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It’s not a game, it’s a shopping experience.
That was how Grian had described this project to Impulse when he asked for his redstone expertise. It was endearing, how Grian came to him specifically, despite the many redstone experts in the server, some being good friends with him too, like Mumbo and Iskall, and lately Grian also had been getting closer to Etho as well.
And yet, it was Impulse who Grian chose to ask for help with his project.
They were friends, and Impulse shouldn’t really look too deeply into it, but he couldn’t help the fuzzy feeling of happiness in his chest when he thought about that.
This would be the last big project of the season for Grian, one last build, one last minigame before the season ended. Already the Hermits were winding down from this world, many had finished their projects while others hurried to build the last few adjustments needed to call things done. Impulse himself had been in the latter category. His mission of making a farm for every farmable resource wasn’t exactly done, but if he was being honest with himself, he did make the ones that really mattered and what was left was mostly useless things to have in surplus like berry bushes.
So he was more than glad to help Grian with this last project. It reminded Impulse of the end of the previous season, when he and Grian had also built a redstone track to take someone on a joy ride. He briefly wondered if they would start making this into a tradition.
Impulse wouldn’t mind if they did.
It gave him an excuse to hang out with Grian. This mischievous gremlin who brought so much joy into Hermitcraft with his ideas and his pranks. Impulse realized this likely would be the last time they hung out together before the world jump to the next season and that could take a few weeks before happening, so he intended to enjoy the moment for as long as he could.
And if what it took was filling shulker boxes after shulker boxes full of random items for the barge sweepers to take, then so be it.
And to be honest, despite the repetitive grunt work, the conversation and banter was enough to make it worth it.
“This is the last of it, isn’t it?” Grian said a few hours later, kicking the shulker box at his feet close after he was done filling it with the last of the random items. He gave a satisfied sigh, stretching his arms, wings and torso to take the stiffness from them. Impulse started at the way his arms lifted up, how his wings seemed to almost cover the entire wall and the way his red sweater rode up, just slightly, exposing the skin underneath.
He shook his head and forced himself to look away, hoping the warmness on his face wasn’t an obvious blush that Grian would notice. “Are we done then? Is the HCBBS ready to play?” Impulse asked with a smile in his voice, even as he kept his head down to hide his face for now.
“Technically, yes. But I would like to test it one last time. Just to make sure the timings are right. we spent a lot of time fine tuning it.” Grian answered, looking at the tracks thoughtfully. It was Impulse who had done most of the work to get the timing right. It was the kind of redstone magic Grian didn’t know enough about to get right.
“Oh! I haven’t tried the whole ride yet. I can do it!” Impulse said eagerly, collecting the leftover items before making his way out of the barge, Grian walked by his side, their shoulders almost touching but not quite.
“Oh no, Impulse. You’ve done a lot already. I can do this last test, don’t worry about it.”
“No, but seriously, I can do it. I want to” Impulse insisted and from his inventory he took out a music disc, the one Grian had modified to play the instructions and song for his mini game. “Actually, I’m already doing it!” He laughed before jumping and using his rockets to fly away towards Aque Town, where the Barge Co. HQ was located.
“IMPULSE!” Grian took the challenge for what it was and took flight as well, his powerful red wings leaving a gust of wind behind when he lifted off. He followed Impulse, quickly gaining distance with the advantage of not needing an elytra to fly. Even then, it was not enough, the trip was a short one, and by the time Grian caught up they were practically above Barge & Co. and Impulse was already landing in front of it.
Grian landed a second after him “Impulse! You can’t just steal my music disc and run off! I’ll do the testing!” He jumped at Impulse, intending to grab the disc, but Impulse lifted it up above his own head in a way Grian, being much shorter, could not reach.
So Grian, of course, did what any parrot who really wanted something did, and started climbing Impulse’s shoulders to grab the disc.
“Grian! Stop! You can’t take it! I’m doing it” Impulse protested, shaking the disc back and forth to avoid having Grian take it while also trying to shake him off of him. Both of them were laughing like madmen, Grian clinging to Impulse for dear life, his wing flapping wildly in an attempt to keep his balance as he was not willing to give up on the music disc.
Grian finally managed to grasp the disc, just barely, but enough for him to try jumping off and running away with it, but Impulse kept hold on it as firmly as he could. They borth tugged it back and forth, once, twice, three times, until Grian turned suddenly, taking the disc with him. There was a distinctive crack as the disc snapped in half, Impulse fell backwards and landed on his butt while Grian was flung out of the building by his momentum. Each holding a piece of the disc.
Impulse looked at it in dismay, he hadn’t meant for the playful fight to go that far. He got up and ran towards Grian with a genuine apologetic look “Oh no! G! I’m so sorry! Are you okay?”
Grian was sitting up, looking at his own half of the disc in shock “I didn’t know these things broke” and then he laughed, loud and delighted, and Impulse couldn’t help but join him.
“Oh man, Now what? Will you have to make another one? We can’t test the timing without the disc”
“Don’t worry. I got it” He jumped back on his feet and hurried inside the building again, making a beeline for the Ender Chest. He rummaged around for a moment before he pulled out another disc, similar to the one broken “I made more than one after I blew the first one up in the first version of my elevator. Just in case.”
“Oh good.” Impulse said, relieved. He would hate it if he ruined the whole thing by breaking the only disc.
“So now...” Grian glanced at Impulse and there was a mischievous glint in his eyes that spoke of trouble. Impulse lifted his brows in both curiosity and wariness. “We both want to test the ride right? So how shall we solve this conundrum?”
And Impulse opened his mouth, ready to say Grian could go, it wasn’t that important and he wasn’t being that serious. But Grian didn’t allow Impulse to speak.
“I know! We just have to go together! Right? Easy solution, everyone is happy!” Grian was grinning as if he just had the best idea in his life.
Impulse glanced at the track, then glanced at Grian, then back at the track. “The track is not made for two minecarts. We might break the redstone, especially if we test the alternate paths.”
“We can ride the same minecart, it's fine!” Grian bounced to the start of the track and plopped a minecart down before he glanced at Impulse expectantly “C’mon, get in! let’s go!”
“Are you sure about this?” Impulse asked doubtfully. Two of them, in the same minecart, it sounded like a disaster waiting to happen. Especially considering how bouncy the ride was made to be, courtesy of Impulse himself.
“I’m sure. Get in the cart, Impulse!” Grian ordered with a laugh and although Impulse still had his doubts, he did as he was told. He carefully got into the minecart, trying to leave enough space for Grian to climb in as well.
It was not an easy fit. Impulse was a big guy, and while Grian was much smaller, his wings made quite difficult to settle comfortably. They grunted as they shifted, Impulse getting slapped by Grian’s wings more than once. In the end Impulse was squashed into the back of the minecart while Grian sat practically on his lap. His wings folded tightly between them.
“Whose idea was it to try to squeeze us both in a single minecart?! I want words with them!” Grian complained cheekily once he was settled.
“No idea” He huffed a laugh, and they both could feel it. Impulse tried really hard not to think too much about how close they were to each other.
An impossible task. How many times had he thought about being close to Grian like this? about wrapping his arms around him, taste his lips or even just hold his hand, however briefly. And now it was like getting all his secret lovestuck wishes in one dumb, stupid and incredibly embarrasing moment that felt like it was designed to torture Impulse specifically. Why did he agree to this? Oh yeah, Grian smiled and made it sound like a perfectly reasonable idea.
Impulse could feel every movement, every shift Grian made. Every Time he spoke it was like whispering into Grian’s ear. This had no right to feel so intimate. Impulse was grateful that Grian could not look at him right now, he was quite sure his face was the same color as Grian’s sweater.
Briefly, Impulse wondered what would Grian do if he did wrap his arms around him and held him closer. Would he allow it? Would he like it?
He shook his head.
“Ok, are you comfy? Let’s gooo!” Grian didn’t wait for an answer before he inserted the disc into the jukebox, prompting the minecart to move forward.
The first drop down already was enough to make both of them yell. Being in a minecart definitely not made for two people made the ride very unstable. Grian tipped forward as they went down, and Impulse grabbed him by the waist without thinking, holding him back to avoid having him fall.
In response, Grian briefly looked back at Impulse with a cheeky grin before he leaned against Impulse’s chest.
Grian’s own recorded voice spoke to them as the minecart passed by the first shulker box, the timing was perfect and Grian even opened the box right before the recorded him lamented about it being empty.
The first alternate path was activated by Grian as they passed the lectern with a book on it. Grian flipped the pages as fast as he could, causing the tracks in front of them to flick. The Minecart took a sharp left into a side room that had more empty isles and a few shulker boxes. It then took a right and they were taken to a replica of the early shopping district, with all the mycelium they could wish for and more importantly:
“The mini barge! I remember when it was just this little thing in the middle of the lake. But from what I remember though, HEP headquarters didn’t exist back then” Impulse said, opening the box on top of the mini barge just to see its contents. It was full of random mixed value items. Like diamonds and soul lanterns.
“Ehhh” Grian Shrugged and Impulse felt his wings shift “Details. I didn’t care for accuracy, I just wanted to include HIEP” He chuckled.
They moved on, back to the supermarket aisle room, and Impulse almost forgot to hit the daylight sensor to change the path once again. The Minecart took another left and they entered a room with a quartz structure in the back. Impulse still wasn’t sure what it was supposed to be.
He didn’t have to wonder for long, though. “Remember My season six base?” Grian asks proudly, gesturing at the quartz build. Grian’s first home in Hermitcraft.
“Oh, Is that what it is?” Impulse asked, sounding a little surprised, and looking at the structure a little more carefully he could see what Grian was going for.
“Oh please, it’s not that bad!” Grian laughed, not offended at all. “It’s hard to scale down a building so big to fit a room like this”
“I didn’t say it was bad! I couldn't have done a better job” Impulse was quick to reassure anyway “I just couldn’t tell what it was at first glance! We pass by very fast too” He said just as they left the area, rejoining into the main tracks that took them directly to Impulse’s green rollercoaster of slime and bounciness.
“Brace yourself!” Grian warned with glee in his voice and Impulse held Grian a little tighter. The first piston fired, making the minecart fly up to the sound of Grian and Impulse yelling. The fact that there were two people in it did not make the redstone less effective. They bounced on the slime blocks with a mix of yelling and laughing. At some point Grian almost slipped out of the minecart.
They were laughing as the minecart was pushed to the surface, it would have been quite the sight if someone was passing by the shopping district at that moment.
They went back down into the Barge Sweep tunnels without interruption and their laugh slowly died down as they passed by other rooms, corridors and caves. Grian and Impulse testing if they could reach the shulker boxes.
The track eventually took them to a cavernous area with a large chicken head at the back of the cave, overlooking anyone who trespassed into its lair.
“Oh man! Poultry Man! Who was he, I wonder. Important enough to be here, represented” Impulse teased, poking Grian on his side and making him squirm and try not to laugh.
“No idea! No idea! I didn’t put that here! It was the man in the chicken costume!”
Season 7 and Grian still insisted saying that. How could Impulse not find it endearing? They were still laughing as the minecart made its way to the next area. They passed a corridor that slowed the ride down briefly before continuing and the minecart came upon an open field, or as open as a field could be when it was built underground.
The main thing, however, was the replica of one of the RVs at the back. Impulse couldn’t hold his surprise “Whoa! I hadn’t seen this! When did you build it?”
Grian flicked a lever and the minecart turned on the track that took them into the vehicle. “I finished this room a couple of days ago. Do you like it? Remember when we became hippies?”
“Of course I do!” Impulse answered grinning “Oh man, the nostalgia! Those were good times”
Impulse thought back on those days, when they camped outside their vans, campfire crackling while food cooked, Ren played his guitar and sang to them. Occasionally Impulse and Grian would join as well.
Not to mention the reason why they got together in the first place: Bothering Doc and Scar, making problems on purpose, storming into their alien research facility.
Getting lost in the past because of a time machine.
That one was a little more intense than Impulse expected, if he was being honest, but not for a second he regretted it.
Their time as hippies had been the first time Impulse spent any significant time working with Grian. After the civil war where they stood on opposite teams, he had been curious about the newest hermit, who arrived and caused an immediate ruckus with his game ideas and pranks.
And just as he suspected, Impulse saw that Grian was like a beacon, full of energy, influencing whoever was near him, taking ideas and running away with them until simple pranks grew out of proportion and sucked everyone involved.
Impulse loved it. How could he not? It was the moment he and Grian had become proper friends. Though, if he was being honest with himself, he’d say it was also the moment his feelings started to run deeper.
He tried his best to ignore that, to not let a stupid crush get in the way of the genuine friendship they had. It would be stupid to jeopardize that just because he thought Grian’s smile was cute one time and then let his feelings get out of control.
But no matter how much he tried to suppress his feelings, it was a fact that Impulse would willingly let himself be dragged into Grian’s shenanigans anytime of the day just to see him laugh in that uncontrollable way when one of his traps worked right.
He was still deep in thought when the minecart passed through the RV and Impulse saw it had been adapted for the minecart ride too, with a few shulker boxes inside full of goodies. He smiled fondly as he noted all the details Grian put into the build, seats on both sides, the steering wheel, a mostly perfect replica with the exception of the added space for the prize boxes.
There were no levers or tricks in there, so they made their way across the room and forward. The hippie camp was the last decorated room, the music picked up the pace as it reached the end, the two of them making their way through a dark room, going up on the rails to the last stretch before they came out at the Barge where they gently stopped. The song kept playing for about five more seconds afterwards though.
Impulse felt Grian shift for a few moments before he settled again.
“That was pretty good, wasn’t it? The end was a little off though” Grian said thoughtfully, leaning forward to rest his chin on his hand. He seemed like he was in no hurry to move and Impulse was still very much trapped in the minecart.
“We can tune the timings some more” Impulse suggested. He shifted in place, trying to wiggle out of the cart, but it was impossible “Uh, Grian? Can you move? The ride is over” He laughed.
“Nope” Was Grian’s simple response.
“What? What do you mean, nope?”
“So uh, good news is the ride works, right?” He started,glancing at Impulse briefly, who just barely caught his cheeky smile. “Bad news, erm- I think we might be a little stuck”
“Stuck!”
“I can’t-” Grain struggled to move, trying to stand up, but his legs were pressing against the sides of the minecart and he wasn’t able to leverage himself up. He managed to free one of his wings though, and it immediately slapped Impulse’s face, making him yelp “Sorry!”
“Wait, let me-” Impulse was the one who tried to extract himself from the minecart next, gently trying to dislodge Grian from on top of him. He got a mouthful of feathers for his trouble. Both him and Grian were yelling at each other as they tried to get out, but the words didn’t really make much sense. The minecart jostled with both of them trying to exit at the same time, sideways, back and forth, until Impulse leaned back a little too much and he felt his stomach drop as the minecart tipped backwards, taking him and Grian with it.
Both yelled in surprise and Impulse got the wind knocked out of him when Grian fell heavily on top of him. Impulse groaned with his eyes closed, feeling the rails digging at his back uncomfortably, the minecart fell off the tracks. At least they were free.
He got one last face slap from Grian's wings “Grian! Stop that!”
“Sorry!” Grian turned around, bracing his arms on either side of Impulse’s face before froze on the spot. Impulse blinked slowly, staring at the man laying on top of him, their faces a few inches away from each other.
There was a long, dragged out silence where they just stared at each other. Impulse was fascinated to see Grian’s face get progressively redder the more time passed, but made no movement to stand up.
Not that he was any better.
As the silence dragged on for far too long and grew increasingly uncomfortable, Impulse finally broke it with a laugh, the tension dissolved as Grian joined him “Is this the part where you kiss me?” He said playfully, without thinking, poking Grian on the ribs slightly. But his words made Grian freeze again, his eyes going wide.
Maybe that had been out of line, uh? Good job, Impulse. You made things awkward!
He was about to apologize, but before the words were out he felt Grian press his lips against his. Rushed and with more force than he would expect from a kiss. Their teeth knocked together and Impulse tensed, his eyes widening in surprise. His heart started hammering in his chest in a way he was sure Grian would be able to feel.
He must’ve taken too long to respond though, because soon Grian backed away, looking at Impulse with mild panic. No, no, that wasn’t what Impulse wanted! So in the spur of the moment, he leaned forward before Grian could say anything and kissed him back.
He felt more than saw Grian relax on top of him. He braced his arms around Impulse’s head and leaned further, deepening the kiss. Impulse made a small pleased noise and closed his eyes. Impulse wrapped his arms around Grian, his fingers tracing his back through his sweater. He gently nudged Grian’s wings by accident and felt him shudder.
At that moment it was just him and Grian, nothing else existed around them. The rails digging at his back were forgotten, the fact that they were laying on the floor of the Barge in the middle of the shopping district where anyone could walk in anytime didn’t even cross Impulse’s mind.
When they broke the kiss, they were both panting, their faces a matching shade of red. Grian sat up, still on top of Impulse. He looked away briefly, dipping his face behind his sweater as if he was trying to disappear inside of it. The silence hung between them until Impulse couldn’t bear it anymore.
“So that was… good. Right?” Impulse said slowly, scratching the back of his neck awkwardly, but even if he wasn’t sure how to react, he was still smiling widely.
“That was… Yeah! Good. Good is right” Grian still seemed a little out of it as he answered, but he jumped on his feet after a moment and ran off to the barge entrance
“Grian! Wait, where are you going?” Impulse felt his stomach drop, his mind immediately running wild with worry that he might’ve done something wrong, that Grian was running from him. But the man stopped by the door, smiling at Impulse mischievously, the setting sun outside reflecting on his red wings in a way that made they seem like fire. Impulse stopped, holding his breath and he wished he could freeze that moment forever.
“What are YOU doing? Aren’t you coming? C’mon Impulse!” Grian gestured and when Impulse didn’t immediately listen, Grian jogged back to him and grabbed his hand. “I'm not letting you go yet. We’re going on a date. Right now.”
“What?” Impulse said. He willingly let himself be dragged along and his confusion turned into laughter midway through. Grian was not someone who waited around if he wanted something, Impulse knew that, but he didn’t quite expect this!
“It’s not optional. You’re coming. We’re having a nice date. Right now. Before the season ends!” Grian looked back at him with a smile and he felt a soft squeeze on his hand.
It was so late in the season, most everyone was either packing up, finishing their projects and getting ready to leave. This felt like the start of something new though, one last gift from the dying season to Impulse and Impulse only. He felt a swell of affection mixed with excitement for what was to come.
Things had to end so new things could begin. This was exactly it. Maybe he waited too much, maybe he could’ve said something sooner instead of pinning for most of the season but.. He couldn’t say he really regretted anything. Not when it lead up to Grian dragging him to the Moopop Cafe, hand in hand.
“You know… next season. We should live together” Impulse blurted out, impulsively, and Grian would probably appreciate the pun. A suggestion that came on a whim, later that same night, after Grian kissed him again while Impulse marverveled on how they had come to this when that same morning all he expected was to stock shulker boxes.
And Grian had looked at him in surprise, his black eyes seem to twinkle under the moonlight when he nodded.
“I’d like that.”