Watching and Listening - An Empires SMP AU

A friend in me

           Sheriff Jimmy worked on the Tumble Town railway. He'd been working on it for who knew how long now, but it wasn't done, and he wasn't stopping until it was. It didn't help that he was constantly interrupted in his work by the other emperors.

           "Hello, sheriff!" fWhip said, flying towards him with his enormous ears. Jimmy sighed. Not him again. Or him, he added annoyedly, as he spotted another figure flying into his empire. God Joel was the bane of his existence, it seemed. He'd been the one to start calling the respectable sheriff a toy, and he'd turned practically everyone on the server, even Jimmy's own deputy, fWhip, onto his side. The jokes that Jimmy was Woody from Toy Story would probably never end now that the god of lore had started it.

            "Hi, Jimmy," Joel said pleasantly, the towering eleven-foot-god casting a humungous shadow as he landed. "How's life as a toy?" "Leave me alone, Joel," Jimmy snapped. He'd barely had any sleep lately; trying to rule an empire and finally finish the railway, and the sheriff could barely keep his composure. Some would say that he never could. That was probably why he was always the butt of everyone's jokes. He reacted so over-the-top it was insanely hilarious to everyone watching. Everyone but him.

           "How's the railway?" fWhip asked. "It would go faster if you guys would stop bothering me." Jimmy answered, and then he realized that he'd run out of anvils again. I need to go see False about iron. "I could help, you know," fWhip said, his goblin ears twitching. "Goblins make a lot of railways. I'm used to this!" "Yeah, but you and I are no longer friends, and Lizzie told me the other day that she died on your tracks, so I don't trust your work." Joel looked at fWhip.

           "What? It was a one time accident. One time. And she died falling off of Stratos too!" Joel had no reply to that. "For a cat, she's terrible at landing on her feet," Jimmy said. Everyone knew that Lizzie was secretly a cat pretending to be human. She was terrible at keeping secrets. No one had told her that they knew, though. Either they wanted to be nice and not let her know that they knew her secret, or they just wanted to see how long it took the mayor of Animalia to notice that everyone knew what she was.

           Jimmy went into his house to find his elytra. He usually didn't wear it; the mesa sun was harsh and unforgiving in these parts, and the thick leather of elytras were incredibly uncomfortable in that sort of weather. Finally finding his wings in a barrel, the sheriff put it on and prepared to fly.

           Just then, Norman and Flick trotted up to him and meowed simultaneously, rubbing against his ankles. He paused and bent down to pet both of them. "The sheriff's gonna be out for a bit, okay, deputies? I'm just going to get some iron to finish the railway." The cats meowed again and Jimmy flew off. fWhip and Joel noticed him going, though, so they followed him. Can't they ever leave me alone these days?!

---

           Jimena woke up feeling odd, her head fuzzy. She had a vague impression that she'd been dreaming about something, but she couldn't remember what it was. Oh well, it's probably not important. She got out of bed and checked the time. She'd overslept, it was already in the afternoon. Frowning, Jimena went to False's house and rang the doorbell.

           There came a muffled shriek from inside and the sound of someone tripping over a chair, and then False opened the door. She looked tired, like she'd been awake all night instead of sleeping. "Are you okay?" Jimena asked, concerned.

           "Bad dreams," False mumbled, rubbing her eyes. "Just woke up now. What time is it?" "Past lunch." Jimena said. "Both of us overslept." "I guess breakfast's not an option anymore," False said, walking back inside. Jimena followed her in. The two of them ended up having cold toast for lunch.