doooooog | Grass Finn Bullshit

Grass Finn Bullshit

"Finn!" Jake cupped a hand beside his mouth, the other six or seven busy putting away their haul from the Bargain Kingdom (a store, not a government, for once). A ninth hand sprouted to gently retrieve the vuvuzela from where BMO was absconding with it. "You hungry, buddy? They had a huge special on boar meat, I'm thinkin' sloppy joes!"

"THEY LEFT!" Neptr chimed in, sullenly, from his perch on the stair. "FATHER AND GRASS FATHER. NOT NEPTR."

"Oh yeah. Well, don't sweat it Neptr, that chicken coop is the kinda thing that changes a man. Better to skip it."

"NOT A CHICKEN COOP, A DUNGEON ADVENTURE."

Jake's coordinated dance of arms flagged for a moment, doubt curling in his gut. The prickle of concern was followed immediately by guilt. What the hell was he worried about? Two Finns were better than one. He could stand to cut Fern a break, even in his own thoughts.

"Welp, you can help me on a culinary adventure if you want." Jake's gaze dances from the meat to Neptr. "Whaddya think about Sloppy Joe Pies? Has a nice ring to it..."

---

The sun was slung low in the sky by the time Jake heard the familiar sound of Finn's return up the treehouse steps. Alongside the involuntary prick of his ears, the dog feels a smile start to spread. No matter how capable the kid (teenager) had become over the last decade, Jake was pretty sure he'd never lose the sense of relief that came over him when Finn came home safe.

Lately, lingering misgivings aside, those feelings were starting to blossom towards Fern as well.

"Hey boys!" Jake lets the smile grow to a grin, craning his neck over the arm of the couch. "Y'all have fun out there?"

Jake felt suddenly cold, as if some cosmic entity had reached its hand down and pinched out the contented flame and safety of home. His voice lost its usual buoyancy, standing up from the couch.

"Wait, what happened?"

Finn said nothing, standing there looking as if he'd been through a woodchipper. Blades of grass clung to his hair, his clothes, even stuck to the razor sharp line of blood at his exposed stomach.

"I know that look!" BMO chimed in, sounding pleased to be the one with the answer to Jake's question. Neither the boy or the dog seemed to hear him in that moment. "You just killed someone."

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"Oh, yeah, no." Jermaine assures, jogging along to try and keep pace. Finn was clearly used to being accompanied by someone who was only short when he wanted to be. "It's not like he disappeared, we just don't know where he is."

As he said it, Jermaine's own doubts seem to creep into his words. The distinction between the two concepts wasn't all that huge, was it? Honestly, a lot of this was starting to feel a little painfully like deja vu. But Jake wasn't Joshua, or Mom. Hell, he wasn't even Finn. For better or worse, their eldest brother was a survivor.

"So how do you know this... uh, normal man? 'Cuz these digs don't seem super normal." He gestures to the statues around them, attended to dutifully by a league of what Jermaine presumed to be Martians.

“Oh, uh, yeah. We go way back,” Finn says with a note of uncertainty to his voice that sounded more like ‘it’s complicated’. “I mostly knew him back when he was Magic Man though?”

He hums a little tunelessly for a moment, thinking. He pays little mind to their surroundings, passing statue after statue and coming upon larger and larger structures built out of, or maybe into the Martian rockscape. The largest structure in the middle was guarded by two disinterested looking Martian guards, one of them looking at his phone, the other picking dirt out from under his fingernails.

Finn leans down, cupping a hand to whisper to Jermaine.

“Just let me do the talking.” Straightening back up and waving to the guards, he walks up to them. “Hey there guys…doing great work. We cometh seeking an audience with no- the King. King of Mars. Is he available?”

The one on his phone glances up, giving them a protracted up and down look before shrugging. “Upstairs, don’t touch anything.”

“Thank you, good sir,” Finn gives an exaggerated bow, elbowing Jermaine as they walked past. “Nice. We’re in.”

Jermaine can't resist rolling his eyes at the botched pomp and circumstance, feeling caught between embarrassed at his kid brother's antics or worried they were one faux pas away from being thrown in a Martian dungeon for the rest of their lives. He had no idea what kind of run-ins Finn had with this king, but he did know that half the people his brothers called friends had also tried to kill them at least once.

"Whoa." He says, those worries banished from his mind as they stepped into the Martian great hall. It was undeniably impressive, from the perspective of both a layman and an artist. Filling both rolls in this adventure, Jermaine found himself slowing down, staring up at the grand columns and relief carvings on the walls. They stretched up forever, depicting what Jermaine could only assume was Martian history. Comets rocketed around Grob-Gob-Glob-Grod, magic swirling into intricate patterns all around them. He could've stayed in here all day, doing studies, immersed in the history and craft of it all.

But then he heard his name and a tug at his arm. Did Finn even notice where they were right now? Did he feel any of this at all?

Edited 2022-11-30 22:31 (UTC)

Finn had never been to Mars when there wasn’t some crisis pulling all his focus, and this time was no different. Any beauty or awe that there was to experience was just background noise, colors and shapes that didn’t contribute to the mission at hand. He’d never had much interest in history anyway.

Tugging Jermaine along, tearing him away from his sight-seeing, Finn spots the door to their left with a plaque proclaiming ‘KING OF MARS’ along with office hours in smaller script underneath. He knocks loudly, holding Jermaine close until the door cracks open, seemingly of its own accord.

The grand hall opens onto a much smaller room. A tidy little office, low ceilinged and bureaucratic. The room was dominated by a desk in the middle, old-fashioned looking, piled with neat stacks of files and papers, no frivolities to be seen. Pushing the door open all the way and peeking all the way in, Finn clears his throat.

“Normal man? It’s me, Finn the human. From Earth, we have a favor to ask…”

Behind the desk was a seemingly impossible window, staring out over the Martian rockfields. Workers could be seen carting large slabs of red rock down winding tracks, toward some unknown purpose. Leaning forward at his desk was none other than Norm-Man himself, sporting a large tophat and a wreath of birdskulls around his neck. He stood, beaming cheekily at his guests.

"Nay. King Man." He interrupts, putting a hand on Finn and Jermaine's shoulders. "Busy times here on Mars, you two. How do you boys feel about a little walk n' talk?"

---

"... Okay, here we are. To locate Jake, you will need to retrieve our space telemetry capsule - deep within Mars at the end of a deadly three-part mind maze."

His tone seemed positively gleeful as he described the trials they'd endure to get their brother back. Despite his new attire and overall reduction in Magic-Madness-Sadness, there was still a wink of the person Magic Man used to be. Whatever he became after being dipped in MMS, there had to be something there to start with. Jermaine winces, a worried whine coming out unbidden.

"Don't fret, cowardly dog," King Man smiles, patting Jermaine on the head with gleeful condescension, "You will have your child brother with you, hm?"

Edited 2022-12-01 00:16 (UTC)

“Yeah, Jermaine. You baby bro has your back.” Finn takes a few steps toward the entrance, looking back at him with a condiment smile. “Me and Jake do crazy mazes all the time, and you’re like, great at crossword puzzles. This’ll be a piece of cake!”

He cranes his neck, looking up at the entrance, a sense of excitement and optimism filling him. It felt almost fated…what could be a better way for them to get their brother back than what was essentially a mars-style dungeon?

"Uh, yeah." Jermaine nods, tipping up the brim of his Mars hat and trying to leech off Finn's confidence. It didn't not work. He even finds himself smiling up at Finn at his pastry-assertion. "Yeah, why not, right? Brothers?"

He holds up his fist, ready to bump.

Donning his own Mars hat, Finn couldn’t be more thrilled to complete that fist bump, a big smile spreading across his face.

“Yeah! Brothers!” He over-enthusiastically bumps Jermaine’s fist with his robot hand.

The door slammed shut behind them, carved with the same intricacy as the Great Hall's relief work. Jermaine ran a paw over it, still stinging a little from their fistbump.

He looks over at Finn, who was already charging ahead. To his surprise, the formerly white expanse was now cold gray stone. In front of them were three doors. When Jermaine looked back at the red door, he found that had changed too. In its place was a thick stone circle, surprisingly smooth to the touch.

"... Whoa. Mind maze is right." Turning fully now, Jermaine walked over to where Finn was parked in front of the three doors. "So are you supposed to do here, expert? Just guess?"

Finn hesitates, turning to look back at the entrance, a sinking feeling in his gut. Something about his demeanor had changed, both the smile and the determination on his face melted away to confusion.

For a brief, wild moment he felt a cold stab of fear that this was the hall of egress entrance again, a feeling of deju vu at all the countless times he’d ended up back here. That somehow he’d tricked himself into thinking he’d solved it and now it had reset all over again.

But it wasn’t. You’re not in front of the door, for one thing, he reminded himself firmly. This is a mind maze, it’s pulling from your memories. Besides, Jermaine was here, as real as anything. Finn casts a furtive glance in his brother’s direction as if checking to make sure he was still there.

Still, it was hard to shake the chill, and there was a strange waver to his voice when he spoke.

“We…go straight.”

As far as Jermaine could tell, there was nothing off about this place at all. Just a dungeony looking hallway, same as any other. From the way Finn had gone white as a sheet, though, something told him there was more than meets the eye.

"Wait, hold up." He put an arm to Finn's chest, forcing him to slow down. "You know this place, I can tell. Why straight?"

Because that’s the way you go.

Finn stops in his tracks, looking at Jermaine and then at the door again.

“I…I guess we don’t have to go straight,” he acknowledges. “This place looks exactly like a dungeon I’ve been in, and that’s the way to the next part but…”

But why would we want to get to the next part?

Finn frowns in confusion, looking suddenly rooted to the spot in uncertainty.

Edited 2022-12-01 03:29 (UTC)

"This is supposed to be a mind maze, right?" Jermaine reasons out, frowning a little at just how... strangely Finn was taking this dungeon. It couldn't be just any one he'd visited through his travels. Something happened here, something Jermaine was sure Finn wanted to avoid telling him about. What else was new.

"So, it must've picked this place for a reason. Probably to wig you out." He steps forward a bit, in front of Finn. Protective. "What happens in the next part?"

“Mind dungeon.” Finn says simply, leaving off any real explanation.

Looking down at Jermaine, at the protective way he’d stepped forward, Finn felt a familiar pang of guilt. Jermaine was always just outside of things, and the closeness that they lacked meant that Finn never really went to him with problems, or even opened up when asked. He hadn’t even thought to call him all that time that Jake had been missing. It wasn’t fair to keep him at arm’s length for everything…even if he could be kind of a stick in the mud worry baby about every other thing.

“It’s called the ‘Hall of Egress’,” Finn offers as wary explanation. “It was like…a magic maze that kept sending me back into it every time I got out. I was stuck in for a long time.” A pause. “Like, a real long time.”

It was simplified, but Finn felt like maybe the quick and dirty explanation was best. It got the idea across, at least.

Quick and dirty was the right word for it. Jermaine tilted his head as Finn explained, processing his explanation slowly. Without more detail, he couldn't be sure what exactly the solution was. But then again, maybe they didn't need detail.

But they were here for a reason, and if this place was feeding off their mind-biz, then surely it all had to loop back to one person.

"Where was Jake in all this?"

Finn turns to look at the big circular door behind him. “Locked out. That door closed as soon as I came in.”

He points to the middle entrance. “When I went in further, I tried to leave a trail for him, but it didn’t really work.”

“And every time I got out of the maze, I would find Jake and he couldn’t remember it…not the dungeon entrance, or any of the other times that I had found him.”

Finn tried to wrap his head around what that might mean here. It was a hard memory for him, full of painful trial and error and a rare time in his life he hadn’t been able to rely on Jake to help him. This place knew they were looking for Jake, so maybe it was just pulling strong memories associated with him. It made his head hurt to think about.

Jermaine looked toward the black doors to nowhere, then back again to Finn.

"You're telling me what happened, man." He sits down, wincing a little as his old bones gingerly hit the hard stone. With a quick pat, he indicates Finn should do the same. "You're not telling me how you felt about it."

Finn looks momentarily stumped at the suggestion that he sit down. Almost as stumped as the suggestion he ought to be talking about how it had made him feel, rather than trying to solve the puzzle of what to do. It all ran so counter to his instincts.

“Feel?” He looks at the door, hesitating for a long moment, before sitting on the cold ground next to Jermaine. It felt completely real, and exactly the same as all the times he sat on it before. “I felt…a lot of things, I guess. I was in there for ages. Mostly it was frustrating…and scary. And…exhausting.”

"Heh, yeah..." Jermaine sighs, rubbing the side of his face. "It... really sucks, being alone like that. You lose sight of the beginning and the end, eventually."

Suddenly, it seems like they weren't just talking about the Hall of Egress.

Finn turns to look at Jermaine, a strange expression passing over his face, like he was seeing him for the first time.

“…it must have been hard spending so much time alone. I feel like I didn’t really get it, when I was younger.”

"Huh?" Jermaine's head jerks up, ears perked at the sudden shift in focus. "I wasn't--I mean, it's not the same as being in a mind dungeon, Finn."

He scratches the back of his head, thinking through those words a bit.

"...Okay, maybe it's not not like that. But you were just a puppy back then, bro. And everything was really... messy, after Mom and Dad died. Jake and I had different ways of dealing with it." It was strange. Jermaine wasn't sure he'd ever said any of this to his family. Just Bryce. "Our parents wanted you with Jake, so you went with Jake."

Finn swallows; it was so rare that any of them really talked about that time after mom and dad had died. Finn knew it was an incredibly difficult time, but he’d been so young. He only half remembered it, and was so shielded from a lot of it by Jake. Maybe Jermaine too, in his own way.

“Why couldn’t we have all lived together?”

In some ways, this wasn't his story to tell. In other ways, well... Finn was asking, and Jermaine couldn't remember the last time Finn looked to him with a question like that. It was always Jake, whether or not their brother was ever willing to give a straight answer.

With a sigh, Jermaine dug at the tiles with a finger. He traced the grooves between the stones, thoughtful.

"Jake couldn't be in the house anymore. Too many memories. And... he had a few other reasons for needing to get out of town." The latter was said with a little less sympathy than the former. "Jake decided to take you and live at the treehouse before we even finished burying them. I never asked to come along and he didn't offer. Someone had to stay and take care of our parents estate, y'know?"

As he spoke, Jermaine realizes how he was painting their brother. The brother they were here to save, whom Jermaine dearly loved, despite all this baggage.

"But I think he also was worried about you. Jake loves a fresh start. Treehouse gave both of you that." He heaves a sigh. "I didn't at the time, but I guess I can understand why he did it."

It was hard to imagine that there were any other alternatives to how things were; him and Jake at the treehouse, Jermaine taking care of their dad's occult treasures. It was hard to imagine that his life didn't just happen, but that there was a series of decisions that had to be made, by his parents and by his adult brothers, all while he was still basically a baby. It was one of those sticky little reminders for Finn of how much distance time had put between him brothers.

"Is this...the stuff you guys fought about?" The question comes tentatively, but with a genuine concerned curiosity. That argument hadn't been forgotten, and it loomed like a dark cloud, even for Finn who had a suspicion it was at least partially his fault.

Jermaine grit his teeth, wincing a bit at the question. This is why you don't tell tales out of school; because they lead to more questions. Ones Jermaine definitely didn't have all the answers to.

"Oh Finn, I don't..." He begins, only to trail off at the sound of something new underscoring their conversation. "Do you hear that?"

A distinct, melodic hum was coming from the large circular door, accompanied by a soft glow through its seams. Jermaine stood, blinking at it in confusion.

"Is the door... singing?"

Edited 2022-12-01 15:49 (UTC)

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