Watcher's Admins

Chapter Six

   All of their communicators were put away, but they knew everyone else had logged out. Grian yawned, rubbing his eyes and set down his pen looking around to everyone else asleep. 
    He smiled and closed their books, shut the lights off, and laid next to Pearl and Scar in one of the corners of the room, falling asleep quickly. The next morning, Grian was shaken awake by Hypno, which startled him quite a bit. Enough to throw a punch against Hypno’s side. 
    “Ow! Sorry Grian.” Hypno jumped and coughed, rubbing his ribs, chuckling as Grian sat up groggily. His hair a frizzy mess and his feathers ruffled in a startled or threatened type of way. His eyes had flashed purple  when he was shaken, which had initially caused Hypno to back up, but now back to their charcoal hue. 
    “What’s going on?” He mumbled getting to his feet, pulling his wings around him to soothe the feathers. “Everyone went home to sleep for the day, I waited for you to wake up but thought I should wake you so you could go home sooner.” Hypno explained. Grian yawned and simply gave a nod popping his back. 
    “Thanks Hypno. Go get some sleep yourself.” He left with him and split ways before heading right home. He took the quickest way, enjoying the warmth and scenery. 
    It reminded him that he needed to relax and take time to breathe. He felt like the events going on were slowly drowning him. He dove down once at his house and went inside stretching, hanging up his armor. It was bright out, maybe early noon, and he couldn’t find the urge to sleep again, so he decided to start to organize his chests. 
    He kept himself busy trying to tire himself out, not realizing that time was passing by rapidly. He stopped once he had filled four shulkers with all the wood from his chests to look out his window after grabbing water and saw the sun had already set and the moon was hanging high in the sky. 
    “Oh crud.” He muttered and rubbed his eyes heading to his room. He hit tab and realized he and Stress were the only two  online.  That brought some comfort that he wasn’t the only one online and he laid down trying to fall asleep. 
    He should be tired, right? But he wasn’t. He laid in bed, shifting side to side occasionally, listening to the ticking of the clock. Tick-tock-tick-tock. It was an annoying sound that normally lulled him to sleep. 
    He groaned and threw the blanket off of him and pulled his pillow over his head. He realized how uncomfortable his bed was when his wings flared out of frustration. One of his wings knocked over things from his side table. He heard the crashing of the terracotta pot which held one of the flowers Scar had given him. 
    “For pete’s sake!” He groaned and threw his pillow against the wall and sat up looking at the mess he had made. The feathers on his wings on his back and the smaller wings that sat at his temples that when folded cradled his cheeks to his jawline. 
    He grumbled and knelt down grabbing a new pot before setting the flower in it. He started picking up the flowerpot shards, ignoring that one of the pieces sliced his palm. Grian grabbed the broom and swept up, before there were a few knocks on his door. “Stress?” He tilted his head looking downstairs toward the front door.
When more knocking came he set the broom down and went to open the door. Stress stood there, soaking wet even though it wasn’t raining. Before he could utter her name, she took his hand and noticed the cut. For a shallow cut, it seemed to be bleeding a lot. “Grian what happened?” She asked, taking a cloth from her pocket and wiped the cut before wrapping gauze around it. 
“Stress.” He blinked utterly confused. She just scolded him, shaking her head like an upset mother. “Stress.” He pulled his hand away and put his hands in his pockets. “Hm?” She finally answered and looked up at him, putting the cloth in her pocket. 
“Why’re you soaking wet? Come inside…Silly thing.” He sighed pulling her inside, putting her on the couch. He grabbed her a towel and a mug of hot cocoa. “Did you fall into the lake on the way here? Why are you even here?” He asked, draping the towel over her shoulders. 
    “My elytra broke on the way here,thank god I was over water.” She shifted and took a sip of the cocoa. “As for why I’m here mate, it’s because I’m a bit worried about you.”
    “Worried about me? Why? I’m alright, just having an issue sleeping.” Grian shifted gently, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly. Stress gave him a look and motioned to his hand. 
    “Really that's all? You answer the door with a bleeding hand and look at you.” She motioned to his plumage. “You’re all…fluffy.”  Grian blinked and pulled his wings tightly against his body trying to smooth them. It was a bit too late to try and hide it.
    He looked at his lap, sighing. “Tell Stress what’s wrong.” Stress ushered leaning forward, setting the mug down.  He sighed and rubbed his eyes before looking at her. “There’s just a lot going on and at this point I feel like I’m drowning.” He couldn’t tell her everything. 
    He wanted to tell all of the Hermits, but he wasn’t comfortable yet. It would just put everyone else in danger. Am I just that? A danger to them? He thought as he rubbed his hands on his jeans. A hand on his shoulder brought him back to reality and he looked over seeing Stress had moved next to him. 
    “You did seem uncomfortable when we found the sigil. If you’re scared they want to destroy Hermitcraft, or look for you, those mean Watchers will have to go through the rest of us. So take a breath. You’re in this crazy dysfunctional family, remember?”  
    Grian nodded gently and closed his eyes, taking a breath. He groaned, rubbing his eyes. “Thanks Stress.” He patted her on the head and leaned back.  “You should stay here for the night, I have some XP bottles…somewhere. You can take my bed.” 
    “No it’s okay, mate, I just wanted to check on you. I can walk home.”
    “Stress, please. It’s a long walk and I don’t want to see a death message.” Grian chuckled and stretched. “No go. Off you pop.” He got up and pulled her to her feet, gently shoving her to the stairs. 
    “Okay. Okay you pesky bird. You should get some sleep too.” She jabbed a thumb at him before heading upstairs. Grian waited for a while. Listening to her shuffling about, most likely looking through his things looking for anything to tell her if he was being candor. 
    When the movement stopped, he waited for even a few more minutes to make sure she was asleep before getting to his feet. 
    Since he couldn’t sleep, he decided to get things done around the server. Set up pranks, stock every shop and put shulkers around his friend’s bases with a lot of  building blocks they needed. 
    The more he did, the more awake he became, but it did calm his nerves. When the sun was rising and others started logging on he plopped on the couch and closed his eyes putting an arm over them. He drifted to sleep quickly, wings sprawled out as he laid there clumsily. 
    His communicator buzzed, yet he didn’t wake up to check it. He just shifted, stretching his limbs. He didn’t know how long he slept, so when he woke up to the sun being in the same position as he went to sleep, it startled him.
    “Oh my…” He muttered and pulled himself to his feet looking at his communicator.
    <Pearlescent Moon>  so everyone has no clue where the building blocks came from? 
    <Renthedog>  yeah
    <XisumaVoid> it is weird that whoever they were did this in the span of us offline and before Jevin joined this morning.
    <StressMonster101> Grian and I were the only ones online last night but we were both sound asleep
    <DocM77> Speaking of Grian, where are you?
    Grian popped his back and typed in chat as he got his things together. 
    <Grian> I ended up sleeping in. why?
    <DocM77> we’re all at the game district. Were so bored.
    <Grian> Alright, i'm coming lol. 
    Grian smiled softly and made his way there. Peregrine diving down behind Scar and Doc silently before putting his hands on their shoulders. They stopped talking with Zed and Keralis jolting. A startled gasp combined with a creeper hissing coming from Doc which made Grian start cackling.  
    “Dude! How are you so quiet!?” Doc groaned and smacked him on his shoulder playfully. “For real man. That’s freaking terrifying.” Keralis snorted, holding up a laughing Zedaph who was holding his sides. 
    Grian smiled triumphantly and his wings flared out, putting his feathers in full display. He realized his friends haven’t actually seen his wings close up. “This is how.” He said and snickered at Doc’s eyes lighting up. “You're like a child Doc.” Grian smiled as Doc looked closer at them. 
    Doc clicked his tongue at him and crossed his arms. “You are one of the coolest avians.” He said and Grian tilted his head relaxing his wings.  “Red macaw in breed, but your wings are shaped like owls’.”
    “Oh that’s right you did say you were called an owl for your silent flying.” Scar snapped his fingers and smiled. “I did, though I didn’t realize that's why.” He muttered sheepishly. 
    “Well, now  you know. Come on, everyone is trying to decide what game to play. We wanted to wait for you and Jevin.” Keralis laughed and pulled him and Zedaph to the center. “There's the waffle head!” Tango threw his arms up and laughed when Scar toppled over as he tipped on his own feet. 
    “Sorry guys. Let’s get the game on.” Grian smiled and they started a vote to pick a game. After some slight arguing, they finally agreed on a sequence of games and played throughout the day. Some team versus team, others player versus player.  They even played hide and seek, using the entire game district as a map. It was a welcomed distraction, which they all seemed to need. 
    “Look out!” Grian shouted over at Cleo and Cub who were currently trying to avoid snowballs. The two looked up at him, which left them distracted long enough to be pelted by Scar, Jevin, and XB.
    “Grian you pesky bird!” Cleo groaned, shaking snow from her hair. “You’re on our team man!” Cub bellowed, laughing, chucking a snowball up at him as he perched on one of the beams that held the redstone lamps.  
    “Am I really?” He asked and hung upside down, gripping the beam with his talons throwing a snowball back at him. Everyone started laughing and it turned from two teams to one v one. It was a battle ground, and they had their fair share of wars.  
    Grian tried to avoid being pelted and the onslaught of Scar’s scary accurate throws, flying above them to try and get out of their range. Until he felt a cold wave of stinging pain rattle through his body. 
    “OW!” He explained in pain. His body tensed as he felt eyes on him. Cold void-like eyes. They felt…wrong. It was like they were cloudy, unable to focus on him. His wings closed tightly against his body and he couldn’t open them back up. After a second time trying, the cold pain spread again causing him to black out. “Grian?” Scar questioned, causing the others to stop and look up to see him falling. “Grian?!” Stress ran towards Scar, gripping his shoulder. 
    “Guys we need to do something!” Ren ran to where Grian would land with Etho and Tango. He looked towards Xisuma who had already launched himself up to Grian and made a grab for him. Missing by a hair.
    “Dammit!” He circled around and grabbed him again before circling down carefully. Pearl ran to them as Xisuma knelt on a knee leaning Grian against it. He’s cold. Why is he so cold? Xisuma thought for a moment and gently smacked his cheek to try and wake him up. “X?” Pearl knelt down as the Hermits circled them. 
“He’s freezing like something had sucked the warmth from him. He isn’t stirring either.”
“What would be able to do that?”
“I don’t know but we need to warm him up and see what’s going on. Doc, Zed. You two know the most about medicine. Stress, do you have blankets with you? We warm him up first, then move him to his ba-” He paused as Pearl straightened Grian’s collar a bit. He moved her hand slowly and looked at a faint marking. “That wasn’t there before.” He muttered and covered it back up. Stress ran to them and helped practically swaddle the shorter hermit. 
Xisuma stood once Doc took Grian from him and looked at his friends. “XB, Hypno, Scar. Once we get him to his base, I need to talk with you and Pearl. Everyone else, I know this is scary and you guys are worried but let’s give them time to see what’s going on.”
“Alright. You two will take care of my brother.” Pearl turned to Zed and Doc, her warm eyes now cold. Zed visibly flinched, Doc audibly gulping at the authoritative tone, before they both nodded. “Yes ma’am.” 
They were too scared to even process what she said, so they just ran to Grian’s base without another thought. Everyone else started to separate, some following the boys, others going to keep themselves busy.  
    When it was just the small group that constantly smells like coffee and ink stains in places left, Xisuma sat on the ground letting out a long shaky exhale. “Woah, X. You okay?” Scar asked, putting a hand on his shoulder. “We have a big issue guys…” X murmured.