When the Dawn Breaks [TBAU]

☆ Chapter 24 ☆

"You can't stay in that room for the rest of your life, you know."

Impulse jumped at the sudden voice outside his room in the lodge, recognizing it as Xisuma and blurting out a quick response. "Yes I can!"

Outside the door, Xisuma let out an annoyed sigh, like that of a parent dealing with an unruly child. "No, you can't. You'd run out of food and die, you know."

"Technically speaking, that would be the rest of my life though," Impulse argued back. Though X made a good point, the only food he had left in here was– he did a quick mental tally – two apples, a box of crackers, and some water. Definitely not enough to keep him alive for an extended period of time.

" Impulse... " Xisuma groaned, words trailing off into a dull thud that sounded suspiciously like him hitting his head against the door. With a small grimace, Impulse caught on to the desperation in his tone. "'M sorry," he muttered, a bit timidly, "I just don't know what to do , okay?"

"I know, I do, but if you just..." Xisuma cut himself off, seeming to lose his words for a moment. "Why don't I come in and we can talk about it?" he finally settled on.

Impulse instinctively nodded, before realizing that, in fact, X was not able to see him nod. "Yeah, that'd be fine," he said, running a hand through his hair nervously. He didn't look to see the mayor step inside and shut the door behind him, taking in the room. Impulse sat at his desk, fiddling with some redstone components. He turned his chair so that he could face Xisuma, still holding a small lever.

Xisuma took a small breath before getting straight to the point. "You've gotta tell them something soon, Impulse."

Sucking in a shaky breath through his teeth, Impulse flicked his lever around and didn't give Xisuma an answer. His clock contraption on the table didn't respond to the wireless lever like it should have, so he gazed at that instead of meeting Xisuma's eyes. Xisuma fidgeted with the hems of his gloves, waiting for Impulse to say something even though he'd chosen to ignore the endborne. Impulse was going to tell them about being a demon and everything, he was!

He just didn't know when. Or how.

Eventually, Xisuma gave up waiting and took a step over to poke at the redstone contraption. "This an Etho Hopper Clock?" he asked, genuinely curious. Impulse nodded, a verbal answer seemingly dying in his throat. "This piston's a little off," X leaned over and nudged one of the pistons into place, "...there, try it now."

Impulse did, flicking the lever back into the on position. The contraption worked, pistons pushing back and forth, items moving around and making it tick like a metronome. Satisfied with the machine, Impulse smiled, turning it back off and placing the lever onto the table again.

He shifted to face Xisuma, realizing X had probably only fixed his machine to get his attention back on the more pressing matter. But X was good at hiding his emotions and intentions behind that mask of his, so Impulse couldn't really tell.

"I'm not going to push you to tell them if you really don't want to," Xisuma remarked with an apologetic tone. He sat down on the edge of Impulse's bed and crossed his legs underneath him, tipping his head into his hand and keeping eye contact. "But, I can't control what the others do, and the hermits can get," he forced back a wince, " quite curious. Just a warning."

Impulse hummed a response, chewing at his lip. He still couldn't seem to look up at X, and instead trained his eyes on his lap, where he was picking at his fingernails.

"I'm just saying, they're going to figure it out at some point or another, and it's easier if you tell them before they do. Plus, Scar might explode if he has to keep a secret for too much longer– his words, not mine." Xisuma added, voice giving away his amusement. Impulse didn't share it, a shudder running through him instead as the truth to those words lodged itself in his mind.