#ruby duo

Not everyone was as cautious as he was. Doc, for one, insisted he didn’t need goggles because of his eyes was bionic, which Tango thought was silly but Doc was too stubborn to convince. X claimed his helmet functioned as a respirator on its own, which to be fair it might. He’d never actually allowed Tango to study its mechanisms despite years of begging. And Etho said his mask did enough filtering that a real respirator wasn’t necessary, which Tango often poked him about. Impulse and Mumbo, at least, shared his same level of care.

Of course, every Hermit needed to do a bit of redstone sometimes. But when they did, they had heard Tango lecturing enough that they knew to gear up lest they face his wrath. Skizz had learned that lesson with a swift “Don’t be that guy” in his first week.

And so, Tango was confused about how this had happened. When guiding Pearl through some basic redstone, a few months ago, he had not thought to ask about whether she had PPE. He gave every Hermit a kit at the start of each season, at least to prevent himself from having to scold people about it. He had seen her using it during his tutorials.

Tango also knew Pearl had worked with redstone a little last season, and most people had seen redstoners work before, Pearl included. She had based right next to Mumbo a couple of servers ago, she had spent tons of time in Decked Out 2 and seen him do maintenance, surely she knew she was meant to be wearing protection when working with redstone dust, right?

So imagine his surprise when he met up with her for a few rounds at Hungry Hermits after she had been “busy” for a few days and noticed that her hands were stained red. A familiar bright red that seemed to glow on skin and was currently coating her fingers and speckled all the way up to her elbows and on her face. To top it all off, she kept coughing into her elbow, a cough he knew wasn’t from a cold.

“Pearl, you haven’t been working on anything recently have you?” She flushed at the question. Ever a poor liar, she stuttered through a response.

“Wha- no! Definitely not!” She began fidgeting with her hair (which he just noticed was also stained red at the ends) in a way that definitely wasn’t suspicious, “No secret projects here!”

Tango tilted his head and sent her a disapproving glare. He crossed his arms over his chest and looked pointedly at her hands.

“Uh huh, but if you were you would be wearing the PPE I gave you, right?” He felt a mix of concern and annoyance at the way she hung her head a little at the question.

“Well, I just,” Pearl was cut off by a cough that made Tango wince. It sounded like it hurt. “I get so caught up sometimes when I realize something is going to work, I just forget!”

“Pearl! That’s super dangerous! You could do real damage if you’re not careful!” All thoughts of playing Hungry Hermits were gone at this point. Did she not realize how serious this could be?

“It’s not that bad! It came off after a few days when I finished Dye-Duction, and the burns healed pretty quickly. I’m sure it’ll be fine this time too,” She sounded defensive, almost offended.

And she had spent weeks in and out of the wires for Dye-Duction, if she had been skimping on the PPE during it then he would have noticed it. Sure, she kept weird hours, but he thought he had run into her while she was working on it at least once. Right? Apparently not.

“That is so not okay, dude. You can do permanent damage if you’re not careful! And don’t think I haven’t noticed your coughing,” As if on cue, Pearl once again let out the kind of painful, throat tearing cough that came with breathing in a mildly corrosive dust. Tango had the passing thought that he should really grab her a water bottle. Her voice was raspier when she spoke next.

“I know that, it’s just that when inspiration strikes you have to chase it, yeah? And sometimes when inspiration strikes, my PPE kit happens to be put away in my farm house when I’m working on the other side of the base. So I just… didn’t wear it,”

Her eyes were shining in the way they did when she got ultra invested in something, the way he had seen her do with both Decked Out 2 and now Hungry Hermits. That made it click for him. It wasn’t that she was being reckless, just that she had probably genuinely forgotten. Pearl, he had learned in the years he’d known her, had a tendency to get obsessed with whatever she was working on. It wasn’t enough for her to casually work on a project. When she got really into something, whether it be a game or a build, she would drop everything to perfect it. Sleep, food, and even other projects tended to fall to the side. He had had to walk her back to her base himself sometimes when she ran Decked Out 2 too many times in a row. Apparently whatever this was had captured that same fervor.

He ran a hand through his hair, exasperated.

“You are so sitting through my power point. This is not okay, Pearl,”

She looked up finally and crossed her arms.