Chapter Text
As soon as the trio walked out of the apartment complex, Grian spotted a couple familiar faces.
Yuki and Chan were crossing the street towards them—Yuki running eagerly over to Sam and Chan trotting along the road in a much calmer manner, glaring subtly at the other girl.
This immediately reminded Grian of the bad blood between the two.
Yuki literally framed Chan for murder. Yeah, she definitely had a good reason to not like her. Hell, Grian wasn’t a huge fan either—she did do some messed up things, didn’t she?
“Sam! It’s about time, what took you so long?” Yuki complained, hugging the hybrid with enough strength to make Sam let out a slightly choked noise.
“Gree-on refused to get dressed, me and Taurtis had to convince him to,” Sam struggled to get the words out and Yuki finally let go of him, looking over at Grian.
Chan grabbed Taurtis’ arm and spoke before the other girl could even say anything,
“We should get going or we’re gonna miss the train.”
She wasn’t wrong, so Yuki begrudgingly gripped Sam’s hand and led the way towards the underground train station.
As they began to walk, Grian in between the two couples, he could hear Chan speak to Taurtis behind him,
“So, what happened? Why does Grian look so…off?” She asked, sounding confused.
“He’s from the future!” Taurtis responded with audible excitement.
“The future? What—“
Grian turned and stared at the teens, Taurtis was looking at Chan with a happy grin and Chan had an eyebrow raised, smiling slightly.
“You know, you could always just ask me about what’s going on with me, right?”
She looked at him,
“I didn’t think you’d wanna talk about it,” she said with a small shrug.
Grian sighed.
“So, is it true? Are you really from the future?” She asked, tilting her head.
“Yes,” he answered simply, turning back around to catch up with the other two.
Taurtis and Chan raced to catch up, now walking either side of him.
“So why are you here, then?” Chan asked.
“Well—“ Grian started before being cut off by Taurtis,
“He came here on accident! He said he has to find a way back, but he’s staying with us until then!” Taurtis informed his girlfriend eagerly.
Grian grumbled quietly at being rudely interrupted and Chan looked like she was thinking.
“Hmm…Maybe J could help you?” She said in a questioning tone.
“Hm? How could he help?” Grian asked, brows furrowing.
“Well, he’s pretty smart, likes science and stuff a lot. And he’s rich too, so that would probably work in your favor,” she shrugged at him again, turning to face forward, “I don’t know, I feel like it’s atleast worth a try if you don’t already know how to get back.”
“Huh, you’re right, that’s actually a pretty good idea,” Grian said, “Thanks, Chan.”
She smiled,
“Of course.”
Taurtis and her passed him, walking slightly faster to not fall behind before the train left without them. PufferfishPete wasn’t so lenient as to wait for every usual student. You were either there or you weren’t.
Grian started walking faster too, not wanting to get left behind in the area he only barely remembered how to get his way around.
Xisuma was aware of the existence of the rift and had elected to ignore it for the most part. It wasn’t uncommon for the Hermits to create game-breaking things on the server—Doc was especially guilty of this.
After reading the sudden message from Scar, he thought to himself that maybe he should’ve looked more into this whole rift situation, because he had a sneaking suspicion that’s where the problem stemmed from.
He typed back a response and put his communicator away. It looks like he had to take an unplanned trip to Grian’s base, affectionately named Dwayne.
He flew for a few minutes before finally seeing some beautifully sculpted floating rocks in the distance. Getting closer fairly quickly, he could see two figures looking up at him. He knew it was the two Hermits in need of his help.
Before he knew it, he was landing roughly on the wooden floor of the base. One of the two men jumped backwards slightly. Xisuma looked at them and—good lord.
Now there was a smaller (both in height and physique,) younger Grian standing next to Scar.
The Hermit had already informed him of what he would see once he got here, and yet it still didn’t prepare him for it.
His eyes were wider, cheeks rounder and jawline softer. Plus he was definitely lankier. The differences were mostly subtle, yet they were hard to ignore. This was definitely a teenage Grian they were dealing with.
“Well, what do we have here?” Xisuma asked playfully with a kind smile, although it was only visible through the crinkle of his eyes.
Scar stood up and walked over to the teen and softly slung an arm over his shoulder, feeling more mindful that this Grian was less lean and more so just thin.
“This, Xisuma, is Grian,” the elf introduced, squeezing the boy slightly, “Grian, this is Xisuma, the admin of this server!”
“Hey, bud, must be confusing to suddenly appear somewhere you don’t recognize, huh?” The Admin said, looking down at the teen, tilting his head with his hands on his hips.
Grian huffed at being talked down to like he was a kid who got lost in a mall, but nodded anyway.
“Well don’t worry, I’m gonna find out how to get you back home, where you’re supposed to be. Sound good?”
“Yeah,” Grian replied, feeling slightly relieved and safe with the presence of someone who knows what he’s doing.
Could he really trust an adult though? The adults he knew always pretended to know what they were doing but always did the wrong thing. Oh well, he was just gonna have to take what he could get.
Scar clapped his hands together,
“Okay! So where do we start?”
“We should probably make sure we figure out exactly what happened before we do anything.”
“You’re right,” Scar said and looked to Grian, who was staring questioningly at the two of them.
“So, Grian,” the admin started, pulling out his own tablet, “What was the last thing you remember before you got here?”
Grian thought about it for a second before answering,
“I was walking out of school with my friends, then suddenly I woke up on that bridge out there,” he pointed, “that’s all I can remember.”
The admin looked down and recorded the information,
“So nothing strange happened before that?” Scar tilted his head.
“Not that I can recall, no. Nothing out of the ordinary,” the teen shook his head.
“You said you were walking out of school before you woke up here. What server were you living in?” Xisuma asked, looking up from his device.
“Uh, I don’t know?” Grian said hesitantly, “I don’t know exactly what you mean by server. I was in Japan, I guess. Oh! I was going to Akademi High School, if that helps.”
Xisuma furrowed his brows and looked back down, reluctantly typing something out,
“Hmm…Well that doesn’t completely narrow it down but I’m sure I could figure something out with that information.”
He looked up again,
“And, mind telling us how old you are?” Xisuma questioned him.
“17,” Grian answered, arms crossed tightly in front of his chest.
The admin muttered an “okay” to himself and continued typing on his tablet.
Scar, on the other hand, cooed at the teen. He was 12 years younger than the Grian he knew.
“Aww, you’re just a baby-Grian, aren’t you!”
Grian gave him an intense look, a mix of both bewilderment and offense.
“I’m not a baby!” He said, narrowing his eyes and scrunching up his nose in anger.
Scar raised his hands in defense,
“Sorry, sorry! I just can’t help it!” He laughed.
He then looked over at his admin,
“So, what’s next, X?”
The admin looked up at the Hermit,
“Well, I was thinking we take a look at the rift.”
They reached the train station, just slightly more late than the other students. PufferfishPete glared at them,
“Hurry and get over here, before I close this door on you!”
The group rushes over to the door, wielding their freshly bought tickets.
They each individually made their exchange with him and he would grab the ticket roughly, telling them to get on already.
Grian was the last to give him his ticket. He handed it over to the man and he only looked him up and down with a confused look on his face before demanding that he get on, turning around and heading towards the driver’s area.
Grian hurried on and found a seat next to where Yuki and Sam were sitting—Sam too busy talking to Taurtis to pay any attention to his attentive girlfriend. The British man looked around at the seats and huffed.
J wasn’t on the train, figures. He did own several expensive cars. It would be a waste to not drive one to school everyday.
Grian breathed out through his nose, closing his eyes. He was gonna have to remember to talk to him at school then.
He opened his eyes and jumped slightly when he saw Yuki staring at him. Her reddish pink eyes bore into his soul. He stared back, waiting for her to stop. She didn’t.
“What?” He finally asked, exasperated.
“Why do you look weirder than usual?” She asked, looking unimpressed.
He gave her the same look back,
“I’m from the future,” he said bluntly.
She tried and failed to hold back a loud laugh, making Grian smirk a little bit to try and hold back a laugh of his own. He didn’t think he’d ever seen her genuinely laugh before. It was all fake, cute laughs to make people like her.
“No, but seriously.”
“Really, I’m not lying,” he reaffirmed.
She scrunched up her nose and crossed her arms,
“There’s no way. Time travel doesn’t exist.”
Grian raised an eyebrow,
“Seriously? Out of all the weird things that happen here everyday, time travel isn’t possible?”
“Hmph,” was all she let out and Grian adjusted himself in his seat.
“The Grian you know is probably like…16, 17? I'm almost 30.”
Her jaw dropped,
“No way you’re 30, you look younger than that!”
He could hold back a small laugh at that,
“Well, thanks I guess.”
She sat back, looking like she was thinking hard about something, before asking,
“So, you’re actually from the future?” At a nod from Grian, she continued, “How did you get here then?”
“Uh,” he scratched his head, “let’s just say I made something I probably shouldn’t have and leave it at that.”
She looked him up and down and decided to lay off on him.
“Okay, then.”
Grian sighed and sat back, wanting to just relax for the rest of the ride before he got to the school. God, he hated school.