Chapter Text
“My brave little spark…Can you do something for me?”
“Please sing one more time, sharing your life with others around you…It’s far greater than memory, as for its loss and love words cannot hold and will overflow…”
“And that will carry your light out to sea…”
~0 ~0~0~
She flew as fast as her little young wings could carry her as the Eyes around her were looking at her and following her.
She could hear the static noises and weird speaking from those bad people as they chased her, even tried to grab her wings, before the bright white-blueish light stopped them and opened a path for her. She looked back for a second to see where the light was before she took off flying while holding back her tears. The invisible purplish hands kept materialising around her and tried to grab her, but the white-blueish light kept shooting down the hands before those could grab her.
The portal at the end of the path was getting smaller and smaller as the purple light was fighting off the white-blue light, but she was small enough to go past the small portal before it was closed forever before her. The impact hurted her wings, but it wasn’t her concern.
“Mom…” She whispered, in pain and sadness. “Mom…I made it out…”
“But you don’t…make it out…”
She could only watch helplessly as the portal to her home server was closed and dead for eternity with strange purple marks all over it. It would never be reopened again, not even for her mother to come out. Her mother made sure of that. Her mother’s smile and last words were the last thing she saw before she took off.
She didn’t know what to do from here…She didn’t know if those bad people would go after her…Who could help her…Who could help her mother…
It’s finally sinked in for her.
She’s alone in this world.
~0 ~0~0~
Grian was in big trouble now.
He asked Xisuma if he could come with him and Keralis to the Main Hub to buy new blankets for his nest. The Main Hub was always a giant place where people from all different servers came for anything or meeting up with people from other servers. Xisuma had the Annual Admin Meeting at the Admin Council and Keralis was accompanying him. Mumbo tagged along to accompany Grian in his shopping, but he managed to lose him in the crowd of people.
Xisuma would scold him for this…At least Mumbo would join him in the scolding too…
Grian made some random turns before he realised he ended up in portal corridors. None of these portals led to the Hermitcraft server, so he knew he was totally lost. When he felt irritated at himself, he heard a sobbing coming from the other end of the corridor.
“...There’s no ghost player here right…” Grian felt pretty scared right now. He knew there would be some servers here that were just themed for the horror.
However, curiosity got the best of him and he followed the sobbing.
At first, he was glad it wasn’t a ghost. However, he found a young avian sobbing quietly while hiding behind a dead portal. It must have been the young avian’s home server.
What gave him the chill was that he recognized the familiar traces around the dead portal. He knew those traces anywhere. Even though he managed to run away from Them, the pain and trauma were still haunting him to this day.
It was The Watchers.
“Who…Who’s there…”
Grian snapped out from his thoughts and saw the young avian peeking from behind the broken portal. The sight of the scared young avian triggered his avian instinct to wrap her under his wings, but he knew that could make her run away in fear. She was wearing a Watcher’s Robe, but it was more like for someone else and not for her. It was too big and long for someone as young as she was. He didn’t know what she went through, but he knew enough it would forever scar her for life.
“It’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you…” Grian tried to coax her out, but she went further from him.
“Uhm…Oh, look!” Grian showed her his proud parrot wings. It took him a while to fix his original wings after The Watchers messed up his code and changed his wings. “You’re an avian hybrid too right? So do I. Do you want to see my wings?”
That got her attention, since she slowly came out from her hiding spot.
“It’s alright…My name is Grian, what’s yours?”
“......Hope.”
“Hello, Hope.” Grian gave her a bright smile. “Can you come out to me? I can help you.”
It seemed to do the trick. Grian could finally take a good look at the girl as she was fully coming out from her hiding spot. She had long silvery white hair and bright blue eyes. What caught his full attention was her wings. It was bruised and stained with blood. He didn’t know what happened to her, but he knew she would need immediate care for her wings or else she may not be able to fly again.
“Your wings are hurt!” Grian quickly became worried. The girl was shied away from him, but she didn’t come back to her hiding spot. Her wings were in disarray, he didn’t know how long she was hiding in this place. Hopefully not for so long.
“How long have you been here…”
“I…I don’t know…” She was holding back, still unsure of him.
“Alright, can you do something for me?” Grian asked gently, which she went quiet for a minute before nodding. “Can you wait for me here for a bit? I’m going to get you some health potions and some food, alright?”
“Alright…”
“I will come back soon. I can get you something, what do you want?”
“...orange juice.” Grian nodded.
With that, Grian nodded at the girl and went back to the shopping district.
~0~0~0~
“Goodness gracious! There you are, Grian!”
A familiar voice called Grian out and soon a familiar face with a glorious moustache came to his side. Being a good friend he was, he also carried the blankets he had already bought before. He just bought a couple of health potions, orange juices and cookies for Hope, now he was choosing a robe for Hope to wear and getting rid of that Watcher’s robe.
“Great timing, Mumbo. Which one of these that’s good for a young girl?” Grian just showed Mumbo the robes he thought would be nice for Hope. He didn’t pick anything that’s purple-coloured…or blue-coloured.
“Well…Pink is the safest choice if it’s for a young girl…” Mumbo gave his thoughts. “Wait a minute, why are you buying a robe for a girl? Aren’t you going to buy blankets for your nest?”
“Pink is a bit boring…Maybe the yellow one is better…”
“Grian!”
“Fine, I will tell you later!” Grian knew Mumbo, and everyone else, would ask the question. It’s not used to keep it a secret. “But not here. I will tell you when we get there.”
In the end, Grian chose a light orange shoulder cape for Hope. It was designed for avian hybrids, so the cape wouldn’t get in the way of the wings. He didn’t bring much to pay all, only enough for his nesting materials, so he borrowed some from Mumbo. Mumbo came prepared just in case, which Grian was grateful for. Mumbo still looked confused and suspicious, but he still helped Grian carry the stuff and followed him.
Like Grian expected, Hope was still there and hiding. She popped up for a second before coming back to her hiding spot as soon as she spotted Mumbo behind him.
“Don’t worry, Hope. He’s my best friend, Mumbo Jumbo. Look, he has an amazing moustache!” Grian coaxed her gently, in which the girl popped her head out to look at them.
“This is the girl you mentioned before?” Mumbo asked curiously.
“Yeah…She lost her home server and I don’t know for how long she’s here…”
Mumbo studied the dead portal in a slightly horror look. While it was rare for a server to suddenly die, it was still a heart-breaking thing to see. Knowing his best friend’s history, he could see he emphasised with Hope as well, as his home server was no longer available for everyone anymore. Not even him could come back for a visit.
“Alright, I have something for you.” Grian pulled out the cape and showed it to Hope. “I got this for you. It’s better than that robe right? Your wings are too restricted with that robe.”
Seeing the cape, Hope slowly came out to the pair and took the cape to see.
“Thank you…Grian…”
Grian smiled at her before helping her to take off that cursed robe. Underneath the robe, Hope was wearing a red skirt, a white dress shirt, black leggings, and leather boots. Her clothes were all tattered and looked a little too small for her. It looked like she wasn’t looked after nicely, or the Watchers didn’t really care for her. He quietly put the cursed robe in his inventory for him to throw it away to the void as soon as he went back to Hermitcraft.
The cape made her look a little bit better, but her wings were still Grian’s big concern.
“Okay, can you drink this potion? It will relieve some pains.” Grian gently handed her the potion.
“It tastes awful for me…” She made a disgusting look. It seemed she wasn’t a fan of potions.
“You can have a cookie if you drink the potion.” Mumbo also joined Grian in coaxing her into drinking the potion. She still wasn’t convinced.
“2 cookies?”
“...”
“3 cookies and an apple? You still have your orange juice as well.”
“...Alright.”
Hope finally drank the potion, despite her feeling disgusted by it. The taste of potion was quite an acquired taste, but most people had to get over the taste in one way or another. The potion seemed to do the trick as he watched her wings healing up steadily. Thanks to the food, Hope was more relaxed with both of them around.
“So Hope, how old are you?” Mumbo asked while taking a cookie again.
“I’m 8 years old.”
“8 years old? I thought you’re younger since you’re quite small.” Mumbo was surprised by it.
“Everyone said that, Mom said it’s because my bird species has a small body.” Hope said it in a matter-of-fact tone.
“Everyone?”
“Yes, there’s people on my home server…Mom’s friends and families…But I don’t know where they are now…According to mom, it has been a year since the bad people came.”
Grian couldn’t help, but was relieved just a bit. While he didn’t dismiss her trauma for being with the Watchers for just a year compared to him for 5 years, he never wished this upon anyone no matter what. He was more or less relieved she didn’t suffer as horribly as him, it took him a long time to heal thanks to the kindness from the other hermits.
“Speaking of your mother…where is she?”
The calm atmosphere quickly shifted to tense as soon as the question came out.
“She…didn’t make it through…”
Grian seriously wanted to strangle his best friend for being a spoon at the wrong time, but what happened already happened.
“It-It’s alright, Hope. She will make it out someday…” Grian tried to cheer her up, but even he couldn’t guarantee it. However, lying would also hurt her as well.
“I…can’t guarantee it, but…I’m sure she will make it out one day…” Grian was contemplating it, unsure what to tell without breaking Hope’s heart. “However, I’m sure she wants to see you again…”
Hope was quiet, but nodded before munching the apple.
They fell into quiet time before Grian and Mumbo’s communicators rang. Keralis just texted them that Xisuma finished the meeting and told them to finish up the shopping quickly before meeting up with them to go back to their server.
“Grian, what should we do… We can’t just leave Hope behind in the Main Hub.” Mumbo asked in a concerned tone.
“Well… We have 2 options here.” Grian stood up and dusted himself. “We can leave Hope to the Council for them to assign Hope to one of the orphanage servers…but I don’t think it will be a good idea considering her situation. As for the second option…We take her back to Hermitcraft.”
“That’s a bad idea, Grian!” Mumbo yelled. “I would agree with you if you put her in your private world, but Hermitcraft…I don’t know!”
“I can’t just leave Hope alone, not even in my private world. You know that avian hybrids are social creatures, they need constant interactions or else they will be stressed out and miserable. Hermitcraft is perfectly safe and she will have many people to interact with.”
“...Let’s just hope Xisuma won’t scold us for this…”
~0~0~0~
“...Grian…Mumbo…What have you both done this time?”
Grian and Mumbo went and met up with Xisuma and Keralis at the meeting point they decided together, with Grian carrying Hope in his arms. Xisuma gave them a tired look while Keralis looked like he wanted to comfort the young avian. Hope was really shy towards the pair and Grian couldn’t blame her. Xisuma was wearing full armour while Keralis had big doll-like eyes, but he knew they were good enough.
“We found her…Well, Grian found her.” Mumbo spoke up quietly.
“Her home server was dead, she will need a new one to thrive.” Grian added.
“Well, we can take her to the Council-”
“We can’t!” Grian cut Xisuma off. “She…Her situation is a little bit different…”
Xisuma, being an understanding person, turned to Keralis who was confused about Grian’s sudden outburst. “Keralis, can I speak with Grian for a bit? Take the girl and Mumbo with you.”
“If you said so, Shashwammy.” Keralis came up to Grian, looking happy to see Hope.
“Hello, little one. What’s your name?”
“...Hope.”
“Alright, little Hope. Shashwammy and Brian here are going to have a talk for a bit, so let’s get some ice cream with Bumbo.” Keralis easily and effortlessly took Hope from Grian’s arms. She was surprised at first, but calmed down a bit.
Xisuma and Grian watched them going to the nearest stand that’s selling ice cream. They stayed silent for a bit before Grian broke the ice.
“Her home server was invaded by the Watchers.”
Xisuma gave him a worried and firm look. There were a few people who knew his history with the Watchers, Xisuma was one of them since he was the admin of Hermitcraft. However, he knew about the Watchers long before he met Grian. Being a voidwalker, he’s no stranger to the Watchers and sometimes encountered them in the past. It was also the main reason why Hermitcraft was the safest place for Grian…and Hope. It was thanks to Xisuma for creating the safest place from the Watchers.
“...Bringing her to the Council will make it worse then.”
“Yes. While I think they would still assign her to an orphanage server, the Watchers can still easily invade that server to take her back and it will result in more casualty of innocent people and children. I still don’t know what they want from her, but I know it’s too dangerous for her and others. Right now, Hermitcraft is the safest place for her… It’s the safest place for me afterall.”
“......I’m sorry, Grian, but we need to respect the rules.” Xisuma stated carefully, which almost broke Grian’s heart. “However, we can still bring her to the server temporarily. Since she’s under 18 years old, she doesn’t need to be whitelisted to enter as long as she’s with a member of the server when entering.”
“Oh, Xisuma, thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet, Grian.” He said it firmly. “We still have to bring this up at the next meeting. She still needs the votes from others in order to stay on Hermitcraft permanently. Don’t forget we’re still in the middle of the season, which can weigh on the voting. For now, she can come with us.”
But it’s still a good start, and Grian couldn’t be more thankful.
At least, one innocent soul could be saved from The Watchers.