Wisteria

Voices

Phil went inside a few hours later. He’d watched the moon fall, the sun rise and climb, and he figured, for now, he didn’t need anymore alone time. He was getting cold anyways.

He met Techno when he went inside. He was maneuvering around the wall of chests to craft what seemed to be some golden apples. Phil walked up to him.

“Need any help?”

Techno, warned of his presence by the door, shook his head.

“No, almost done,” and, right on cue, he finished the last one. He split the pile up, keeping some to himself, handing some to Phil, and tossing the rest in a chest that he pretended he would organize later. He bit into one and leaned against the chests.

“So, you’re back inside for now?” Techno asked casually. He knew that it was Phil’s way of distancing himself without actually going far. He didn’t know why Phil felt the need to distance himself and didn’t care to ask- he knew there was no point.

Phil nodded “‘Til further notice.”

“Good, actually, because I was thinking about somethin’,'' Phil raised his eyebrows “Ranboo asked where you were this morning. I told him, figured you could send him off if you wanted to. But thing is, when he asked, he called you Phil.”

“Oh, huh,” Phil said.

“Yeah- I mean, your name in Piglin isn’t drastically different- obviously, that’s how language works- but the fact that he knew that your name in English was specifically Phil means he either managed to decipher your name from us talking, or-”

“-Or he still knows a little bit of English, subconsciously,” Phil finished. Techno nodded.

“So,” Techno took another bite from the apple “I figured we could maybe try and… coax ‘im into it, y’know?”

“Ooh, yeah, alright,” Phil said “Either it’ll work or it’ll be funny.”

“Exactly.”

 

Ranboo was upstairs. He was getting used to being upstairs, he liked it up there, though-

He looked out the window across from the bed, being met with his dull wooden shack.

He still felt like he was being something of a nuisance to Techno and Phil. He tried to piece together everything he’d been told, but without the context of his memories it all hardly made any sense.

At some point he left the End and got trapped here, apparently some twenty phases ago. He lived with Techno and Phil, he had his shack, and it seemed like everything was going just fine. Until he forgot, anyways.

Forgetting. He remembered the memory book he’d found. That would probably be the most helpful thing if he could actually read it. He looked over at it as it lay on the ground. Taunting almost.

Something else came to mind. What Orlen had said. 

“I don’t think we’ve ever found you so lucid before.”

They never elaborated on that. What did that mean?

“Even before then you weren’t really yourself. Not very aware, kind of just wanderin’ about for a little over a week.”