"So, are you only looking for Fundy?", Dream asked Iskall, breaking the silence that had befallen them for the past couple of minutes. The admin had led him down a path made of planks of wood, flaked with splinters and water damage -it was surely rotting under the surface.

Iskall wondered who kept tabs on the builds and preserving them. The poor state of the path reminded him of the first days of building the Omega Tree. The poor thing's roots had grown splinters and the wood had gotten soft from the relentless downpours of the jungle. That happened until Doc, another hermit, dropped by with his gardening expertise and somehow fixed the issue. From then on, Doc would come by every once in a while as Iskall worked on expanding upwards to observe the exterior damage. Perhaps he could find the builder and give them the few tips he had picked up from Doc during his two-day-stay.

Now, though, he was trusting Dream with leading him to Fundy, who he would ask about what had happened to the place. Had he trusted Dream more, Iskall would have asked him directly but he had a feeling that he would receive the cold shoulder or something much, much worse; something akin to a sword to the throat because he tried to pry into the server's perfect history.

"Yeah", he said, tone as casual as he could hold it, "I wanted to catch up with him, you know? See how that bunker held up for him before... whatever happened here", he finished, waving vaguely at the destruction just a few blocks behind them.

"A lot happened"

Buildings had come into view now, standing on either side of the path, holding it hostage. They weren't the best builds to be honest but there was some effort put into them and Iskall let the subject go. The wars were far more laborious than making a shop look all pretty, the owners deserved some slack thanks to that.

There was an infection running across the section of the path they were walking down, though. Thin and thick vines and tendrils of alien origin crossed above the planks of wood, that were obviously trying their best to win over the server's turf. It was a whole other fight all of its own. Many of the vines had been cut short, left to grow from another place on the remaining body and others had grown dark at the ends, dead and stale. The mere presence of them made Iskall feel uneasy and nauseous and he could only wonder how Dream could walk over the ones daring to lay across the path without so much as batting an eye.

"What are these by the way?", Iskall asked, pointing a hand at the vines as one tried to wrap around his ankle. He quickly moved away from the alien plant. Dream shrugged as a small mansion of marble came into view through some light fog.

"I don't know. These vines appeared one day and we were shearing them the next", and to emphasize his point, the admin grabbed the axe from his back and swang it down on the swirling plant in front of his feet. The red turned to black and the black turned to ash, flowing away with the wind. Iskall grimaced.

"They look like they belong to the Nether. Did they come from there?"

"Perhaps", with that, Iskall gave up on making small talk. Dream was too tense, too mistrusting and too suspicious for whatever reason. He was sure that Xisuma had not gone out of his way to inform Dream of Tommy's arrival directly and if he had, why was the admin acting so... weirdly? A feeling of dread swirled in his stomach, one that made him feel sick yet healthy at the same time. Some instinct told him to run, to escape while he still had time. But run from what, exactly?

"Iskall?", the startled tone of a high-pitched voice attracted the man's attention. There, walking up the small hill they had passed through was Fundy with his fluffy ginger hair and twitchy, pointy fox ears. Iskall smiled at the sight of the other, giving a wave as he drew away from Dream in favor of approaching his previous client.

The two of them were on good terms. After Iskall had learnt of the struggling economy of late Manburg, he had approached Fundy about his payment for the construction of the bunker. Fundy had been nervous about the subject, clearly not doing well financially-wise and the man had picked up on that. He had offered Fundy to pay him three stacks of oak logs for the Omega Tree, which he had thought was more than fair and if anything, Iskall was the one gaining basically nothing out of the deal.

It would have been unfair to drive a teenager-nearing-young-adult to the mines for a couple of diamonds, though, which he could mine for and trade with the hermits to get his own. And he believed that Fundy had appreciated it; Iskall had definitely seen the fox's shoulders slump with a sigh of relief that day.

Fundy jogged over to meet him halfway on the wooden path, the two shaking hands, a confused and nervous expression on his face. Hazel eyes fell on the admin with hesitance and atmost suspicion. Iskall did not miss how there had been a stutter in the younger's steps as Dream fully turned to face them.

"Fundy!", Iskall greeted the other, "How have you been, man?", and Fundy tugged him just a bit closer to him as Dream walked over.

The air was thick and awkward as the two engaged in an intense staredown. Iskall felt like he was intruding on something personal; a grudge or something like that. He felt the fox hybrid's hold on his arm tighten for a split second, almost like a warning. But the two were engaged, a step away from marriage if he remembered correctly -maybe they had had an argument recently.

Fundy completely ignored his good-willed question, instead focusing on the masked man.

"Where were you taking him?", he asked Dream, his hold tightening again on Iskall's arm but this time, it stayed that way.

"He was looking for you, I figured you'd be somewhere around here", Dream answered solemnly and somehow his creepy masked darkened, like a shadow fell over it. Fundy shook his head, ears twitching and eyes narrowing.

"Why were you taking him to the prison?"

The what?!

Dream hesitated for a second, fingers twitching for a handle of an axe that was not in his palm.

"I was going to ask him if he could help with the redstone-"
"Sam said the prison's redstone has been completed"

The silence that befell them was a deadly one. Dream lowered his head, scrutinizing through the eyes of his mask the ginger before him who had leveled him with a similar glare. Whatever argument those two had had was not a simple one; it was something beyond a grudge as well.

Every alarm in Iskall's head was going off, ringing loudly and flashing bright, red lights and sirens. His mind was trying hard to process the new information, trying to sort it to form an appropriate reaction. He knew he had to remain calm, he had to because who knows what would happen if he were to stummer out a nervous excuse and break the fragile tension in the air? His insides were screaming at him to run, to return to Hermitcraft but he had not gathered enough intellect yet to justify his shorter-than-expected trip.

Over in the distance, behind the white mansion and red, curling vines, stood a tall and bulky building made of an obsidian shell and blackstone checkered walls decorated with lava waterfalls. It was obviously a secure structure and the involvement of obsidian, one of the hardest things to mine, was quite unnerving. It was a building designed to keep the ill-willed in and the other people out: it was Pandora's Vault, the high-security prison of the Dream SMP.

Did he plan on locking me up in there?

Before he could ponder the ominous thought, Fundy was dragging him away. The prison, the mansion disappeared along with Dream as they went over and down the hill. They walked far away, straying from the wooden path at a point and treading in the small forest behind some buildings.

"What are you doing here?", Fundy asked, his tone worried and panicked, as he finally let go of Iskall's arm.

"I thought I'd come and visit-"
"Didn't I warn you about the place being  dangerous?!"
"Well, yes but-"
"Then why in the fuck did you come?!"

Iskall sighed and held up a hand in an attempt to stop Fundy's growing hysteria. Thankfully, the fox closed his mouth but Iskall noticed how his bottom lip quivered with the will to speak and shout questions of his own.

"I wanted to talk to you, Fundy and I trust that you'll be honest with me because I have some questions", Iskall started and at his words and serious tone, the other became more attentive.

Fundy was the only person Iskall could trust on the server -aside from HBomb but the man did not involve himself in conflict- as he had spent his time with him the longest. From plucking iron ore together from the mines for the bunker when they would inevitably run out (there were limited resources to begin with) to teaching the curious hybrid about some redstone tricks and to throw out any pieces of diorite he would find in the chests of supplies, he knew Fundy the best. And even though he stayed one week on the server, he kind of felt like a faraway uncle to the young adult.

"...What sort of questions?", Fundy asked with newfound curiosity.

And so Iskall asked Fundy about Tommy, the loudmouthed blond child that had cursed one-too-many times during their flight through the Omega Tree's branches. He swore the man to secrecy about the subject. Fundy told him of the war between Pogtopia (a base of operations founded by Wilbur Soot in a ravine for the rebellion against Schlatt) and Manburg, the menace that was Technoblade who had turned his back on them and spawned Withers to destroy the land. He learnt that the current president was Tubbo, a barely of-age kid that had been involved in the rebellion and received the scars for it, and had Fundy, Quackity and Tommy by his side after Wilbur died.

Fundy had taken a deep, shaky breath as the next part left his mouth. That Dream had issued the construction of Pandora's Vault after managing to exile Tommy to faraway lands. It was a sickening revelation, that an admin would exile a kid for some messed up reason.

Somewhere along the way, the conversation ultimately drifted. Iskall was reminded that the late president of the original L'Manburg, the Wilbur Soot, was the ginger's father and he was now dead and that a ghost had taken his place in the world of the living. Iskall placed a comforting hand on the other's shoulder as tears pricked the corners of Fundy's eyes at all the memories he had buried and dug up for his sake. He felt bad and he told him to stop if it was hurting but Fundy just shook his head and kept going.

Iskall guessed he had been bottling up all those feelings and information for a long while.

A guy named George was mentioned who had apparently ruined the wedding and stole Dream away from the altar with a chicken. It sounded like quite the funny scenario -and it must've been hilarious to watch- but it must have been heartbreaking for the fox. And the tears fell at the end of it all as a storm came rolling, following a mourning ghost that watched from afar.

And that was how Iskall came to meet Ghostbur, the ghost of Wilbur, who was trying to become Fundy's father once more.

Φ

Tommy had met many hermits in his emboldened adventures inside and outside the jungle. He met Mumbo Jumbo on the day he met Grian, as the avian had convinced him in travelling just a bit further into the jungle trees to meet his friend. Tommy would be the first to admit that parrots were -in fact- much faster than he had expected; he barely managed to not lose the other in the thick foliage thanks to how fast he was going.

Mumbo was something else entirely: tall and lanky and jittery, always moving back and forth on his haunches, wearing a business suit and red tie. He was by far the most official-looking person Tommy had ever met aside from that Ranboo kid on the Dream SMP. His black hair was styled and he had a nice, thick mustache that hid his mouth when he wasn't talking.

That mustache somehow looked like it was more valuable than the diamond throne.

The man's base was a living temple. How that was possible, not even Prime would know. It had three symmetrical, hexagon platforms that shrank as they went up, all open with a few stone pillars and wrenches with chains supporting and keeping the whole structure together and standing as its exterior. At the very top, on the last platform, hang a heart. A giant, golden, beating heart! And apparently, the base had to eat in order to keep the pulse from flatlining -Just how?! -and of course it only ate golden apples.

Tommy later learnt that the heart was actually mechanical, made of iron, redstone and spare sheets of gold and that Mumbo was a redstone super-genius -even though the man persisted on saying that he only had two brain cells.

Admittedly, Mumbo was weird. First off, he used phrases and slang terms that Tommy had not heard in years and it only served in making the man look much older than the suit and tie and slicked back hair made him out to be already. And second, instead of saying 'idiot', he said 'spoon' -Tommy did not want to know the origin of that one and no, he had not gotten the word stuck in his mind for a whole afternoon. Absolutely not.

The most aggravating thing was that Mumbo referred to himself as a 'spoon', called himself stupid! And Tommy wanted so bad to smack him over the head for it. The man had built a whole living organism (albeit mechanical) out of redstone for Prime's sake!

Another day, he met two more of the server's redstoners. It was when he had spotted the giant building that resembled the head of a ravager, an open mouth of teeth as the entrance and giant, straight horns protruding from the sides. Tommy had been peering down the dark, red-carpeted staircase that went down under the shopping district, wondering if it would be a good idea to go down there or if there was some hidden mechanism that would shut the entrance once he was a few steps down.

There was the distinct sound of elytra wings cutting through the air then, and someone landing just a few blocks away from him. Someone wearing a red T-shirt and a cargo jacket, his hair a deep blond and spiked back and red eyes. Not the natural type of red, not like Techno's. That man's eyes were cores of red with no whites to be observed, seeming to hold the knowledge of all redstone in them. His gaze was unnerving and unnatural to a degree that Tommy actually jumped a block into the air.

Of course, Tommy would never admit that to anyone.

"Welcome to Decked-Out!", and the man's name turned out to be Tango. "You're that Tommy kid, aren't you?"

Tommy had been surprised to hear that the man, Tango, already knew of him. That was until the teen remembered that the hermits had actual communicators in their possession.

He met Impulse in a fly-by of the shopping district, inside the concrete pyramid base that had waterfalls for entrances. By then, the blond had grown used to seeing big, impressive bases that had taken at least a month of grinding for resources. Tommy had gotten curious of what was kept in there, of who lived in there. So, he just went and found that the waterfalls parted when he approached to allow him entrance.

That was where he had found a normal-looking guy with short, brown hair and casual attire. No, Impulse had not found him because he flew straight into the chests of his storage system while the man was sorting items and almost got a concussion because of it. What gave you that idea? After some bandages and that very laughable introduction, Impulse handed him a small box, small enough to fit in the palm of his hand.

"What is this?", Tommy had asked and Impulse had smiled at him. Why are all of the hermits' smiles so genuine? Not strained with effort? Tommy will never know.

"Open it", the man had instructed, the air fizzling by and messing their hair as they sat outside of the northern entrance.

Inside was a communicator bracelet, one like Stress'; matching even. Tommy did not know if the gift had been intentionally made to look like hers or if it was just a coincidence but he had been too tired from the day's journey to ask. He was finally able to have a peek at the messages on the chat screen the hermits sent and honestly, he had been hoping to see a super secret, evil plan but alas, there were only trade requests and invites to projects.

That was a let down but it was fine. Grian had told him that he would pick him up to go prank people after he had found a place to settle down. I still have to do that, huh.

Next, he visited a vast land of basalt and rivers of lava, a biome he had never seen before in his life. Later, he learnt that the place was the Valley of Tatooren. There, he met Ren, a dog-hybrid with droopy, brown ears and a short, scruffy tail. Tommy thought he looked more like a werewolf from one of those storybooks than a hybrid with the growing stubble and rough and sharp edges of his face. At first, he thought the man was unapproachable; the tattered shirt and pants from what Tommy could only guess were from fights made him look scary.

"Hey, my dude!", Ren had shouted when he saw him. Tommy had been wandering near the plumes of smoking ground and ash on the burning hot riverside. He had almost fallen in when Ren approached him.

When Tommy thought he could not be more impressed, he was proven wrong. The hermits were, indeed, crazy. Ren had built the valley of blackstone and basalt from scratch, had told him that under the black ground was the orange of the mesa that he could see where the border of the Renpire (as Ren called it) was.

He was scolded for the 'What the fuck's he uttered.

Tommy was proven wrong again when he met Keralis, a builder and a gentleman with the smoothest voice he had ever heard in his life, when Bdubs took him off the mainland for a road trip. Or a sky trip in their case. He thought Keralis was a lunatic when the harbor of a giant city came into view in the middle of their flight.

There were boats; wait, no, not boats -ships! Giant and made completely of iron instead of wood, all handcrafted by the man with braided, dark hair and bulging eyes standing proudly in front of it all. Cranes lifted cargo containers off the ground, stacking them automatically and sorting them on platforms to go on the ships and Tommy's jaw went slack in awe.

Especially when he was introduced to the city, Tommy practically felt his jaw hit the hot, black concrete of the street. Buildings rose up from the ground to kiss the sky (skyscrapers Keralis said they were called), office buildings and potted trees at the sides of wide roads, small houses tucked under a high, concrete bridge and colorful graffiti on the walls of back alleys. It looked lived-in yet there were no people around; just the random mob in the darkness of the nooks and crannies the sun could not reach. It was the sheer size and small little touches of animation at the docks and specks of color in the windows that made it look alive.

Tommy noted a couple of buildings he could use as a hideout whilst they strolled through the streets.

"This is my office", Keralis had said with the slightest hiss of a snake in his accent as the three of them walked into a particularly rich-looking building near the harbor. That was where the man gifted him a stack of diamonds and told him to spend it wisely.

Nope, that was not going to happen. Tommy would lock them up in a vault before he used even a speckle of the gems. And no, he had not cried in front of the two men, he did not shed tears of joy and confusion. He was not comforted and pulled into a hug by two strangers. He wouldn't admit to it anyway.

What happened in the office, would stay in the office and that was final.

Today, he was perched on the top of the tallest tower of the technology-oriented cityscape developed by False out in the sea. He had snuck up there to have a midday snack, simply enjoying the sereness of the server. He could see the blond woman working in the huge walled-off hole in the ground, where the walls and towers' roots were firmly planted into bedrock under shallow water. If his eyes were giving him the full picture, she was covering some cracks at the entrance and some leaks in the walls to keep the base from flooding... and probably herding some chickens that Grian brought over as a prank.

The man literally did an air strike with chickens; had carried them in his arms and then threw them in the base. Okay, Tommy had tugged along for the fun of it but he still blamed Grian when False was asking in the chat about who had done it. Surprisingly, he was not hunted down and slashed at with a sword by either of them when the truth was revealed. Instead, they just laughed at his poor excuse of a cover-up story and the woman had sent them a warning that the next batch of chickens would be sent to the butcher's.

Thankfully, there was no butcher on the server. There wasn't... right?

Tommy shook his head. He was aware of a dog catcher named Joe who had apparently provided shelter for over a hundred dogs on an island (he still needed to go over and kidnap a dog, re-add that to the to-do list). He was aware of Doc, the creeper and ram hybrid, tall as the mountains, that lived in a giant house in the sky and aware of Etho, a ninja who hopped on bamboo shoots in the jungle. At least, Tommy thought he was hopping on bamboo over there, that's what ninjas do, right?

He was broken out of his daydreaming when he heard a shout. Looking below his feet and past the delicious sweet berries in his hands -given by Stress, the snack hero- he found False looking up at him through the mechanical engineering goggles over her eyes and waving for him to get down. Sheepishly, he stood up, feeling as if he had gotten caught stealing when he was just sitting on a roof and watching her work.

Okay, that sounded creepy. Moving on.

He leapt off the edge, elytra wings opening without a hitch as he glided to the main road to meet her halfway. With a firework and a sharp clank of iron heeled boots, False was in front of him, shuffling on the short, jean jacket she had had tied around her waist while working over a white and red striped shirt. She moved the goggles with a leather-clad hand atop her hair, letting them rest there before regarding him.

"I hope there aren't any more chickens around my base", she joked, raising a hand his way, much like she had done with Grian and him when they were repenting for their crime. Back then, he had expected to get slapped on the ear, naturally viewing a stranger as something akin to the harsh people on his old server (like he had done so many times already) but now he knew better; he had learnt. So, he shook her hand as she wiped off the dust on her shorts.

"There might be", Tommy replied and broke into a fit of laughter when False's face paled, surely at the thought of having to herd even more of the little pests. "Okay, maybe there aren't", he corrected and with that, the other let out a relieved sigh.

"What brings you to my evil base?", she asked as she walked towards the main tower -the only one that was connected to the walkway they were on- and he followed right after.

"I was looking for a place to sit and saw the roof of the tower. Thought why not sit up there?"

"On the very dangerous edge of a dome?", False supplied and he nodded.

"Yes, I am a big man, I will never fall off a roof and die"

"Whatever you say"

The first thing he noticed was the weapon rack on the back wall, next to a smithing table and  something akin to furnace but built with gears and iron cords. There were so many swords, at least ten of them, some rusty from disuse, some bent from age, some jagged and the three last ones looking almost new. Knives, Tommy thought and he approached the rack to pick one up and examine it. No, he was not going to steal it, he already had his own tools and since there was no conflict on Hermitcraft, he didn't need a new blade.

Though, he was very tempted to stash it in an ender chest and bolt. And if False was similar to Stress, he would probably make it out the door with a scolding.

"You can take one if you want", he heard False say from where she was opening white cabinets above a stove. Tommy spotted the cocoa beans on the counter right away. "None of them have seen the light of day in a long time"

"You a swordsman?", Tommy asked. Had he found the Niki of Hermitcraft?

"I used to be", she admitted, setting down two cups like she knew that Tommy would accept hot cocoa, "I haven't held a sword in years, stopped and took up smithing after a few years of it", her eyes fall on him and the blade in his hands and Tommy can see the longing in them and the nostalgia of old memories.

And he couldn't stand that.

"You haven't stabbed anyone in years?", that received a small chuckle, albeit a sad one but still, it was something. "Would you like to spar with me? I'm pretty good with a sword"

Before he knew it, he had a cup of hot cocoa warming his palms, which he hadn't realized were cold till then. False had raised an eyebrow at him, questioning his intentions silently.

"I'm rusty", she said, "but you're on"

Tommy had not cheered like he did right then since the false win of L'Manburg.

===================

For any inaccuracies, feel free to blame my memory
Yes, the marriage is canon in this fic and yes, Dream did attempt to put Iskall in the prison but who knows if Iskall has escaped him yet?

Am I hinting at a future scene? Maaaybe-haps!

Comments and votes are appreciated!