Face Reveal

 

@RogerCross 2 minutes ago
Hey SonicScrew.  It’s a pleasure seeing you join a bigger band.  I’ve been following CovenCraft for a few years now, and I think you’ll be an excellent addition to this community.
You and Mandel have such a great presence on screen.  You seem like really good friends, and that brightens my day.
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▴ 1 reply
@sonicScrew 1 second ago
Thank you!

 

---

 

 

I took a break.

It wasn't an unexpected visit from my parents with little to no room to refuse, or a family reunion where my presence was mandatory, nor was it a day where I played Minecraft without recording, but still with the underlying idea that everything I did would benefit a video project. For the first time in years, I took a real break. Sure, one day isn't that much, and people argued — ‘people’ being historically my parents, occasionally my subscribers, and now my boyfriend — that more than a day was necessary to properly take care of myself. Yet, I took my entire Friday off. And that felt weird: jitteriness, checking my phone way more than usual, swaying my chair left and right, groaning in voice chat, darting my eyes every second or so to the thin sliver of the outside hidden behind the window curtain, and trying really hard not to think too much about last evening.

We’d kissed! That sure was a thing that had happened. And the bubbly sensations felt during this fresh experience and every time I thought about his lips again indicated that I liked it, very much. 

But at the same time — and without erasing the sweetness of it all — there was a feeling of incompleteness. It had taken hold the second Mandel laid his eyes on me after the kiss. Being with him was no problem (guy was hot, that was established), but being with him was clearly not working as intended. And that brought me to a temporary conclusion, not final but convincing: I was doing something wrong. I felt guilty.

There were a number of things that validated this sentiment: I hadn't asked him how he felt about the flirt half-jokes — sure, I'd prompted him when I saw some discomfort, but that wasn’t enough — I hadn’t understood my own attraction correctly, I’d thought I was straight and let that block all the other possibilities, I’d worked tirelessly on my video to drown out my feelings, and I’d played with his. I’d failed completely at being a good friend, let alone a boyfriend. All in all, everything dictated that he should've been angry and rejected me.

But that wasn't the case.

And this is why you shouldn't take a break. It messes with your brain; It induces silly thoughts, broken reasoning, and looping self-arguments, and that's bad for your health! I mentally wagged my finger.

Fortunately, my brain shut off the moment he knocked on my door. I sprang out of my chair to open it. But my excitement turned into fear when I saw the silhouette of a second person standing outside my flat. That wasn't Mandel.

“Mister Peeters?” the voice of my landlord asked. “I'm really sorry for the inconvenience, but we have an impromptu visit today. Can I come in?” He loved doing those. And the worst thing was, I didn't have much wiggle room to complain. I’d been far too afraid to negotiate the contract and thus I’d agreed to this shit.

I suddenly grew still, my hand centimetres from the handle.

“Well, no response, I suppose he’s not here right now,” he mumbled in a lower volume. “That’s surprising.” 

“Shouldn't we, like, wait for him to come back? I— I don't want to break into people's homes like that…” the second guy said, sounding dejected and closed off. I mentally thanked him for his consideration, even if it wouldn’t be of any use against the landlord.

“Um, I understand, truly. But you shouldn’t worry about that, it's actually something he agreed to when signing the lease. Now, where are my keys—”

I opened the door.

“Ah, you're there.” My landlord smiled.

“Yes. Sorry. I was… I was dishing my washes, I… had to hand up my cleans,” I stammered.

“Sure,” he said, brushing aside my excuse with a wave of his hand. And I caught a glimpse of the other guy accompanying him on his left. He was also white, but younger and pinker than the landlord, and quite clearly suppressing a raging burst of laughter. My foolishness made him crack up a smile, at least. “As you know, since you couldn't prove a steady monthly revenue, you're still on the list of potential flats for new renters. Really sorry for the inconvenience, by the way.” He didn't sound like he was. “So, here's Zachary, my nephew. He's here to study and in need of a flat because—”

“Because of personal reasons,” Zachary cut in, back to a low voice, looking at his feet, and making himself smaller than he already was.

“Yes, that... Well, let's not dawdle on it; we still have more flats to visit after this one,” his uncle said. And without further ado, the two stepped in.

The landlord immediately went to the other side of the room, leaning on the countertop of the kitchenette, like owned the place — well, he did, but you get my meaning. As for Zachary, he stayed close to the entrance, kneading his left arm with his right hand.

Some Minecraft players talk about this deep sense of dread you fall into when you update the game to its latest version only to realise one of the contraptions you made isn't working anymore. They talk about a sense of profound frustration over the unfairness of the outcome, the belief that whatever just happened was not supposed to happen, and the realisation that they’ll have to do a task they weren't supposed to do that day. Yet, they're surrounded by the message that this is indeed perfectly normal and expected, because this was how things worked, don’t question it, and besides, this would ultimately serve the greater good, wouldn’t it?

While I didn't particularly feel that way about Minecraft, I certainly understood those players that day. The way the landlord entered my space without asking — he started explaining the qualities of the place I was actively living in to a complete stranger while nearly ignoring my presence only to tell me he was ‘sorry’ like the word was hurting him personally — felt almost as unpleasant as playing the 2022 Minecraft April’s Fools update.

On the other hand, without having said much, Zachary was looking more apologetic than his uncle ever sounded. He flashed me a few looks of understanding while pressing his lips into a thin line each time I looked in his direction.

When his uncle was lost in the lengthy description of the way the bathroom was arranged, Zarachy leaned in and whispered something to me. “Christ, that's a good setup you've got there.” He subtly pointed to my desk. “Looks like mine. That's funny.” He smiled.

I was not sure what was funny about that. But my burgeoning frown in reaction to this confusing comment was cut short by the landlord facing us again. “Well, I think that's about all. Zachary, what do you think?” His nephew shrugged. “Right. Okay, let’s move on then.” He looked at me. “Mister Peeters, thank you very much for your time. Once again, I must apologise for this little incursion. Have a good day,” the middle-aged man said, then hurried Zachary outside and closed the door.

 

✦ ▶ ✦

 

#PvPSunday-that-will-actually-be-recorded-on-saturday-because-of-christianity

—21 December 2023—

McGLVN _{21/12/2023 15:44}
Hi, coming after the storm. I hope Justin’s feeling okay ♥
Anyway, still haven’t decided if I'll play with ferret, Carl or pikka.
@team horns, one of you wants to play with me?

pikka202 _{21/12/2023 15:44}
Id be game

_{┌── pikka202 Id be game}
FullFerret _{21/12/2023 15:45}
I don’t think that’d be fair dude
You already teamed up with MG last time.

Carlwheel _{21/12/2023 15:45}
Actually i'd like to play with ferret this time

FullFerret _{21/12/2023 15:46}
mooooh
look at himm
he wants to play with lil’ ol’ me
mmmmmm
kay let’s do that
and pikka can play with MG
No homo tho haha ^^

globubububububble _{21/12/2023 15:47}
HELO

_{┌── FullFerret No homo tho...}
Carlwheel _{21/12/2023 15:47}
No homo lol ;p

globubububububble _{21/12/2023 15:47}
CAN I

pikka202 _{21/12/2023 15:47}
Oh not again

_{┌── globububububble CAN I…}
globubububububble _{21/12/2023 15:48}
BE A DOG
LIKE…
A LITTLE PUPPY

pikka202 _{21/12/2023 15:49}
stfu glob!

globubububububble _{21/12/2023 15:49}
AM I NOT ALLOWED TO BE A DOG?

McGLVN _{21/12/2023 15:51}
Yeah, it’s getting tiring. And just weird all around. I genuinely don’t understand how your subscribers stand your streams…

globubububububble _{21/12/2023 15:51}
That’s the thing.
You can’t appreciate the height of my genius!!!!!
I'm a shitposting lord.
In ten years people will be like, ‘MGLVN? Wasn’t he the guy who talked with the Great Globule once? What a lucky lad…’ :3c

Carlwheel _{21/12/2023 15:53}
Huh-huh…

globubububububble _{21/12/2023 15:55}
anyway i’ll be playing with 40!!!!
boo-boy~

40bees _{21/12/2023 16:03}
I’m sure y’all are very jealous you can’t play with globule like me ;)

globubububububble _{21/12/2023 16:05}
They're all melting into an envy-puddle,
like each time i see a girl~

pikka202 _{21/12/2023 16:05}
lmao
see?
you can be funny.
finally a joke that makes some kind of sense

globubububububble _{21/12/2023 16:06}
Glad to be of service!
But really gtg. See you saturday!

_{┌── globububububble like each…}
Skelegal _{21/12/2023 17:27}
Relatable.
But in the other way round ofc

RockDivine _{21/12/2023 19:52}
@McGLVN I’m feeling ok, dw.
@globubububububble, please tune it down and don’t ask the new guys the question. You’re gonna freak them out, if that’s not already done by now…
@sonicScrew, @Mandel, I’m so sorry for all of that. glob’s been a source of discontent for the whole server for a while now, I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again.

Mandel _{21/12/2023 19:54}
I don’t really see a problem here, but I guess it’s more complicated than it seems ^^’

RockDivine _{21/12/2023 19:54}
Trust me man, it is

Mandel _{21/12/2023 19:55}
Hmm
Okay!

_{┌── pikka202 Id be game}
McGLVN _{21/12/2023 21:22}
@pikka202, okay then, let’s team up! But for the love of all that is holy, try to actually play the game this time…

pikka202 _{21/12/2023 21:23}
yes ofc
sorry (edited)

RockDivine _{21/12/2023 23:38}
Always better than to play with Dulip lol
(it’s a joke, please don’t hit me rachel xd)

✿Dulip✿ _{21/12/2023 23:40}
Haha yeah, I'll try to do better this time :)

RockDivine _{21/12/2023 23:40}
That’s my girl!
Alright, it’s late. good night everyone :)

—22 December 2023—

McGLVN _{22/12/2023 00:16}
Good night!

40bees _{22/12/2023 08:12}
Hello everyone, good morning.
Tomorrow is the big day!
I’ve gathered all the info from you guys and some people with whom I chatted more in private and I think I have the final composition of the game:
We have 8 teams of 2.

Team 1 - globule and myself
Team 2 - RockDivine and Dulip
Team 3 - Mandel and Screw
Team 4 - Gidon and Davio
Team 5 - sofa_king and Skelegal
Team 6 - McGLVN and pikka
Team 7 - Ferret and Carl
Team 8 - AlexCraft and Sammy

We have to thank Skelegal for coding the plugin and Merlin who will do the admin work in spectator mode while we play.
The other members can’t come because of christmas eve arrangements, I wish them the best.

RockDivine _{22/12/2023 10:17}
Thank you for all the hard work!
See you all tomorrow

sofa_king _{22/12/2023 10:40}
Yes. Thank you so much 40.
I’m pretty sure I’m gonna lose but the fun will be worth it.
And thank you @MerlinTheLog for the admin work, you’ll be the backbone of the game this time ;-) (If you have any lingering questions about how the tools work, don’t hesitate to ask me!)

MerlinTheLog _{22/12/2023 10:42}
Thanks!
I’ll probably botch it anyway though lmao

_{┌── sofa_king I’m pretty sure I’m…}
Skelegal _{22/12/2023 12:25}
Oh not on my watch! I’ll carry you dw

—23 December 2023—

globubububububble changed their username to oglobobolule _{Today at 00:00}

oglobobolule _{Today at 02:03}
HELO
I AM A DOG BY THE WAY
IN CASE YOUD FORGOR
I AM DOING THE BEING OF THE DOG
That being said
REJOICE MY FRIENDS
THE DAY HAS ARRIVED
!!!!!
smell you soon nerds! ;p

McGLVN _{Today at 02:05}
it’s 2am, please go to sleep glob…

oglobobolule _{Today at 02:05}
And what are you doing here this late?

McGLVN _{Today at 02:12}
Can’t sleep lol

 

✦ ▶ ✦

 

My game was open on the multiplayer tab on my main monitor, but my attention was on my left, where I could see everyone slowly joining the main voice chat and getting ready for the event. I sighed, clicked on another random Discord server, and closed my eyes.

One could try as best as he could to remember all the names of the CovenCraft line-up, and one could fail miserably — like I’d been doing only a few days earlier. After all, it was a band of mostly very similar-sounding guys playing Minecraft, one wouldn’t be blamed for mixing them up. But I wasn’t one anymore; my dad had come to my rescue. As soon as I’d told him the news of my participation in the upcoming event, he hadn’t stopped talking about them; he’d gushed about the silliness of Glob’s streams, the unbeatable PvP prowess of the AlexCraft and NESammy duo, or the immaculate chill atmosphere floating around sofa_king. And thanks to that, I had a pretty rough idea of who was who. That should’ve alleviated my anxiety. I should’ve been able to just join the voice chat. But I couldn’t.

I opened my eyes again, then glided my mouse to hover over the CovenCraft server icon, and a little pop-up appeared to indicate the number of people in the voice chat. They were already ten in there.

The fear of the unknown was still present, infiltrating every pore of my skin and making my hair stand up like thousands of little knives. With every new minute ticking closer to the event, the apprehension inside my guts boiled more intensely. And having read through the messages I’d missed hadn’t helped one bit.

Mandel wasn’t on the event channel yet, but it was only a matter of time before he would. I opened his DMs to stare at our conversation history, with no intention whatsoever to add anything at that moment; I simply needed to be reminded of his existence.

What had helped with all the anxiety had been spending Friday evening at his place, listening to music, and — dare I say it — cuddling. Cuddling was new, but good new; new that fills your mouth with cooed words and cute sounds. I realised it’d been a unique moment, where I’d truly forgotten all the tension that’d been building up. I’d had a single focus for the whole evening: my boyfriend, and it’d been more than enough to replace any of my ill-advised ruminations about today’s event.

Ah. There, he joined. 

I braced myself one last time, then clicked and followed him into the voice hellscape.

“Helloooo.”
“Hiiii.”
“HELLO!”
“Screw, welcome!”
“Hi!”

Lots of other flavours of half-screamed greetings ensued — so much so that I couldn’t differentiate the source of each of them — and a cube of relief took residency in my stomach.

Yes, it was definitely an auditory nightmare. Yes, I knew no one, and that was practically my number one fear (in close competition with the movie E.T.). Yes, there were a few people like RockDivine and McGLVN who smelled like turmoil, they were radiating bad vibes. Yes, I was jumpy and struggled with words. But, when I noticed that all of the waiting and squirming in anticipation was out of the way and that the moment had finally come, there wasn’t as much awkwardness as expected. No one gave me any trouble. Everyone was focused on having fun. I could manage.

“Well,” 40bees started, trying his best to silence the others. “Seems we’re all here—” Someone shouted a ‘woohoo’ of excitement, and another whistled. “Okay, okay, I see.” He laughed. “Here’s the IP.”

I copied it and connected to the server.

All sixteen of us took places in the best approximation of a Minecraft circle — I know, heresy! — and we got our recording software running, then 40bees did a standard little introduction. Mandel and I got close together, did little dances while crouching, and that brought me some fluttery feelings no one could perceive. 40bees mentioned our newest arrival in the event, but as agreed, he didn’t prompt us to speak further on the matter, preferring to let the game start, and let the best win.

“Alright then, without further ado, let’s get started,” 40bees said. “Oh, and don’t forget to mute yourself in Discord; we’ll use proximity chat from here on out.” He broke the circle — phew, much better, thank you — pushed a button in the centre of the lobby, and we all got teleported to random locations throughout the map.

And with the hardest part out of the way, the fun could finally start! I was now in my element.

We got transported to a Taiga forest filled with foxes and berry bushes. While we took in this starter area, I reflexively started a little introduction for our viewers. “Hello everyone~ Welcome to PvP Sunday, we’re here with Mandel—”

“‘Sup,” he said, while crouching, doing a 360 with his character, and punching the air around him.

“—and the rest of the CovenCraft crew.” I pressed tab to show all the players connected to the server. “But I don’t think we’ll really get to know them today. We’ll just have to fight them to death.” 

“Or fail miserably. Probably.” He laughed, then started to run in my direction. “Oh! Hey, Screw, look behind you.”

I turned only to be met by a huge gaping hole, which was perfectly obeying the rules of Minecraft physics. “Oh, this is good, this is perfect! I don’t think I’ve ever had a spawn as good as this one before.”

We quickly got into a good rhythm. We started punching wood, gathering stone, then coal, then iron, and punctuating that with little quips and comments. 

Not being used to group events — even less so to PvP ones — the feeling of discovery had totally taken over me. There was really something about exploring a new world with the sole objective of having fun for a few hours tops. I felt excited, lively, and I was learning things. The novelty was more than welcomed.

 

✦ ▶ ✦

 

At one point, we had to get outside for a while and gather some food before plunging further underground. We already had good iron gear — the game had been modified so each ore gave us three times the usual amount — and even a Fire Aspect enchanted sword we’d found in a chest; it’d been useful to instantly cook every animal we’d encountered.

Except when the animal in question was a McGLVN that had been waiting behind a hill at the edge of the forest.

What was a bit hilarious was the fact he had about the same Minecraft skin as Mandel — MG had a white character with a beard and wore a red and black flannel and black pants, and Mandel had a brown character with no beard (matching his IRL appearance), but the rest was identical — so for a second, from afar, I thought MG was Mandel, even though the genuine article was actually paces behind me. “Um. How did you get that far ahead?” I asked.

“Moh, you thought I was your little boyfriend, eh?” As it happens, he had a deep voice — probably artificially boosted with an equaliser — but the way he used it didn’t convey more than the little snarky tone kids use when they want to mock someone.

I froze, and a knot tied itself in my throat. A torrent of questions flooded my brain, and some of that even escaped the bounds of my skull in the form of beads of sweat. “I… what? I don’t— Um, what?” I stuttered.

“Come on, everyone knows about Mandel, and you spend so much time with the lad so... Well, you know?” He snorted.

“Ah, sorry ‘bout that,” pikka chimed in, and caused me to uncontrollably slide my mouse in surprise, but I couldn’t pinpoint where he was. “Truth is, MG’s in his homophobic era, lol.” They both chuckled.

“Absolutely not! I'll have you know that I’m very supportive of Ferret and Carl!” MG laughed again for a few uncomfortable moments before finally coming back to the matter at hand. “So are we gonna fight or not? We don’t have good gear right now, so we could just… ignore each other?” He paused. “You have to imagine that I’m winking.”

“Screw, watch out! Run!” Mandel shouted from behind me. “Pikka’s drawing his bow.”

I tensed up. The second I turned and jumped to take to my heels, the funny sound you make with a flick of a ruler placed at the edge of a table informed me that an arrow had touched the ground right behind me.

“Ugh, no!” MG cried through his teeth. “Pikka, you were supposed to wait for the signal.”

“Oh. Oh… Yeah, sorry about that—”

“We should talk about this later, now they’re getting away. But still, why did you—”

As we went back to the thick of the Taiga we came from, the sound of the two teammates arguing slowly faded in the distance.

We ran for a few more minutes, and a giggle slowly bubbled up between Mandel and I as we entered our cave again. “What was that? What was up with them? Why were they fighting instead of chasing us?” I asked after catching my breath.

“That’s, like, their main gimmick.” Mandel answered as he started cooking the food we’d gathered. “MG’s the bossy one, and the three others get bullied. I always thought it was kind of just an act, but it seemed a bit too real there. Not that I’m complaining. We might actually have a shot at this!”

 

✦ ▶ ✦

 

“I… have no idea what to do right now.” Mandel whined. “I forgot how painful it is to gather resources without having enchantments. I mean, without having you carry me and give me all the pretty shinies. Ah, what to do? Screw, help meeee…”

I hummed, pondering our options. “I think we should go to the nether as soon as possible. Quartz’s a very good source of XP, and we need blaze rods for potions. They shouldn’t be that hard to get with the better loot rates.”

“Do we have the gear for that, though?”

“Good question. As a matter of fact, we do not.”

“Okay, what do we need then?”

“Erm, I’d say we keep mining straight—” I coughed and my cheeks grew hot. “Sorry. So, yeah, we keep mining straight that way for at least ten minutes. We should find enough diamonds to get a full set for each of us. And then we try to find a lava lake and we make a portal.”

“Or I could help you!” a cheery, high-pitched voice surprised us.

I screamed and gave a hit to Mandel with my iron pick.

While I was hyperventilating my way out of this surprise attack, Mandel spoke. “Who’s that? Who’s there?”

“It’s me, globule!” Globule answered with a more familiar and lower-pitched voice.

“Wait, there are two of you?”

“No, I’m just messing with my voice, tee-hee,” he answered, back to his soprano.

“Wow. Props to you man, you got serious skills. I thought you were a girl for a moment.”

“Ah!” Globule mined his way closer to us. “About that. Promise me you won’t tell Justin this and cut it out of your video, but I have a question…”

When I gathered all of my wits, which I had desperately lost in the tunnel earlier, I spoke. “Wait, aren't you gonna kill us?”

“Nuh-huh, Forty died. From a creeper. At the start of the game, remember? And I’m too much of an agent of chaos not to make a secret covenant with the newcomers.” He mined a block just on our left so we could see his cuby head poking out, and he started unequipping his armour. His skin was the default Alex character, but with a goofy smile. “See, I’m naked. I won’t hurt you. And! Wait for it… Drum roll… I have a tribute~” he added in a sing-song voice, then dropped dozens of diamonds at our feet.

“Don’t mind if I do.” Mandel stepped in and took the precious gems into his inventory. “What? Thirty-four? Glob, who are you?”

“Your saviour! You’re welcome! Now, please answer the following query to the best of your abilities: do you want to be a girl?” he asked, singing the words as if they were a little jingle of his.

“Well, yeah. Who wouldn't?” Mandel answered. 

“I mean, yeah, if there was a magic switch or something, I’d press it,” I said, at the same time as him.

For a second, there was a deafening silence. I swore I could hear a chicken pop an egg on the surface above us.

“Oh, cubes… Well, too bad,” Globule mumbled. “See, I asked this to all of the CC guys, and most of them said the same thing as you. I was so hoping you’d say something along the lines of, ‘Glob what the usual fuck? How do you come up with such bizarre questions?’ And I could answer you, ‘shush globehead’ — that’s my insult for non-cubic people by the way, no relation to flat earth. I mean, technically the Minecraft world is flat, thus I’m kind of a flat earther. But I digress. So I would say, ‘shush globehead! Great minds always come with insightful questions; you’re simply not trained to recognise them properly.’ But no. You had to be like everyone else and… and that’s a bummer! I thought I was special!” He sighed. “Apparently that’s just a thing every cis guy thinks.” His high voice deflated a little.

“Every ‘what’ guy?” I asked.

“Erm. Forget about it!” He mined the last block separating him from us. “So! There’s actually a lava lake with a portal already set up. It’s back in a cave that way.” He hit the air in the direction from where he’d come. “Follow me!”

“Wait, Glob, why did you rename the diamonds ‘dooimoonds’?” Mandel asked.

Globule glanced at us one last time and tsk-tsked. “Don’t ask such unnecessary questions, Moondool. We have a game to win.”

 

✦ ▶ ✦

 

Despite our best efforts, we lost. 

My dad had warned me about them, so I should have known better. But he didn’t specify that NESammy and AlexCraft were outright PvP beasts. They’d devoured three teams in less than five minutes and managed to extricate my most exquisite scream by unleashing a bucket of lava at my feet. I had been the first to die, then Glob fell into a ravine — while singing a song about escaping his assailant — and finally Mandel exploded into dozens of little items under a critical strike from Alex. There were fits of laughter, series of yells, and a good selection of gasps; the end of the event had been a roller coaster of emotions. 

As we wrapped up the recording in creative mode, flying around the map and reminiscing — “Sofa destroyed our team. He was the real danger: he seemed so happy-going, then bam! With just his bow, he didn’t miss a single shot!” — I realised how well I’d managed to get into the groove. Sure, the instant three or more people were in the vicinity, I’d be rendered incapable of speaking a single word, but that hadn’t caused too much trouble; nobody had asked me questions. All things considered, this event had gone well.

Plus, playing with my boyfriend was a treat; the teasing, the jokes, and the proximity felt so much more natural. And sharing this little secret relationship together actually helped me feel safe in the grand agitation of the day. I had an anchor — an anchor I couldn’t wait to have a date with later that evening.

40bees gave a closing speech for the event and let us all go. As was the case for Mandel and I, more than a few of us had business to attend to, so the channel got empty pretty quickly.

I closed Discord and got up to get prepared. Hoodies and jeans were unfortunately all the variety I got. I was miles behind my boyfriend’s sense of fashion. I probably even lacked the skills to properly gauge the gap between us. Nonetheless, I put on random clothes, got outside and down to Mandel’s floor, and took my phone out. 

I had a few minutes of limbo before he would be ready, so I checked my messages. 

McGLVN

McGLVN

This is the beginning of your direct message history with McGLVN.

_{1 Mutual server   •   Add friend   Block   Report Spam}

—23 December 2023—

McGLVN _{Today at 20:42}
Hey Screw.
Just wanted to apologise for the boyfriend joke earlier. Didn’t think it would get to you like that.

sonicScrew _{Today at 20:55}
Hello MG. Yeah, it was weird I guess. Thanks for the apology.

McGLVN _{Today at 20:56}
Phew. Thank you man ♥
It’s really important for me to be sure about those kinds of things you know. People are always afraid jokes like that are whateverphobic, and I get it, but they’re really not
But if you’re okay with it that should clear things up.
Like it was just a joke. I was making fun of homophobes
Oh and screw i get it
I wouldn’t want people to call me gay, i get it

sonicScrew _{Today at 20:58}
?

McGLVN _{Today at 20:58}
Don’t ‘?’ me wtf, you know what I mean.

I put my phone on standby and grunted. It had become quite clear that MG was a big shot on the server, not as big as RockDivine, but not someone you should mess with. But the gall of that man.

I tensed up and grabbed the railing. The message was imprinted in my mind. What do you mean, 'I wouldn’t want people to call me gay'? What do you mean? Was he insinuating being gay was bad? If I wanted to be charitable, there was the tiny possibility he wanted to mention past experiences of his, though seeing his lack of sensibility around the subject, I wasn’t sure that was it. I couldn’t pinpoint exactly how he did it, but he had a talent to always be on the line between asshole and chill guy — which, when I thought about it for a second, was kind of the definition of an asshole at the end of the day.

The realisation that I would have to deal with this dick on the regular if I were to join CC dawned on me. But what could be done about it? Should I talk about those remarks with 40bees? If I did so, how would he react? Would he simply go to MG's DMs to have a ‘man-to-man conversation’ then come back and say, ‘nah, don’t worry, he’s chill,’ or would he be more strict and take some kind of concrete action? Did I want to risk butchering all my chances of joining CovenCraft — and reveal my relationship with Mandel — just for this one dude’s weird comments?

No. I didn’t want that. 

Drama and conflict were things that terrified me; if I could wiggle my way out of them, that’d be ideal.

I opened the conversation again.

McGLVN _{Today at 21:00}
Hey
You okay?
Sorry I got a bit heated
Why aren’t you responding?
You there?

sonicScrew _{Today at 21:03}
Sorry. I’m okay, thanks for asking.
I have IRL stuff to do, see you later.

McGLVN _{Today at 21:04}
Right, sorry again
Take care ♥

I couldn’t decipher if he was being sincere or not, but in spite of it all, and as a mean to protect myself, I decided he was. I couldn’t afford to brood much more about him tonight.

Warmth wrapped up around me, and I received a peck on the cheek. “Hey Julien, how are you feeling? Oh, and is it okay if I hug you like this?” Mandel asked, letting the hug go for a second before I vigorously guided his hands back around me.

“More than okay, babe.”

“Babe? That’s new.” He chuckled. “I like it.”

“No, it’s not. I literally called you babe for a month during livestreams.”

“As a prank.” He put his face on my shoulder.

“That’s for me to decide.” I planted a kiss on his hair. “And I’m mildly okay. You remember earlier in the Taiga, MG made weird comments joking about us being… um… a thing.” I twiddled my fingers. “I genuinely don’t think he knows about that, but anyway, the way he said it, it stung. And just right now, he’s been making this even weirder in my DMs. I don’t want to do anything about it yet, but I don’t like it.”

“Useless prick.” He sighed. “Well, if it gets worse, don't hesitate to tell me. Even if we can't do much to fix it, it's still vital to talk about it." He turned to look at the street and let out a small chuckle. "We keep running into the worst of this server, don’t we? Except for Glob. Glob’s fine.”

I nodded. “Glob’s the finest.”

He let go of me. “I’m starting to freeze, but I heard they have good heating where we’re going. Let’s go?”

“Yeah, let’s go.” I smiled and got to his side. I looked at his hand. For a second, I hesitated, then went to hold it. He wanted warmth, he would have some!

The place we chose for this first outing would probably be judged underwhelming by most romantic minds — ‘A French fries shack? For your first date? How dare you?’ I could hear my imaginary critics say. 

‘Yeah well, I don’t like restaurants, and I was already supposed to meet my parents the next day for a big meal on Christmas Eve, so no fancy place tonight for me, thank you very much,’ I would answer them.

The essential lesson to retain here was that Mandel was not that dissimilar to me. While he was confident and outgoing, he wasn’t chasing for novel human interaction either. So the choice of a French fries shack was actually fairly clever.

Lost in a little parking lot in between two houses, safely protected by a huge oak and calmly lit with warm street lamps, the shack was broadcasting its peaceful presence to the neighbourhood with its scent of oil and fried fares. As Mandel placed our order at the counter, I secured us a place under the large awning, near a mushroom heater. The place was relatively deserted — I guess because nobody eats fries on Christmas Eve’s eve, or maybe because the air was just that cold. 

From my special vantage point, I could watch my boyfriend struggling to find the wallet I’d lent him earlier, since this hasty gremlin had forgotten to bring his own. He did that funny thing where you could almost read his internal monologue only via the movements of his eyebrows. He didn’t know why the wallet was not in his bag; he frowned. He turned again to face the vendor; he shrugged and raised his inner brow like a defeated puppy. He thought it best to look to me in search of answers; he raised one inquisitive eyebrow in my direction. I smiled and pointed at my pocket; his eyebrows shot up, and he finally found the wallet in the only place he hadn’t looked before. I couldn’t help but let out a little chuckle. He was adorable.

“Behold, your main course.” He gently put a tray with a huge cornet of fries in front of me. “And your side dish — vegan, you’ll notice,” he added while pointing at the box of nuggets on the side.

“Thank you, good sir. Shall we begin the feast?”

“We shall! Feast on, pretty boy.”

He did it again! He called me pretty and fluttered his eyes. How dared he let me discover such species of belly butterflies! A sound slipped out of my mouth. “Aaweeheee,” I graciously offered.

“Cute.”

I hid my blush behind a fry — a foolish tactic in hindsight, for the simple fact that a fry was magnitudes smaller than my head, but this kind of higher thinking was out of my reach in that instant. “Y— You can’t say things like that!”

“Oh, is that so? Then I’ll stop—”

“N— No, please. Don’t. Stop. Ever? Please.”

“Alright then, pretty boy,” he murdered me.

I gritted my teeth and buried my head in my hand. “I’ll— I’ll— You’re— Ugh. If I wasn’t so greasy, I’d kiss you right now, so you’d shut up!”

He nearly choked on his burger and fought a severe case of crimson rising in his cheeks. Mission accomplished.

The soft sound of our munches, which were peppered every so often over the fizzle of the deep fryers, put me in a quiet state of mind. It sounded like rain gently rolling and knocking on your roof, but food edition.

When fries were properly eaten and burps neatly produced, I wiped my mouth and hands. Things had gone well. Weller than expected, even. The wellest I could ever have imagined. And that brought me to the inevitable slippery slope of… “What’s next?” 

“Wadyamead?” Mandel wasn’t as fast a gourmand as me. He gulped and tried again. “What do you mean?”

“Well. The invite. The big one, you know?”

“The event?”

“No, curvyhead! CovenCraft, the server.”

“Oh!”

“Yeah.”

“Ooooooh…”

“Exactly.”

“Well, I don’t think you’ll find that surprising, but I’m rather eager to join. I want to do it, with you. I mean, it’s perfect, really: our last season of M&S’s adventure—”

“We’re not calling it M&S’s.”

“—is nearly finished, and CC could be a good series to replace it.”

I sighed. “You’re more right than you’d think. I wanted to refocus on vanilla gameplay lately. And it slots so well in our schedule.”

He lifted a neatly manicured finger. “Hep! We’re doing it again, you’re doing it!”

“No, I am not!” I paused and frowned. “That being said, could you enlighten me on what ‘it’ is exactly again?”

“You’re talking work outside of work. No shop talk, enjoy the date.”

“Okay, fair. Though—" I saw his brow furrowing. "I’m wrapping up, I promise. I just wanted to say — and I might change my mind about this — I think… I think I wanna try. I’d be okay to join CC.” For a brief moment, the stress building up in my gut as I admitted this disturbing turn of events made me empathise with creepers. I closed my eyes and let out a deep breath, thinking about Minecraft cats. “Alright, I think I said my piece. Now, what non-work-related topic did you want to talk about?"

“I don’t know,” he said, fumbling over his words but putting syrup in his voice, “date stuff, like, um, asking what’s your secret for having such a pretty face, or maybe, I don’t know, um, kissing…”

I was slowly starting to learn the benefit of a good work-life balance. The compartmentalization of different spheres of life was not as bad as I previously thought — my prior beliefs were that it would hinder my creativity, maybe even ploddingly stifle it: from a flare to a flame to an ember, and finally just some sparse sparks. However, I found myself not caring as much as before — or caring differently, perhaps. Whereas previously I treasured my creativity mostly because of an underlying need for productivity, guided by the fear that every pause in my work would lead to an unavoidable downfall of my skills, and eventually my channel, now I was starting to see it as a way of actually nourishing this creativity by way of extending my range of experiences and, quite simply, by fucking taking care of myself. 

All of that to say that, alone in a parking lot, beside the French fries shack, we kissed passionately. And it was good. And I knew I would feel giddy about it for the rest of the night.

Mandel extracted himself from the kiss, a dopey smile drawing itself on his beautiful face. “Oh. By the way, since we started eating, I can't get Glob’s comment out of my mind,” he said conspiratorially. “You know? The one he made when we met him in the tunnel. About being a girl. Well, I’m making wild connections here, but bear with me. There’s a question that keeps popping into my head: if I were a girl, would it be possible to get a fry stuck in my cleavage? How would that feel? Pretty bad, I reckon. But still, now I’m curious, I need to know.”

I sighed dreamily. “Gosh, great minds really do come up with rather insightful questions.”

 

✦ ▶ ✦

 

40bees

40beesunderatrenchcoat

This is the beginning of your direct message history with 40bees.

_{1 Mutual server   •   Remove friend   Block}

—23 December 2023—

sonicScrew _{Today at 23:10}
Hello 40bees.

40bees _{Today at 23:11}
Hello screw! So how was the event?
It was a pleasure having you (and Mandel!) But I understand you’re not used to big events like that, I hope it wasn’t too taxing?

sonicScrew _{Today at 23:15}
It was definitely a new experience, but overall I liked it!
Thank you so much for your understanding btw

40bees _{Today at 23:16}
You’re welcome! It’s my job that everyone feel comfortable

sonicScrew _{Today at 23:20}
Well, you’re doing a good job then
So, I had a question
I wanted to wait until the end of the event before asking it
It’s very unrelated but I can’t help but be curious.
You might not be able to answer though (that’d be okay)

40bees _{Today at 23:21}
Ask away~

sonicScrew _{Today at 23:24}
What happened to orangetech?

40bees _{Today at 23:24}
Ah