We Could Be Sleeping in the Flowers (A Hermitcraft Story)

Chapter Three: A Visit to the Doctor

Grian made a quick pass over the spawn village to make sure Doc wasn't home, but there was really only one place their resident redstone mad scientist was hanging out lately. Doc had marked out a huge area south of the village, big enough for two or three megabuilds, and roped it off with caution tape and keep out warnings. Grian had, of course, been forced to investigate thoroughly, but had found nothing but normal hills, valleys, and an already-raided woodland mansion. Disappointing, really.

He soared past the area he'd staked out for his own megabase and looped back around, then nearly ran into a huge line of pumpkins, TNT droppers and redstone inexplicably hanging in the middle of the sky.

"What the what?" he demanded, swooping up and around the bizarre string of machines, then coming to rest on a convenient pumpkin. This must be the world-eater, he deduced, getting ready for its maiden voyage. It looked really interesting. So interesting. There must be a button on it somewhere...

"If you press anything," a low voice growled in Grian's ear, making him jump, "I will ensure that for the rest of the season you spawn inside a glass jar full of honey blocks. If you break my machine, the glass will be obsidian." Flicking his eyes sideways, Grian saw Doc, arms folded under his torn-up labcoat, looking like he meant it.

"Noted," Grian managed. "No button-pushing here, no way no how!" He gave Doc his friendliest ingratiating smile. "Your machine here is very big and impressive, and I'd love to learn more about what on earth you're planning on doing with it, but I've actually got a bit of a health issue I needed to ask about."

"A health issue?" Doc repeated, the grumpiness in his face replaced by concern. "What, are you sick with something? You look fine, even if your hair is dumb."

"Hey!" Grian protested automatically, raising his hand to his hair before he remembered the big clumps of lilac still forming a clumsy crown around his head. He sighed. "Okay, fair play, but that's part of the problem. I've sort of... I've got... I'vebeencoughingupflowersokay? Can you fix it?"

Doc stared at him blankly, only the barest twitch at the corner of his mouth hinting at any emotion. "If you have come here to resolve your feelings for me," he finally said, "I think you are fooling yourself."

"No!" Grian squawked. "Devs, no! No offense," he added hastily. "There's obviously something wrong with my code, I was hoping you could help me fix it."

Now Doc was full-out smirking, which was somehow even more alarming than his threatening face. "You got flower disease and you think it's a code issue? Don't they teach you nothing in your secondary school?"

"I know why it happens in teenagers," Grian snapped irritably, "I have no idea why it's happening to me as a grown adult. I have a job! I have my own house!" he insisted.

"It is happening because you want to kiss a certain GoodTimeWithScar right on the mouth," Doc told him, grinning. Before Grian could stop himself, he hiccuped up a pair of oxeye daisy heads. That appeared to be too much for Doc, who dissolved into gales of laughter.

"Not helpful!" Grian dropped the flowers off the edge of the machine, hoping against hope that they would clog something important. "Also, how does everybody know this?"

"Because we have eyeballs in our heads," Doc replied, swiping away a few laugh-tears. "There's nothing wrong with your code that a few more guts wouldn't fix. Why don't you go talk to that poor guy, see if he'll go to the school dance with you?"

"Still not helpful!" Grian plopped himself down on the pumpkin, ready to settle in for a sulk right in the middle of Doc's work area. "I need answers, not heckling."

"Well then I have no idea why you came here." Doc was still smirking. He looked happier than Grian had maybe ever seen him. "Go see Stress, maybe she'll have something for you."

Grian grimaced. "Stress fixes people by brute-force respawning them. She's too scary for me."

"It works for most things," Doc pointed out. "But if it doesn't work for you, maybe she'll give you some herbicide. Or at least some ointment in case your face starts getting all spotty."

"I don't know why I even came over here," Grian muttered, even as he surreptitiously felt his forehead for pimples.

"Don't be so down, Pesky Bird," Doc encouraged. "Puberty is an important time in any young player's life! Just wait until your voice starts to change, maybe you get a nice deep voice like mine."

"That's it, I'm just going to let Stress kill me." Grian pushed off the pumpkin block and rocketed away, Doc's laughter following him until it faded with distance.