Child's Play - A Hermitcraft 8 AU

I need a hero to save me now (pt. 4)

Summary: Ren swoops in and helps Mumbo through the emotion rollercoaster of being a teen + living in a world post-earthquake.

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Five days. Five days since the earthquake. There had been a few more aftershocks and a few reports of quakes that weren't strong enough to be properly felt. Though, with Pearl there, especially for the first few days after that fateful night, Mumbo wasn't quite so consumed with fear.

Besides, he was big now, and being thirteen now meant there was no room for fear at all.

So yeah, Mumbo was doing fine. Just messing around with that one redstone project for the future meeting he was trying to fix about a week ago. At first it seemed the launchers didn't want to catapult him properly, and when testing it with other hermits, it was beginning to actually be a problem. That being said, after hours of messing around with it, he found a way around the design flaws.

Seven hours, to be exact.

He'd only taken about three breaks during all that. Despite knowing he should take a break, he was getting so close to being finished that he couldn't just stop now. And after this he'd need to make a replacement for him as he wasn't planning on "officially" attending the meeting. It'd be more fun to have a robot replacement of him anyway.

But before he could fantasize about any new projects, he got a message.

<Rendog>: Hey dude. Near boatem atm restocking shop. Would you like to hang around mine and Doc's area later today?

It was weird to get a message like this, from Ren nonetheless. Nobody really asked Mumbo for company—to be fair, he may have accidentally sent the message to Mumbo. That wouldn't be the first time something similar had happened.

<MumboJumbo>: got the right person?

<Rendog>: You live in boatem right?

What kind of question was that?

<MumboJumbo>: yes

<Rendog>: Ok. I thought I got where you lived mixed up with someone else for a second. No, I meant the invite for you. I'm near your place so I thought, why not?

<MumboJumbo>: so you want to hang out with me?

<Rendog>: Yeah dude. Why not?

That was the thing about Ren: he was always super chill and friendly. For whatever reason, he didn't mind Mumbo's awkwardness in the slightest.

<MumboJumbo>: alright. if you're not going out of your way. you do realize I've died recently right?

<Rendog>: Yeah, I heard. Chat doesn't lie lol. I thought you might want some company and I thought I'd be bored after all this restocking... it's so booooring. I'll be over in about half an hour. Expect to stay at my place overnight, k?

Wow.

So, uh, that just happened.

"It'd probably be best that I get cleaned up before he comes by." Redstone work got one messy and unpresentable. Despite knowing that Ren didn't care far too much about a lack of order or (excessive) mess, Mumbo still did care about the way he was presenting himself. And besides, he had half an hour to kill and it wouldn't do good to get caught up in another redstone project.

He was clear of all stains from the red dust and all burns were cared for as Ren came flying in. "Hey MJ!" he called, started to slowly glide down from the sky into Treesa.