Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

He’s falling. He’s always falling.

It isn’t all that he’s doing, though.

After months of isolation, Ex is as adjusted to the void as he can likely get, and it takes little effort for him to stabilize his freefall enough to analyze the screens before him. His fingers fly over the keyboard as he attempts to finish the line of code that will break him out of the void.

Ex’s fingers finally still, and he scans the lines of code for errors. He finds none.

In the back of his mind, he thinks it shouldn’t be so easy. Grian is one of Xisuma’s closest friends and pupils, surely a server he created would be safeguarded more than this. But it isn’t. Beyond a few measures taken to hide player names and the server details, there are no defenses.

Whatever this server’s purpose, Grian clearly put more effort into hiding it than defending it.

His mistake , Ex thinks to himself.

When Ex first appears in Grian’s server, he appears on a sandy beach, soft and warm enough to register through the gloves of his pressurized suit. To his right lies an endless tropical ocean, so clear he can see straight to the sea floor even at a distance. To his left is a dense wooded forest, but not a tropical one- it’s all dark pines and firs and autumn-colored oaks and maples.

Clearly, this place isn’t naturally generated. Someone has been terraforming.

Ex gazes down the neverending white beach, and sees someone sitting there. It’s a demon, and Ex recognizes him, even if his foggy memory can’t supply a name.

I’m in the right place , Ex thinks. He smiles, and heads toward the demon.

The demon looks up at his approach, blinking in confusion. “Xisuma?”

He seems to realize his mistake the moment he says it, eyes narrowing with suspicion and hints of fear. He remains sitting on the beach as Ex towers over him, teetering in the sand.

“You-”

Ex tries to speak, to threaten, to say anything at all - but his words start to slur, and he shakes his head against the fog creeping at the edges of his vision. He’s never been so dizzy upon arrival in a new server before; teleportation isn’t supposed to make a person nauseous.

Ex raises a hand and attempts to throw a punch toward the demon. He misses, of course, and completely upsets his own balance, crashing onto the beach as his vision goes dark.

The last thing he registers is the warmth of the sand, and someone’s gentle touch.

Impulse is panicking.

Xisuma’s little brother - he’s pretty sure that’s who this is, who else wears the exact same kind of suit? - has just passed out in front of him, on a server he shouldn’t have access to.

No one else is online right now. It’s just Impulse and Ex, alone on a beach.

And Impulse is panicking.

He rolls Ex onto his back and tries to figure out why he passed out. Is he not breathing well? His helmet seems to be working just fine, with no obvious damage to it or the suit. Ex doesn’t seem injured, either. Was it the shock of hacking into the server? Is that even a thing?

Impulse doesn’t know, but he can’t just leave Ex laying here on the beach.

Impulse gathers Ex into his arms, concerning sparking in his gut. He knows he’s strong, but Ex should not be this easy to pick up. He feels as light as Grian with his hollow avian bones.

Something’s wrong , Impulse thinks. Something’s really wrong .

Impulse closes his eyes and tries to envision the place he wants to go. It’s difficult- he’s never had a vivid imagination, and manipulating the server has always seemed so much easier for its more creative members. Impulse whispers directions under his breath, and it works.

Impulse feels the server shifting around him as its code reworks itself to fit his desires. When he opens his eyes, they’re no longer on the endless beach, instead standing in a small cottage.

It’s a place Impulse holds close to his heart. No one else has stepped foot in this space- it exists for him and only him, a place for him to run and hide when the rest of the world is too much.

No one else has stepped foot in this space.

Today, that changes.

Impulse barely hesitates before carrying Ex to the mountain of pillow and blankets he sleeps in. He sets Ex down as gently as he can and rearranges his limbs to hopefully be comfortable.

And then he sits back, stares at Ex’s sleeping form, and starts panicking again.

“How did he get here?” Impulse whispers to no one.

The server, affectionately referred to as the “Traffic Server” by those who used it, had been born after the especially traumatic events of Double Life. Everyone had been affected, and Grian had tried his best to help them through their grief. But not all participants in the death games shared a home server, and since Hermitcraft was whitelisted, Grian had found a solution.

He’d created a space where they could meet and work out their traumas from his death games in peace, away from their home servers where they could never truly open up.

Grian had given them a space all their own- a space they could manipulate at will, where they all had the power they were robbed of during the death games. 

Grian had given them a safe space. And no one was supposed to know it existed.

So how the hell did Ex find it?

It isn’t a question Impulse can ask, not while Ex is out cold. In his bed.

Panic finally starts to fade, and Impulse takes a deep breath.

First things first.

Impulse glances over Ex, making sure his body is well supported by the blankets and that no part of him is being bent or pinned awkwardly. He seems fine, his breathing steady.

Impulse climbs to his feet and heads into the kitchen he’s never used. One of the rules Grian had set when he created the server was for the members’ hunger settings to be nonexistent, so they never had to worry about finding food when they were supposed to be in recovery. Impulse had created the kitchen alongside the cottage out of habit, but he’s never had a need for it.

He has a need for it, now.

Impulse busies himself preparing a meal that won’t go bad if left out, ingredients appearing out of thin air the moment he realizes he needs them. Ex isn’t a member - he broke in, he must have - so Impulse has no way of knowing if the lack of hunger will apply to him or not.

Better not risk it, Impulse figures. 

He wraps everything carefully and carries it back to Ex, placing the food and a pitcher of water at just enough of a distance that Ex shouldn’t be able to knock it if he flails upon waking up.

With all of that done, Impulse sits by Ex’s side and watches his chest gently rise.

It’s a strange feeling, watching him sleep. He looks so similar to Xisuma, with only the colors of their visor tint and the thread of their suits to set them apart, like twins. Impulse knows they aren’t twins- Xisuma had once made a passing mention of being an older brother, long ago.

Impulse really should tell Xisuma about this. He’d want to know about his brother reappearing in one of his adjacent servers, especially after the chaos of Ex’s last appearance.

Impulse needs to talk to Xisuma- only problem being that this server isn’t supposed to exist, so no messages can be sent in or out. He’ll have to return to Hermitcraft to talk to Xisuma.

… is it a good idea to leave Ex alone here?

Impulse can’t wait here for Ex to wake up. Time moves slower on the traffic server than it does on Hermitcraft, but he’s already been here for several days. The last thing he needs is to have Skizz worrying about his prolonged absence and asking questions he doesn’t want to answer.

Impulse stands, rifling through the desk he uses for redstone tinkering until he finds a book and quill. He stares at the empty page for a long time, unsure of what to say.

Should he say he’s leaving to talk to Xisuma? That could just piss him off. Should he politely ask Ex not to destroy the server they’re on? What good has that ever done them?

Finally, Impulse writes a note, ripping it out of the book before he can second guess himself.

Make yourself at home.

Impulse leaves it with the food at Ex’s side, one corner pinned down by the water pitcher. Ex is still unresponsive, and Impulse gazes at him as he pulls up his teleportation screens.

He doesn’t know what he’s doing. Ex isn’t someone he should be messing with.

But… 

He’d looked so vulnerable, collapsed and unconscious in the sand.

Impulse doesn’t know what else he could’ve done.

Impulse scrolls through the teleportation menu until he finds the address for Hermitcraft. He hits the teleportation button, feels his code begin to separate itself from the traffic server.

Ex’s sleeping form fades away, and Impulse heaves a shaking sigh.

Let’s hope I don’t regret this.

Chapter Text

Impulse materializes in his bedroom back on Hermitcraft. He gives himself a minute for the haze of teleportation to fade, then pulls up his comm screens, scanning the member list.

Xisuma isn’t online. Great.

Impulse considers sending him a message in the post, but decides against it. This is something they need to discuss in person, not to mention the chaos that could be wrought if Xisuma found the message when Impulse wasn’t online and panicked.

But until then… what should he do? Who should he tell?

… should he even tell anyone?

Ex has attempted to destroy the Hermitcraft server once before, but it was a long time ago, and he’d never succeeded beyond damaging a few people’s bases, which was reversible. And all Ex had done in season eight was scam them out of diamonds they didn’t even need.

From what Xisuma’s told them, Ex is dangerous, and Impulse really doesn’t know enough about him to argue. The first thing Ex had done when he saw Impulse was try to hit him, after all.

But something twists in his gut when he thinks of how Ex had crumpled to the ground.

He hadn’t seemed dangerous, then. He’d only seemed… sad.

Grian logs into the server, his name popping up on the player list. Impulse’s fingers hover over the private messaging button. It’s Grian’s server that Ex broke into. He should be made aware.

Impulse’s fingers hover. He doesn’t press the button.

Grian’s name flashes again on his comms: Grian logged out.

Impulse sighs, all the tension leaving his body. He collapses his comm screens.

Impulse thinks back to Ex, sleeping peacefully in his little cottage on Grian’s server. He won’t be able to go anywhere or break anything- he isn’t whitelisted, he doesn’t have any power. Where he is right now, Ex doesn’t pose a threat to anyone but himself.

Did I do the right thing, leaving him there? Impulse asks himself.

It’s a question he can’t answer.

A wave of exhaustion floods over Impulse, and it dawns on him that he’d been interrupted while he was trying to destress from cyber-city planning. The itch he’d felt beneath his skin before he’d left Hermitcraft is still present, but it’s fading, so Impulse figures he’ll be alright for now.

Impulse’s comm pings quietly and he pulls up his comms to see Skizz log back in. Five seconds later, his comm pings again with greetings from Skizz and a request to meet up.

Impulse smiles, and messages back an affirmative.

Skizz has always been a great distraction, after all.

He’s falling. He’s always falling.

It doesn’t feel right, this time- it’s wrong, something is wrong, he’s falling but something is wrong -

Ex wakes up in a cold sweat. He isn’t falling. He’s laying somewhere soft and warm, staring up at an unfamiliar ceiling. He isn’t falling. He can feel the sun on his face.

He isn’t falling. It was just a dream.

Before he even realizes it, Ex is crying.

His chest heaves and his vision blurs, and within moments, the air within Ex’s helmet becomes hot and suffocating. He wrestles with his helmet until it releases and throws it to the side.

He doesn’t breathe any easier without it.

Ex sobs until he can’t anymore, until his eyes and throat ache, until he’s curled into a ball with his hands over his face, trying in vain to block out the world.

He lays there for a long time, just breathing. It’s harder without his helmet, but not impossible, so Ex leaves his helmet off, just within arm’s reach. The ache behind his eyes finally begins to fade, and Ex blinks his eyes open, squinting against the sunlight streaming over him.

There’s a window. Once his eyes adjust to the brightness, Ex can see trees through it, swaying gently in a breeze. Ex sees a flash of colorful wings as a bird flies past, swinging sweetly.

The scenery looks nothing like what he’d seen from the beach he’d been on previously. The trees aren’t even the same trees he’d seen within the forest- these are willows and aspens, pale green in comparison to the autumn-colored trees he’d seen before.

Where the fuck is he?

Ex pushes himself into a sitting position and takes a better look at his surroundings.

He’s been laying in a mess of pillows and blankets, arranged into a sort of nest. The room he’s in is small and somewhat cramped- a tiny kitchen to one side, a cluttered desk to another, windows on all sides at all different heights, letting in the light and views of distance treelines.

It feels lived-in. Like this is someone’s home.

Ex thinks back to the demon he’d seen on the beach, and he wonders.

Did he bring him here? If so… why?

Ex’s gaze lands on a pitcher and a plate of food, set just within reach of the pillow-blanket nest. A piece of paper has been left there, pinned down by the pitcher.

Ex carefully slides the pitcher out of the way and holds the note in his hands.

Make yourself at home.

He’s crying again.

He sets the note aside before his tears can smudge the writing, and Ex curls in on himself. It’s a stupid thing to be emotional about- it’s just a piece of paper, it doesn’t mean anything.

But…

Make yourself at home , the note said.

When was the last time he’d had a home?

He’d been blacklisted from his parents’ server, and in the years since, he’s spent his time either hacking into Xisuma’s servers to wreak havoc or falling endlessly through the void. Xisuma could never be home for him- Xisuma has always done everything in his power to reject Ex.

And as neutral as the void may be, the thought of returning to it terrifies Ex.

Make yourself at home .

Ex takes deep breaths, and wipes his eyes. He eats the food that has been set out for him. He drinks as much water as he can hold without feeling ill.

Ex picks up the note, and reads it one more time. Just to be sure.

Make yourself at home.

Well… what’s the harm?

Impulse is starting to feel immensely guilty.

It’s nearing the end of the third day since Ex appeared. Impulse hasn’t returned to Grian’s server since- he has too much to do on Hermitcraft that he’s been putting off, and he also doesn’t want to draw attention to himself, going back and forth between servers too often.

Skizz already knows he leaves Hermitcraft to spend time on Grian’s server when he’s upset. But if he does it too often, Skizz will start to worry, and that’s the last thing Impulse needs.

So he’s stayed on Hermitcraft, plotting out his cyber-city and playing along with the other hermits’ hijinks as always. It’s comforting, this routine, but the memory of Ex collapsed on that beach is at the forefront of Impulse’s mind, keeping him from fully focusing on anything else.

Within that time, Xisuma and Grian both log into the server several times each day.

Impulse never messages either of them.

He couldn’t possibly explain why. He knows he should tell someone, anyone .

But he doesn’t.

Impulse couldn’t possibly explain why.

He is starting to feel guilty, though.

Time moves differently on Grian’s server- three days on Hermitcraft could be upwards of a week on Grian’s server, if not longer. It was Grian’s way of making sure they could take time to recover without worrying about their projects back home going untouched for days on end.

The passage of time on Grian’s server is largely unpredictable, but it’s definitely been more than three days there, and Impulse feels bad for abandoning Ex there.

And he can’t lie to himself- he’s worried.

So once the most recent hermit chaos has resolved itself and everyone has flown back to their bases, Impulse pulls up his teleportation screens, and logs into Grian’s server.

He doesn’t know what he’s expecting. Ex can’t leave the cottage- Impulse had modified the code around his house before he’d left to block all players from entering or exiting, just in case Ex was there to cause some kind of mayhem. This way, he can only cause mayhem indoors.

It had been an instinctive reaction, locking Ex up. Impulse knew what Ex was known for.

It didn’t make him feel any less guilty.

The shapes of Impulse’s cyber-city bedroom fade away, replaced with the familiar wood tones of his cottage. It’s evening, the sunset just barely visible through the cracked-open window.

Ex is still in Impulse’s bed, right where Impulse left him. He’s awake. And knitting.

Ex looks up from the knitting needles in his lap and meets Impulse’s gaze.

“Uh,” Impulse says, “Hi?”

Impulse can’t see Ex’s face, but he can see the way his head tilts and his shoulders roll back, and he gets the distinct impression of arrogance . He’s fairly certain it’s fake.

Ex’s voice is almost mocking. “ Hi . Where the hell have you been?”

Guilt twists tighter in Impulse’s gut.

“I’m sorry I just kinda left you here, I had a lot of stuff to do on Hermitcraft so I just…”

Impulse stops talking.

The moment he mentions Hermitcraft, Ex’s body language changes. His shoulders curl inwards defensively, his head lowered as if preparing for a strike. The knitting needles and whatever he’d been knitting are now crushed between his hands, and Impulse swears they’re shaking.

He doesn’t get the chance to ask why before Ex tosses his knitting project aside and stands. He attempts to adopt the arrogant posture he’d had before, but Impulse sees right through it.

“Guess I’d better leave before he gets here, hm?” Ex says through gritted teeth.

“Who?” Impulse asks.

Ex meets his eyes again, and Impulse knows who.

Xisuma. Ex’s brother.

Ex walks past Impulse towards the door, purposefully shoving Impulse with his shoulder. He gets almost to the door before Impulse remembers.

“You can’t leave,” he says.

Ex doesn’t pause or look back. “Oh, really?”

“I mean, you actually can’t-” Impulse explains. “The server code has been altered so that no one can enter or leave this house. The door will probably make you nauseous if you touch it.”

Ex pauses, just for a moment, then reaches out to grab the door handle. He shudders, then lets go and clutches his stomach. Impulse takes one step toward him.

“So you trapped me here, did you? How courteous,” Ex spits.

Impulse fidgets nervously. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know what you came here for, and I couldn’t wait for you to wake up, so I just… I thought it’d be safer for you to stay here.”

“Safer? Safer for whom? Admit it, you just wanted me to stay in one place while you ran off to tell my brother that I’ve shown my ugly face again!”

Impulse takes a deep breath.

“I didn’t tell Xisuma that you’re here.”

“Yeah, like I’ll believe that.”

“I didn’t ,” Impulse insists. “I didn’t tell anyone. And I’m not going to.”

Silence stretches between them. Ex shifts from foot to foot, hovering near the door like he might try to open it again if Impulse takes another step closer. Impulse doesn’t. He picks at the hem of his yellow jacket and watches Ex, wondering what the hell he’s thinking.

He should tell Xisuma. He needs to tell Xisuma.

But Ex is looking at him, and even with the helmet, he can see the tension seeping out of Ex with every passing second. It dawns on him that Ex is afraid of Xisuma.

Impulse doesn’t know why. He doesn’t know if it matters.

He doesn’t want to tell Xisuma.

“I promise not to tell Xisuma you’re here. Not him or anyone else,” Impulse says, “I promise .”

Ex’s shoulders sag in obvious relief.

“Okay,” he whispers.

Chapter Text

“So… what exactly is this server for, anyways?” Ex asks.

Impulse cracks another egg into the bowl in front of him and starts mixing them. He contemplates his answer as he stares at the swirling colors, deciding how to phrase things.

“It’s a kind of… recovery space, I guess?” he says, already second-guessing himself. “Grian has these games we play, they’re basically a battle to the death, last one standing wins, et cetera. They’re a lot of fun, but not all of us share a home server, so Grian made this server for us to meet.”

It’s a half truth. Impulse keeps the horrors of the games to himself- the guilt, the sleepless nights, the dreams that never fade no matter how far in the past their games may be.

It’s none of Ex’s business, the scars they carry.

Ex hums, disinterested. Impulse peeks over his shoulder at him.

Ex is sitting cross-legged in the blanket nest, knitting once again. Impulse has yet to ask exactly what it is he’s knitting. Ex’s posture is loose, casual, but his fingers twitch restlessly, and he glances at Impulse every once in a while, keeping an eye on Impulse’s every move.

Ex still doesn’t trust him.

Impulse is trying very hard not to feel hurt by it.

He turns back to his cooking, pours the ex mixture into a hot pan, sprinkles it with cheese and herbs. Ex doesn’t ask any more questions. The only sounds are sizzling egg and the click of knitting needles.

When Impulse carries over the platter of eggs and toast, Ex gently sets his knitting project aside. They sit together in the blanket nest, a foot of distance between them, Impulse politely facing away from Ex while he removes his helmet to eat. He doesn’t turn around until he can hear Ex’s helmet whirring.

It isn’t something they’ve ever discussed. Ex has never asked Impulse to look away when he took off his helmet. Impulse had simply done so the first time he cooked for Ex, almost without thinking.

Impulse isn’t sure if it’s because of his familiarity with Xisuma or the desire to avoid pissing off Ex at all costs that has him turning away whenever Ex reaches for the seal on his helmet. He isn’t sure it even matters. Ex is eating, and that’s enough to soothe some of Impulse’s worries.

Impulse doesn’t turn around until he can hear Ex’s helmet whirring again, and even then, he gives it a moment, waits until he can hear the quiet rustle of Ex’s fingers and the knitting needles.

Impulse glances at Ex. Ex doesn’t look at him, focused entirely on his knitting project. The empty plate is sitting at his feet. Impulse doesn’t feel like getting up right now, so he ignores it.

Ex doesn’t look at him or say anything, so Impulse flops back onto the nest and heaves a sigh.

The breeze knocks a tree branch into the window, a soft tap-tap every so often. The knitting needles click against each other. Ex’s helmet whirs softly. A ball of yarn rolls across the floor, near-silent.

Impulse opens his eyes.

He has no idea how long he’s been asleep- he doesn’t even remember closing his eyes. He tilts his head and sees that the sun is setting outside the window, casting golden light throughout the cottage. Impulse is still in the blanket nest. One of the blankets has been flipped around so it covers him halfway.

“Feel better?”

Impulse turns away from the window. Ex is still sitting next to him, but he’s now relaxed into the nest, in a similar position with a blanket flipped up and over his legs.

“Yeah,” Impulse mumbles, He feels a sudden rush of embarrassment. “Sorry.”

Impulse doesn’t know what he’s apologizing for. This is his cottage.

Ex simply shrugs. “You were tired. Big bags under your eyes and everything. You needed the sleep.”

Impulse gazes at Ex, wondering if he’s trying to insult him somehow. If he is, Impulse doesn’t think it’s working. Not when Ex has been so careful in his cottage, hardly leaving any sign of his presence. Not when Ex clearly tucked Impulse in while he slept. Impulse was a light and restless sleeper- he should have felt Ex rustling the blankets around him, but he hadn’t. Ex must have been very careful.

Memories trigger in Impulse’s mind of Xisuma, years ago, warning them that Ex was dangerous. That he’d always wanted nothing more than to ruin the things Xisuma held dear.

Impulse had doubted it then.

Now, after having Ex in his cottage for only a handful of weeks, Impulse doubts it even more.

“Don’t you have better things to do than stare at me?” Ex says.

Impulse looks away, once again feeling that rush of embarrassment. He heaves a sigh. Ex is right- he does have things to do, and he’s been at the cottage for several days already.

“I probably should go back,” he mumbles, more to himself than to Ex. Ex simply nods.

It takes the weight of his own body when he sits up for Impulse to realize he doesn’t want to leave.

He forces himself to leave the blanket nest anyways, stretching out his stiff limbs. Ex is watching him when he turns around, and Impulse feels a stab of guilt that he’s leaving Ex behind once again.

“Will you-"

“Just go,” Ex cuts him off. “I’ll be here. Like always.”

There’s a fierceness to his words that takes Impulse aback. He thinks about the code that keeps Ex here in the cottage, unable to cause trouble. That’s how Impulse had thought of it- all he knew of Ex was that he liked to cause trouble, so he’d locked him here, unable to hurt himself or anyone else.

He’d thought it safer, for the server and for Ex.

Now, Impulse wonders if it’s any different than keeping Ex prisoner.

Ex won’t look at him anymore, staring down at his knitting project, yarn still looped around his fingers. The needles aren’t moving. Impulse feels his chest constricting and turns away. His foot hits the empty plate from that afternoon when he takes a step, and Impulse stoops to pick it up.

They’d done a few awkward tests the last time Impulse had logged in, and discovered that Ex couldn’t conjure up food out of thin air the way Impulse could, no matter how imaginative Ex promised he was being. The server didn’t respond to him, didn’t recognize his code. It was one of the reasons Impulse worried so much whenever he left. He was terrified he’d stay away too long and Ex would starve.

Impulse glances out the window at the darkening sky. Everything in this server functioned at the will of the players. They could shape the terrain in the blink of an eye, teleport anywhere they wanted…

Ex couldn’t create from his imagination like they did. The server didn’t follow his wishes.

“Let’s go outside,” Impulse says.

Ex’s head shoots up. Impulse can see his surprise through the visor of his helmet, can see him glance to the window and back to Impulse, as if he thinks Impulse might be joking.

Impulse puts his hands on his hips and attempts to channel Skizz. “Well, c’mon!”

After another moment of hesitation, Ex gets up.

Ex doesn’t realize how long it’s been since he was somewhere living until he’s outside.

He’d only been on that beach for a handful of minutes before passing out, and since then he’s spent all his time in the comfortable warmth of Impulse’s cottage, only occasionally glimpsing the outside world through windows half-blocked by shrubbery and creeping vines.

Now, he and Impulse stand in a massive forest clearing, shades of green all around them. There’s a tiny pond next to a worn dirt path leading into the trees, colorful fish darting to and fro beneath the water. A ring of willows, birches, and rippling aspens surround the clearing, and a hundred different species of flowers sway gently among tall wild grasses. All of them are a varying shade of yellow.

As the setting sun casts dramatic shadows over the clearing and darkens the trees at its edge, Ex stands frozen near the door of the cottage, feeling somewhat like he might be dreaming.

God, how cliché is that?

Impulse walks ahead of Ex, arms outstretched as his hands brush lightly over the tops of the grass. Ex watches him drift almost aimlessly in the clearing, swaying with the grass and the flowers. He pauses in the middle of the clearing for a moment. Then he sits, the grass and flowers engulfing him.

Ex forces his feet to carry him to where Impulse sits cross-legged in the grass. There are grass seeds in Impulse’s hair and a dozen flowers curled around his legs, dropping yellow petals in his lap.

Ex sits carefully next to Impulse. Impulse smiles, but doesn’t say anything.

The two of them sit there for what feels like forever, and really could have been forever, with how this stupid server works. Ex watches the shadows cast by the setting sun subtly shift, highlighting different spots around the clearing. He listens to the grass rustling in the wind, the delicate splash of fish in the pond, distant birds and the aspen leaves fluttering against one another and Impulse’s quiet sighs.

Ex knows Impulse is supposed to be leaving. He knows Impulse must be thinking it, too.

But he keeps his mouth shut, and listens to the forest, and feels at peace.