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Heroes and villains. It’s as cliche as it comes, and it’s always the same, the hero and villain fall for each other, and the villain must learn to be better for the hero. It’s funny and heartwarming and people love it. What happens though when the villain doesn’t get better? What happens when the hero gets *worse?*
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Grian stretched his arms and wings as he got out of bed. He looked over at the mirror by his bed, looking at his awful bed head. He also noticed his wings were very messy, he would need to preen those soon. It always made getting away from whatever hero was trying (and failing) to stop him that much more difficult. He always got away, but it was annoying, and tiring.
As he yawned, he started walking out of his room, but immediately walking into the wall instead. He let out a loud squawk as his wings fluttered for a second. He grumbled as he walked out of his room, (successfully this time) holding his nose.
Suddenly, a head popped out of another room.
“Grian! Are you ok? I heard a loud noise!”
“Yeah I’m fine Pearl, just ran into the wall.”
He rolled his eyes as he saw the mischievous glint in her eyes, already knowing he was about to be teased.
“Pffff, guess my younger brother is aging faster than me! What with your sight worsening.”
“You better hope I’m not getting old, that would just make you ancient since you’re older than me.”
Pearl stuck her tongue out at Grian as he returned to gesture, giving her the bird as well, like the mature adults they were. After that she went back to her room, leaving Grian to his own devices. He continued his trek to the kitchen, making a quick bowl of cereal and scrolling through his phone.
He wasn’t really paying attention to what he was looking at until he noticed someone. Namely, Hotguy, the #1 Hero of Hermitcraft. The golden boy of the city, loved by all. However he’s most known for his good looks and relentless flirting.
Grian rolled his eyes at seeing his rival. Every time they crossed paths, they would go back and forth with jabs and insults. Just *seeing* him was exhausting.
“Seems like he’s got new merch coming out. …All of the pictures are of him shirtless showing off the product. I bet he doesn’t even care to save people and it’s all a publicity stunt.” Grian mumbled. “Whatever. It’s not like it’s my problem. I didn’t become a villain to save people after all”
Grian finished up his cereal and washed his bowl. Then he headed upstairs and changed into his Cuteguy outfit before heading out.
“Pearlllll I’m robbing the bank wanna come?”
“No thanks! I’ve got some work to catch up on!”
“Ok then, bye!” “Bye!”
He flew over to Hermit Bank and landed on the roof of the building. He was glad it was an easy job today, he was kind of tired. He stayed up way too late last night.
Once he spotted the hatch above the vault room, he climbed over to it and peeked through the glass window. He only saw two guards, fairly scrawny guys, so he hopped in without much thought and got to work.
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Meanwhile, Scar was on his way to the bank, in his Hotguy gear, absolutely exhausted. After pulling an all-nighter patrolling, he didn’t get a break as his boss immediately sent him to the bank like he was an errand boy. He was *not* an errand boy, he was the hottest hero in the city, thank you very much.
Unfortunately, that meant nothing as he was still forced to continue his walk to the bank. Seriously, they couldn’t even lend him one of the agency’s vehicles?
Once he got there he went through the normal procedure of getting money from the boss’s account. He knew he was getting shocked faces from everyone in the building, but he didn’t particularly care. He was looking through his phone when all of a sudden he heard someone screaming.
“HELP! WE’RE BEING ROBBED! SOMEONE CALL THE POLICE!”
Immediately, Scar hopped into action, sprinting to the screaming employee and asking where the robber was. He was directed to the vault room where he spotted him. Cuteguy.
Scar was frozen for a second, staring in awe at Cuteguy’s skills, taking out all of the incoming guards like it was nothing. He quickly snapped out of it, thankfully, and approached him rival.
“Funny seeing you here Cuteguy. What, is villainy not paying enough to get by? Or do you just enjoy seeing my gorgeous face?” He decided to strike a pose after the last comment, just for good measure.
He noticed Cuteguy’s eyes widening just a fraction, before being replaced with an eye roll and an annoyed expression.
“Ugh, Hotguy, why are you here? This is supposed to be an easy day for me, and now I have to deal with your dumb face.”
Scar slowly started advancing on Cuteguy, while trying to keep him distracted with their conversation. “Hah! Easy day? There can’t be anything easy about being a villain. Having to be on the run all the time? Always in constant danger? How is any of that easy?” In truth, he knows being a hero isn’t easy in the slightest either, but Cuteguy doesn’t need to know that.
He saw Cuteguy squint his eyes, scrutinizing Scar and making him feel kind of uncomfortable with his gaze on him. Distracted, he moved a little too suddenly towards Cuteguy, which he of course noticed and took it as a reason to leave. He flapped his wings and crashed through a window, immediately flying up onto one of the neighboring buildings. Scar immediately took after him, but he was definitely starting to feel the drowsiness by now, and all this extra exertion was not helping.
He found Cuteguy standing on a nearby building, facing the wall away from him. He didn’t seem to realize Scar was behind him yet, so he took this opportunity to catch him off guard and trap him. He slowly crept up behind him until he was close enough to trap Cuteguy between himself and the wall with his arms.
The second he did, Cuteguy jumped, his arms going up and wings flailing. Scar quickly grabbed his arms and pinned them to his side, and, his judgement messed up from the lack of sleep, decides to rub in his rivals face *just* a little bit.
“Hey Cuteguy, how does it feel to have been caught by the one and only Hotguy? Must be pretty great, huh? I know I would feel honored.” He closed his eyes for a few seconds, willing the tired feeling to go away for just a bit longer.
All he got in return was the silent treatment, and he really wanted some kind of reaction, so he decided to press on with what he knew best: flirting. “Y’know…you’re kinda cute pinned to the wall like this…all helpless and unable to do anything to stop me. I could do whatever I want to you and all you’d be able to do is watch.
Cuteguy’s eyes widened at that, face going a bit red. He stared at Scar for a second, looking like he was going to say something back, but then seemingly decided against it as he turned his head to the side and away from Scar. Again, Scar had to close his eyes in an attempt to not fall asleep, keeping them shut for longer this time.
*Hmm, that was actually kind of funny, I wonder what other reactions I can get out of him…* He knew it wasn’t normal for him to go this far with his flirting, and honestly he didn’t really understand why he *wanted* to so bad, but…he was tired dammit, and he just didn’t really care that it wasn’t what he was supposed to be doing. So, he decided to keep messing with Cuteguy by holding both of his arms over his head with one hand and turning his face to him with the other.
He leaned in next to his ear, when for the last time he closed his eyes for a few seconds and felt his consciousness slipping. Giving in to his tiredness, he instead rested his head against the wall in front of him and fell asleep.