Tango was wrong about the knuckle-damage thing, unfortunately. But it was fine, really. It wasn't the worst injury he'd sustained, even in the past little while. He was now wandering the mineshaft in a vaguely upwards direction, trying not to tense every time he heard the chittering of cave spiders in the distance. They hadn't noticed him yet, but he knew with his luck, that would soon change.

It was a bitter sort of irony when it happened, really. He could almost feel the sunlight, when something jumped out and landed on him, knocked him over, and sunk something sharp into his neck. Tango screamed and thrashed, but it was no use. He could feel the spider venom pumping through his system, making his limbs weak and his stomach sick. 

Finally, he was overwhelmed. His eyelids fluttered shut as he tried to at least take one last look at the world before he fell asleep - he didn't know if he'd wake up again, after all. If he'd had mire conscious control over his breathing, he'd've laughed. Of course he'd almost make it, only to die at the last hurdle.

With that thought, he resigned himself to his fate, and let the darkness take him. At least he may have saved everyone else, right?

———

ImpulseSV: I'm okay, don't worry. Just keep going. Tango's the bigger issue here. I'll set up the factory so he has somewhere to crash when he gets back.

Zedaph: Ok. You sure?

Impulse: I'm sure.

———

Zed and X were walking through a forest at the base of a mountain, thoroughly shaken by Impulse's death no matter how much he reassured them over comms, when they heard the scream. Zed froze, heart skipping a beat, because it sounded so much like Tango, yet at the same time, so little.

Another, weaker cry rang out, and Zed ran in the direction from which it came, with no regard for whatever X was doing. He quickly found himself at the mouth of a cave, and rushed in with reckless abandon. Xisuma, instead, opted to search aboveground, as it was unclear where exactly the scream had come from.

Meanwhile, Zed had stumbled across a mineshaft, and promptly wandered into the cave spider spawner. He made quick work of both the spiders and the spawner, and was about to move on and keep looking for Tango when he noticed something tangled up in the webbing. Drawing his sword and cutting his way closer, Zed discovered that 'something' was a person, Zed quickly cut them loose.

Lying there, after everything, was Tango. His clothes were torn and ruined, he had several nasty-looking open wounds, his skin looked pale and clammy, his hair was darkened with dust, and he was barely breathing, but it was Tango, alright. Zed carefully scooped Tango up into a bridal carry, ignoring how his arm muscles protested, and began to bring him to the mouth of the cave.

X was waiting for Zed when he got there, his own search having proven fruitless, but with a camp and first aid area well in the works, including a bed, which Zed lowered Tango onto. X had Tango's data pulled up on his console, and was scrolling through it with a frown.

X wordlessly handed Zed a regen potion, which he gently tipped down Tango's throat. Slowly, agonisingly, Tango's wounds stitched themselves back together, leaving nasty scars in their wake - the injuries on his wrist and foot looked like they didn't even heal right. Still, it seemed to do the trick, as mere moments after the gash on his chest closed, Tango's eyes opened by a sliver.

"Hey." Zed whispered, smiling at Tango.

"Zeddy?" Tango asked hoarsely, weakly moving his arm to reach towards Zedaph. Zedaph took the hand, and gave it a gentle comforting squeeze. "What- is this- are- is this real?" Tango asked. Zed nodded.

Cautiously, Zed helped Tango sit up, sitting next to him on the bed. Tango slumped sideways, resting on Zed's shoulder, as Xisuma came over and presented him with a new communicator he'd put together before setting off.

"You don't need the usual bells and whistles, right?" X asked. Tango shook his head, chuckling weakly as he took it and entered his name, hands shaking.

The moment he did, however, there was a subtle change in the air. The barely-noticeable aura Tango had had of not-quite-fitting vanished. A notification popped up that Tango had set his spawn on the bed he was sitting on, and a split-second later he vanished into a respawn, as several death notifications popped up in the general chat at once.

———

Tango fell from a high place

Tango experienced kinetic energy

Tango was slain by zombie

Tango was slain by warden

Tango was impaled on a stalagmite

Tango was slain by cave spider

Tango starved to death

———

Tango's whole body was on fire when he respawned, like all the agony of the past however-long since his rocket had crashed was coming back to bite him ten times over. Distantly, he registered the sound of screaming, although it didn't quite click in his mind that it was coming from him. There was something rubbing against his skin, burning a thousand times worse, so he threw it off and stumbled to the ground, hands planting in the dirt.

Breathing heavily, he eventually registered someone gently rubbing the area between his shoulder blades. He took a few deep breaths as the rubbing continued, slowly relaxing from the tense state he'd been in as the pain eased somewhat. Eventually, he was able to open his eyes, and saw X and Zed looking down at him worriedly.

Shakily, he tried to get to his feet, to show them he was okay, but he just ended up stumbling - one of his legs couldn't take his weight - as Zed carefully caught him. He realised how his arms and legs were shaking violently in absence of the burning, and let Zed guide him to the bed again, leaning on him all the while. Zed kept rubbing gentle circles in between his shoulders, and Tango felt his eyelids slowly drift shut.

"You probably wanna sleep after all that, huh." Zed remarked quietly in response. Tango silently nodded into Zed's shoulder, and let the void take him in its embrace.