Chapter Text
Grian, since seeing Mumbo about his own base and receiving the blocks, had finished the new elevators and extended his base in height.
Why he was building such a big base, he would never know but it was honestly proving to be a struggle in his day to day life.
Now feeling exhausted, Grian slowly climbed down from the second layer of his build, his feet scrambling to find purchase against the smooth side.
When reaching the bottom layer of his base he found an innocent looking sign among all of the chests.
Come visit Cleo's Haunted Shipwreck! The sign read and Grian bit his lip as he read it.
As much as a hermit he truly was despite the others attempting to involve him, he didn't really try to include himself in these types of activities.
So why not start now?
The sign left made no mention to where this ship could be. But really, how hard could finding a ghost ship really be?
Turns out, extremely hard.
Grian had made his way over to the shopping district as a starting point before slowly looking over the shores, trying to find this fabled ship.
All ghosts that Grian had encountered in the past usually came out at night with a few rare occasions so perhaps this ship was just like that.
When he was just about to give up on looking, Grian rounded the corner of a store that sold logs and was quite aptly shaped, there was the fabled ghost ship.
Good Void, practically took him all day to try to find the thing.
Not wanting to waste any more time, considering the sun was now almost about to set, Grian hurried onto the ship, holding onto the rope ladder tightly.
Once on ship, it was obvious that this was a man made ship considering Grian was actually able to stand on it without falling through. Even though, the gimmick was cool and Grian was excited to start exploring.
As he looked around, Grian was amazed at the amount of detail this Cleo person went through, it genuinely looked like a pirate ship - just like the storybooks he used to read in the library. He was most amazed by the ghostly pirate manikins, they were so life like that Grian was expecting for them to start talking.
As he wandered around the ship, Grian knew very well that he looked like an excitable child. And Grian couldn't help but not care, there was no one here to hurt him (as far as he was aware) so he could show his happiness, there was no need to hide it out of fear.
Just as he was about to leave, not wanting to overstay his welcome, Grian found something that he had yet to truly explore.
It was just an unassuming button and in hindsight, Grian shouldn't have pressed that button and should really start working on the problem he has of pushing any button he sees, no matter what it does.
In the end, hindsight was always 20/20 and never seemed to favour him, Grian, true to his own nature and curiosity, pressed the button and fell down a long hole that had opened up from underneath his feet.
Serves him right for pressing buttons that he shouldn't have.
As he fell, Grian couldn't help but think that this was truly going to be the end of him. He had a second chance at life after the poor hand he was dealt all those years ago, starting when he was barely a child in grade school. And look where he was now, really stuffing up this chance by falling down a hole.
Distantly, Grian couldn't help but hope that he would land on his neck for a quick and mostly painless death rather than having to sit at the bottom of the hole for who knows how long before his body eventually just gave up. He wasn't a stranger when it came to falling great distances - it always seemed to be him or someone he knew.
Even if Grian himself has died quite a few times already, there was always the horrid voice that would whisper in his ear, that was your last chance.
As he closed his eyes, preparing for impact, Grian couldn't help but think - Would anyone notice he was gone?
Grian fell to the ground with a loud crack and a loud groan. Broken bones were easy to deal with once you had practice but finding a way out of this hole would be a challenge.
Thankfully (or not thankful at all depending how one looked at it) he wasn't dead but dear void he felt close.
Standing up with a wince, Grian took notice of his surroundings. Wherever he was wasn't very large, just enough for him to fall through without twisting too much. It was also quite dark, the only light being the natural light from above which admittedly, wasn't a lot.
Then a growl was heard and a singular red light broke out in the darkness.
"Hello?" Grian timidly called only, feeling quite stupid. Of course there wouldn't be another person down here! This hole could barely fit Grian himself. But nonetheless, he was hopeful that at least someone above the surface would hear him and come to his aid.
But that hopeful feeling was quickly replaced by dread as a growl came from the darkness and the tiny hole was lit up by a singular red light.
A zombie somehow had the glowing red eye surrounded by metal reaching out to grab Grian with it's dirt covered hand.
Pushing himself against the far wall to get away from the reaching hands of the zombie bit instead of feeling the cool touch of stone, he felt the clammy touch of a hand.
Whipping around, Grian was met with his own face on a zombie's body.
With nothing left to do, Grian screamed.