Corrupted - A Hermitcraft (and Empires) Fanfiction

17: Scar

'Badtimes?' I enter what I certainly remember being his house, avoiding the trap at the entrance. 'Are you here?'

'NO!' Came a yell from upstairs that could only be Badtimes. 'NO I'M NOT HERE!'

'THERE'S AN EMERGENCY!'

'WHY WOULD I CARE?!'

'BECAUSE YOU'LL GET PRESENTS IF YOU HELP!'

Silence. For a moment I stand there, listening as he thunders down the stairs, appearing in front of me.

'Presents?'

To anyone else, Badtimes would be scary, with his scars, muscles, red eyes and snakescales running up his left side. Vex wings and claws constantly out, and usually an expression ranging from tetchy to murderous. But he's not. He's a big idiot who likes cake and presents. Which is exactly what I bought him.

'Presents.' I hand him a shulker box of TNT and cake. He glances from it to me, hiding his interest.

'Sit down. One of the chairs is boobytrapped but I can't remember which.' He signals at the seats around the room. I take the nearest one, triggering the vex trap that doesn't hurt me. 'What do you want?'

'There's a problem with skulk. On hermitcraft. Cub and Xisuma are possessed, Grian's been taken prisoner.'

'Wait, Cub's your little vexy friend.'

'Yes. Can you help us? I know you know a lot about skulk and-'

'Two questions.' Badtimes interrupts, taking his own seat opposite me, starting on one of the cakes. 'Question 1: how did this happen?'

'We don't know. It attacked before in Empires, but we've never seen this happen on Hermitcraft before.'

'I know. Question 2: how is this my problem and why are you asking me?'

'That's 2 questions.'

'Yeah. I said it was question 2.' 

I pause, knowing this is just some of his weird Badtimes-logic, but answer anyway.

'Because you get what you want if you help and we have no one else left.'

'Oooh, I'm honoured. That probably means you're desperate and will give me more stuff.' Badtimes grins. 'Tell me more. What will you give me?'

'You know about Skulk and weird magic stuff no one else knows. And we need some way to help our friends.'

'I don't do 'helping'.'

'Yeah, but you like stuff. And I'm good at bribery.' 

'You're not.' Badtimes scoffs. 'I'm better at bribery than you'll ever be.'

'Setting someone's home on fire and telling them to pay all their money for water is blackmail.'

'It's the same thing. Now, bribe me into helping if you're so good at it.'

I lay a scroll and a quill on the table between us, pointing at the chart at the top.

'For a list of stuff I don't allow you to do. 1 point for something I might allow normally to 5 points for something I'd almost never accept. You get 15 points. Griefing is unallowed, or causing pain for anyone else except me.' 

'20 points minimum for those boring rules.'

'Fine. 18 points worth of stuff.'

'18 isn't twenty.'

'18's bigger.'

Badtimes pauses, considering. 

'How?'