#ALSO SHOUTOUT TO ME HAVING THE BRITISH PERSON USE METAPHORS USING EXCLUSIVELY AMERICAN WILDCATS | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

theminecraftbee · 5 months

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Etho and Grian are back at base, hysterically laughing over their achievement. Cleo sits inside, staring, as the two of them talk about getting a wither and a warden to fight, and tries to figure out what she feels about it.

In some ways it's not their fault. Task made them do it and all that. Plus--

Well, it's not like she and Etho are losing hearts anytime soon. They've both done a damn good job keeping themselves from dying. A benefit, Cleo thinks, of deciding to team with Etho this time. Between the two of them, they'll largely only do chaos they can recover from. Maybe this is their game. Maybe this time, Cleo manages to stick with someone until the very end. It looks like it. It looks like...

Grian, of course, is the confounding factor.

She wasn't going to turn him away. He needed allies. They needed someone a bit better at actually doing damage than herself or Etho. It's mutually beneficial. And, besides, he's weirdly lovable, in an inherently kind of dangerous way. A little like loving a bobcat someone had accidentally raised as a pet cat until it got a bit too big and stinky and murdery for them. Like, yeah, he shouldn't be domesticated and he's not, really, in any sense of the word, but it's a bit sad to watch him try to survive on his own now, right?

Hah. Maybe that's what Scar managed to do to him. Would explain a lot, really.

Anyway, he's her bobcat now, which is the problem.

See the thing is: Cleo understands Etho. It's why finally deciding to be partners for once felt... right. They're similar flavors of people. Scared, mostly. Survivors, but not in the 'will stab anyone' way that like, Martyn is. Loyal, although Cleo has no delusions that Etho is as loyal as she. And scared. Has she already said that? Scared. It's important to the kinds of things she and Etho are. Like... mountain lions, maybe. Mountain lions that have been around just enough people to know how dangerous they are. Like that.

God, she's only doing cat metaphors. Bdubs really is turning them all into furries.

Anyway, the point is, Grian isn't scared.

And that... terrifies her.

That's scarier than anything else. Because, see, Cleo wants to survive. But more than that, she wants her partners to survive. And she and Etho, the two of them are doing well. Better than most people. They're green and they have so many hearts.

But Grian? Grian's yellow and not afraid and goading Etho into not being afraid too. It's not their fault, exactly, Cleo thinks. They both had hard tasks. They didn't have a choice, Cleo thinks.

But. But.

She doesn't know what to do, if Etho gets convinced the humans down the mountain aren't scary. She doesn't know what to do if he gets too close. She doesn't know what to do if he gets hurt.

Because she--she doesn't think she can learn to stop being scared, anymore.

But she also doesn't know how many times her heart can stand to lose someone.

Did you know--wild cats are social? They have a reputation for being loners, but mountain lions, they're social. They don't do well being alone. They don't actually hunt solely alone. That's the important bit here. They seem independent, sure, but actually...

Anyway. This is Bdubs's fault. For making her a furry, apparently.

She watches Grian and Etho scheme together and sits back and breathes and tells herself that Etho isn't going to stop being afraid anytime soon. That if push came to shove, he, at least, would retreat back, and that maybe the two of them could convince Grian to retreat too. Safe from hunters. Safe from red.

Maybe safe from hurting each other, too.

(She's not so sure about that part.)

#secret life smp #secret life spoilers #zombiecleo #a bee fic #staring in. cleo and the fact she seems to consider dying before or at the same time as her allies as her happy ending #staring in. cleo and the fact that the thing she and etho have most in common is CAUTION.#and then staring at grian.#hm. well. hopefully that ends better than it seems like it might.#ALSO SHOUTOUT TO ME HAVING THE BRITISH PERSON USE METAPHORS USING EXCLUSIVELY AMERICAN WILDCATS #in my defense they're the ones i'm actually familiar with

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