#grien

▪︎ The three ages and death.

Place of origin: Germany

Date: ca. 1509-1510

Artist: Hans Baldung, called Grien (1484/85 Schwäbisch Gmünd-1545 Strasbourg)

Alternate version of this

“Cleo, networking is important even for dead people. And please, it’s Joest for the evening.” Joe took a white powder compact out of his suit pocket and dabbed at his face and beard.

“I do network! With hermits! These beings are rotting.” Cleo put down her wine and fixed one of the straps of her satin black dress.

“You are also rotting.”

“That is besides the point.” Cleo muttered, taking another swig of wine. “I just can’t believe you got in here.”

“Cleo.” Joe put down the powder and picked up his whiskey. “The art of makeup and faking confidence does wonders for getting me where I need to be. Plus, the people who live beyond death are a group of people I feel would be a good resource and creative partners. I work with you, and we get along, don’t we?”

“I tolerate your existence.” Cleo told him, but was interrupted by a gravelly-voiced and brazen ghost swagging up to them.

“YO! Cleo and that idiot that I hate! I didn’t know you were coming to this shindig! Who let you two out of the trash cans you live in, huh?”

Joe sighed. “Hello, Beetlejoest.”

“Fuck off, Beetlejoest.” Cleo said conversationally.

“Hey, hey, hey!” Beetlejoest held out his hands defensively, green smoke coming out of his ears. “No need to get sassy, Cleo girly! Just making conversation with you and your masquerading friend here! I couldn’t help but overhear you making fun of good ol’ Joe here, and I couldn’t help but agree! I think you need some good ol’ Beetlejoest in your life, to add that thrill you know you need!”

Cleo bent down slightly and grabbed the knife she had strapped to her thigh. “Nobody makes fun of Joe except me, so you better go back to whatever corner of hell you slithered from and leave me and my definitely ghost friend alone.” She jolted forward, knife held out, and Beetlejoest jumped backwards.

“Alright, alright, I’ll leave the losers club alone. Hope no one finds out about the beating heart in the room.” Beetlejoest did his best attempt at a sneer and slunk off, grabbing an entire bottle of vodka as he went.

“For goodness sake, Cleo!” Joe slapped her her hand until she put the knife back. “You don’t want to upset that guy- he has the hermitcraft IP address!”

“I could take him any day.” Cleo muttered. She smoothed her hair and resumed her calm and bored expression. “Okay, I’ll behave. Who should we go network to then, hm?”

Joe clicked his tongue, looking around the room. The dead were standing or sitting at high tables scattered about, all dressed up in their nicest business attire, chatting with one another and handing out their business cards. Of course, for the dead, business attire was mostly ballroom clothes or rotting t-shirts. The dead aren’t very good at caring.

“What about that being?” Joe pointed out a smaller blond figure wearing a dirty and tattered red sweater.

“Wow, that looks exactly like Grian from behind.” Cleo said. “Grian isn’t dead, is he?”

“No I think he’s a bird, although some birds do have death imagery associated with them.” Joe said, stroking his beard and getting white powder all over his hand. “We could talk to him. Maybe it’s his secret twin brother, Groan.”

So the two gathered their drinks and ventured from their table at the back of the room and made their way over to the red-sweatered fellow, who had their back to them at a table by themselves.

“Pardon me, can we join you, fellow dead person?” Joe asked.

The being sat up straight and turned to face them in a disjointed, jerky way, and Cleo couldn’t help but to gasp.

“I’d love company!” The being said.

It was Grian. But it was very much not Hermitcraft’s Grian. Yes there was that blond hair and the red sweater and those black eyes. But this Grian had papery, pale skin and a wicked oozing wound in the side of his neck. And, most horrific of all, this parody of Grian had a black felt Mumbo Jumbo style mustache sewn to the rotting skin of his upper lip and cheeks.

Cleo grabbed two nearby stools and sat a stunned-looking Joe on one before settling herself down on the other.

“Um, hi there. What’s your name, fella?” Cleo asked, trying to sound as normal as possible.

“Well howdy, I’m Grien! That’s G-R-I-E-N!” Grien pointed at a little nametag he’d attached to sweater that said just that.

“Grien.” Cleo said in disbelief, eyes narrowing slightly. “No relation to a guy named Grian, I suppose?” As she said it she knew it couldn’t be true- no one with working nerves would sew something into their skin like that.

“Grian? Oh, no, no, that’s not me. Who is that? Haha!” Grien’s eyes looked everywhere but at the two of them. Cleo’s mouth fell open. So was this actually Grian? “And who are you two?” As Grien spoke, the mustache began to droop, pulling on the string and the holes in his face they were looped through. The effect was horrible, and Grien didn’t seem to notice.

Joe took over speaking for them. “I’m Joe H- I mean Joest, and this is my friend ZombieCleo. We live on Hermitcraft, you may have heard of it?”

“Hermitcraft… no, can’t say I have!” Grien’s mustache was completely covering his lips now.

“You got something…” Cleo whispered, gesturing to his lips.

“What? Oh!“ Grien felt for the mustache and chuckled. “Ah, this thing, always coming loose!” He opened his mouth and stuck his fingers behind his lip, pulling on a black string and tightening it.

“Here’s our business card, we gotta go now!” Joe’s voice was at least an octave higher, and he threw a business card down on the table, grabbed Cleo’s hand, and took off into the crowd.

“Holy shit holy shit holy shit!” Cleo whispered, eyes wide, as they got back to their corner.

Joe shivered, putting his hands to his eyes as if to block out what he’d just seen. “There’s no way that’s Grian.”

“But there’s no way it’s not!” Cleo replied. “Like clearly ‘Grien’ was hiding something related to Grian, he was being so cagey.” She downed the rest of her wine. “Ugh! You would think dead things wouldn’t get to me anymore, being dead and rotting myself, but that was alarming to say the least.”

Joe shivered. “It’s like Grian and Mumbo had a person baby and it went very wrong.” He took a sip of whiskey. “Let’s never work with that guy.”

Cleo snorted. “Agreed.”

——