising something? The roof obviously wasn’t fixed, so it was just an empty promise of course. That’s what people got when they tried working with him.

Martyn then started antagonizing Joel until Joel fired at them. Martyn fired back until Probably Not Ren pointed out it was likely a losing battle. As they retreated, the people on the house kept attacking with bows, even once they were rather far away. Apparently Etho had died near the ‘Sand People’ and thus wanted his stuff back, so to retreat with purpose, the group started toward wherever that was, getting away from Joel’s house in the process. Even then, the house people were still attacking with their bows, which while not nice, did have Martyn call one of the people Skizzle. He didn’t catch which person it was, but Grum at least had one more name.

Once they were finally out of range, Martyn started mentioning how no one should trust Scar as he was just swindling everyone out of everything that they owned, which lined up with what Grum knew of Scar along with the lack of roof at Joel’s house. From there, Etho started to suggest if the burning of Cyan’s place was done by Scar, which had Martyn saying it was either Cyan himself, or Grian and Scar.

That sounded about right to Grum. If Cyan was still looking for someone to blame, they could have done it. Scar was apparently already causing issues and Dad- wait a second. Had they said Grian and Scar not Grian or Scar?

“What is the, uh, what is that thing where you like, get close to your captor. What’s that called?” One of the unfamiliar people asked. After a moment of thought, multiple people all thought of the same answer, stockholm syndrome, Martyn then saying Grian had it bad.

Grum’s mind started racing from there. He vaguely comprehended the laughter from the group, which pointed at it being a joke, but Grum didn’t think that was the case. Grian had specifically run against Scar. Well, technically Mumbo had, but Grian ran the campaign to go against Scar. At then he had made some war the two were on opposite sides of. And then last season he was running Area 77 against Grian. Dad did not work with Scar. He just didn’t. Such a sudden change shouldn’t be possible. Unless of course what these people were saying was real.

For some reason, Scar had captured his dad. Scar was already tricking random people, promising things he wouldn’t give and them listening anyway. And that seemed to be to people who Scar was just running into. If… if Dad was trapped by Scar… If he was forced to stay near Scar, and… and work for him…

Grum’s train of thought was cut off by his dad’s voice. The group was here for Etho’s stuff and Grian then said Etho could have his stuff. Scar tried to distract the group by bringing up the mysterious burning again, saying it couldn’t have been him because he used his flint and steel up burning Etho’s castle, which was apparently burning again. Grum was shocked at the statement, and even more by the lack of reaction that was given by those who should have cared.

Part of that was because Scar deflected back into the question. Martyn explained that they were already interrogated by ‘Timmy and Scott’, and then reiterating that he thought they did it themselves, so one of those names belonged to Cyan Hair. Then Scar said “Big B you disappoint me.” Likely another name. While having the names was helpful to slowly piecing together the puzzle of the people there, it still didn’t answer what was going on with his dad.

Etho took everyone off guard by messing with some noteblocks, meaning most people were looking away when a group of three approached, those being Cleo, Timmy or Scott, and Singed Hair. Apparently they were friends with Scar, though he had forgotten the word for a moment, probably just thinking of them as tools or assets rather than actually being his friends.

Marytn called over for Timmy, getting Singed Hair responding, apparently making Cyan Scott. Either way, they accused Timmy of burning down whatever was burnt down, which did fit with them looking like they had dealt with fire. Though that could have been from trying to put it out. In trying to defend themself, Timmy nearly accused Scar, showing how weak their ‘friendship’ was.

The one person apparently unaccounted for and could have potentially caused the fire was Tango, which Grum thought was a little mean since that could be them blaming him for being blazeborne, but if he was the only one not seen, it could have been him. And apparently they spoke at just the right time, because then he was seen at the edge of the nearby forest, getting a laugh from everyone at the timing.

Right after, arguing continued, people now building walls looking like they were preparing to either attack or defend or even both. Weapons were also being drawn and tensions were getting high, everyone starting to point fingers even more now. As Probably Not Ren tried to get their group ready for battle, Scar piped up saying he left something in the house he didn’t want people to get. He started running from the group, obviously using it as an excuse to let everyone else fight and leave him unscathed. But Martyn followed behind him, Grum happy that Scar wouldn’t be let go so easily.

But just as Grum thought that, Martyn doubled back, the rest of the enemy group scattering as well. With them all fleeing, Martyn regrouped with their team, agreeing that they should surround Scar while he was all alone. Unfortunately, once they attacked towards Scar, Tango had gotten to the swindler first and was potentially there to help protect him. Martyn tried to get Tango to talk and finally get an answer to who caused the fire. Scar on the other hand, was asking Tango for a warning when Martyn’s group arrived, not realizing they were already there.

Once Tango said he hadn’t caused the fire, Martyn started threatening Scar, saying he needed to hand over a banner, or he would kill what was likely a pet bee, the Beard Person clarifying they meant the bee, and not themselves, they being Big B.

Scar asked where his friends were, likely referring to his reluctant allies, who were nowhere to be seen. Hopefully that meant his dad had finally escaped and was free while Scar would be stopped. Slowly, the main part of the group drew Scar out while Martyn snuck around, breaking into the house and rooting through the chests. From outside, there was warning about plenty of TNT inside, but Scar then said it didn’t work, Etho apparently having broken whatever trap it should have been.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t broken enough, as there was then a sizzle as someone manually lit a piece of the explosives while Martyn was still inside. Scar cried out, meaning it likely wasn’t his doing, which meant that someone from Martyn’s team had likely lit it not knowing they were inside.

Explosions started to erupt and there was no way Martyn could escape, which is when Grum came to a horrible realization. He seemed to be stuck near Martyn, as everywhere he tried to look was focused around them. If Martyn died here, Grum wouldn’t get the answers that he wanted, maybe even needed. It was impossible. There was so much TNT, he was going to die. But Grum couldn’t let it happen. Not now. Not yet.

And then, someone agreed.

“It is not yet your time, green one.”

Jrum woke up when someone started shaking him. He groaned a little, just wanting to keep sleeping. It shouldn’t be time for him to wake up. Hasn’t he even gone to bed early? There was no way he slept in enough to be woken up. But apparently he was being woken up nonetheless.

He reluctantly rolled over and looked at whoever was shaking him. Two things were made clear once he looked. First was that Grum was the one shaking him awake, his screen flickering eerily between his face, static, and some weird symbol.

The second and more important thing, was that Jrum could see out a window and tell it was still somewhere in the middle of the night. When he definitely should be allowed to sleep. But both of them should be asleep. And if Grum was awake and acting weird, something was wrong.

Jrum wasn’t fully charged, but close enough, so he pulled himself out of bed and checked his brother’s charger since it was right there. After helping Grum get unplugged, Jrum took his hand and led the two of them to Daddy’s room, shaking him awake in turn to both make him suffer the same way Jrum was, but also to get his help.

Mumbo wasn’t roused easily, and more shaking on its own didn’t seem to do the trick. Jrum wasn’t sure if his daddy was awake enough to listen, but he tried saying something anyway, just in case. “Daddy, something’s wrong with Grum.”

For a moment, nothing really happened. Jrum thought that meant words didn’t work, so he was going to try more shaking. But Mumbo had just needed time for his sleep-addled brain to catch up and process the words before he immediately sat up to see what was going on.

Grum wasn’t flickering as much as he had been before, but it was still a concerning amount, that being that it was happening at all. Mumbo fumbled for his comm, trying to call someone, but Jrum could hear the other side of the line was just static. He either tried again or tried contacting someone else, only to get the same result.

If Jrum had felt concerned before, he was feeling almost terrified now. If Daddy couldn’t fix it and also couldn’t get help, what could be done? He even tried opening Grum up, something Jrum knew shouldn’t be done unless they were completely off or in emergencies, but Grum managed to slap Daddy away.

With no other ideas, Mumbo pulled the bots into the bed with him. Jrum clung to his daddy, just wanting some comfort from whatever was going on. Grum on the other hand just sat in place, screen still flickering ominously. At that point, Jrum was pretty sure the only possible solution now would be if Grum’s battery ran out, but that would likely take hours. They were built to last a whole day, so even half or even a quarter charge would last ages.

After a while, long enough that any mechanical form of adrenaline had worn off and Jrum was finding himself nodding off, the bot jumped a little when his daddy did the same. Looking over, the flickering of Grum’s screen was finally petering out, and he had stopped sitting up and was now leaning against Mumbo. After a moment or two more, there was then the sound of sniffling, like Grum had been crying. Obviously he hadn’t been, he was a robot and couldn’t cry, but sounds could help to convey emotion or whatever Mumbo had given as an explanation.

Either way, Jrum joined his daddy in giving Grum some comforting hugs. They had no clue if it was helpful, but Grum wasn’t pushing them away, so it was probably fine.

Eventually Mumbo pulled himself away to drag out the backup chargers in the room for when the bots ended up sleeping in there rather than their own room. He helped plug Grum in as Jrum plugged in himself, then they all got situated in bed. Grum was the first back asleep, likely worn out by whatever had happened. Jrum found himself drifting off not too long later, snuggling into the blankets and against Mumbo, but also making sure one of his hands was holding one of Grum’s. Again, he didn’t know if that would help Grum, but at the very least, it helped him.

6 notes · View notes