Rain's Writing Archive

Scar's Newest Business Venture

Originally posted to Ao3 on 12/11/2022.

The idea comes to Scar in one brilliant moment of genius. It was though a lightning bolt of pure wisdom came down from the heavens and struck him in the head, though that may just be the normal lightning that tends to strike the roof of the Swaggon whenever there's a storm. Either way, the idea was still amazin'!

What was the idea?

Selling AFK players to other players, of course!

Now, Scar does have the presence of mind to know that it might sound bad, but it's all in good fun! Everyone he sells can go right back to what they were doing before, so it's not human trafficking or anything! Besides, the only "currency" he's accepting is dirt. See? Perfectly fine and definitely not shady at all!

Ok, he admits it's a little shady, but he needs dirt for scaffolding! And terraforming! And who would want to mine all of it? Or worse, spend hard earned diamonds on it? Certainly not Scar, that's for sure.

And Scar is a businessman , it's his job to make money in maybe-probably-definitely questionable business deals.

With perfectly sane reasoning in mind, he forms a plan.

It would be easy to reuse the tracks and minecart he used for Grian's AFK prank. Otherwise, they'd just sit in a chest forever. Though, he'd have to account for longer trips from outside Boatem.

Eh, he'd cross that bridge when he came to it.

Scar has to look through almost his entire chest monster to find the chest with rails and minecarts in it. Once he's finally found it, he transfers them to an empty shulker and stashes it in his inventory. He pulls his comm from his pants pocket, leaning on his cane, and scrolls through the tab list, searching for anyone with a gray name.

Within seconds he spots Mumbo's name, grayed out and presumably AFK.

Nodding to himself, he slips the comm back into his pocket. His elytra is pulled out of his inventory and securely strapped to his back. He has to rummage through his ever-growing chest monster for some rockets. 

With newly-found rockets in hand, he shoots off to Mumbo's part of the Boatem Gigabase.

After spending several minutes trying and failing to get inside the proper way, he breaks a hole wide enough to fit through and swears to himself to patch it up later.

It's rather hollow for a mountain, Scar thinks. Though, his own mountaintops he built above Grian's alley were also hollow, so it's a bit hypocritical of him to think so.

Scar wonders in the hollow mountain for a bit, breaking a few more blocks to get inside the actual inside base, before he finally finds Mumbo. The mustached man is standing nearly unmoving in the middle of his storage room. 

He's not entirely sure exactly why Mumbo's AFK, but Scar's not gonna complain.

Giggling to himself, he pulls out the shulker from his inventory and takes several stacks of rails from it. He lays them down quickly, going from inside Mumbo's base, through the holes he used to break in, and all the way back to the Swaggon. 

It's remarkably similar, Scar thinks, to when he tried to prank Grian while he was "AFK". He was using the same rails, and he even fell in the Boatem Hole! Luckily, he'd managed to save himself from the Void at the very last second.

By the end, it'd taken nearly an hour for Scar to set the entire thing up. Surprisingly, Mumbo's name is still gray on the comm when he checks.

Humming in satisfaction, he dusts off his hands and flies back to Mumbo.

The man was standing in the same position he was before, eyes staring off into nothing.

Scar places a minecart on the rails and turns back to Mumbo.

Getting him in the minecart will be a lot more difficult than it had been with Grian, Scar reasons, because Grian is tiny and has hollow bird bones. Mumbo, on the other hand, is a foot taller than Scar and has not-so-hollow human bones to boot.

After some careful consideration, Scar leans his cane against the side of the minecart and scoops Mumbo up in a bridal carry, before realizing that was a Very Bad Idea as he collapses under the other man's weight. The air is knocked out of his lungs as he hits the ground, Mumbo completely limp on top of him.

Well, this is quite the predicament.

Scar pushes Mumbo off and gently lays him on the ground next to him, then grabs his cane and uses it to push himself back to his feet. Scar looks down at Mumbo.

It'll be harder to pick him up if he's on the ground. Scar hums and haws over what he can do to get him in the minecart, preferably without falling (again) or dropping him.

A thought washes over Scar, and he turns back to the minecart.

Carefully, he tips it on its side, making sure it won't tip back onto its wheels. Then he goes over to Mumbo, hooking his arms under his armpits and dragging him over to the cart. Once he's close enough, he rolls Mumbo onto his side and into something resembling the fetal position, so it looks like he would if he were sitting in the minecart upright. Except he and the minecart are still on their sides on the ground. And Mumbo still isn't quite in the minecart yet.

With a little more shuffling around and pushing, Mumbo was sitting sideways in the also-sideways minecart. Scar stands back up straight and cracks his back.

It only takes him a few seconds to get the minecart back on its wheels, and with that, Mumbo's finally in the minecart properly.

Scar allows himself to celebrate and congratulate himself for his hard work for a few seconds. He then, now well and tuckered out, climbs into the minecart in front of Mumbo. He uses his cane to push the minecart into the powered rail ahead of them and sends it shooting off down the track.

The ride back to the Swaggon is a smooth one, and when it comes to a stop, Scar hops out with enthusiasm. He can't wait to see the look on Mumbo's face when he comes back.

Scar breaks the minecart, and Mumbo's body automatically stands up. Scar had always been fascinated by how their bodies instinctively know to stand even when they aren't present inside them.

Brushing the thought off, Scar runs to his chest monster to get some glass and wood to make a giant glass bottle. He knows Gem already did it with Grian, but it was a good idea, and no businessman would pass up the chance to… borrow a good idea.

So Scar takes his glass and wood and builds a bottle around Mumbo.

The whole thing ends up being over nine feet tall to accommodate Mumbo's absolutely ridiculous height. The cork of the bottle is made of wood and has holes poked in it to allow Mumbo to breathe.

With the bottle finished, Scar grabs some signs and writes "Mumbo Jumbo for sale! Only 10 dirt  stacks!" and places them around the area.

After he's placed about 20 of them, he stops and surveys his work.

There are far too many signs, Scar realizes, and some of them have misspelled words. Mumbo stands idle in the giant bottle, looking quite out-of-place amongst the - beautiful, if Scar might add - terraforming. It's probably fine, though, because it looks pretty funny.

Taking out his comm, Scar types a message.

<GoodTimeWithScar> Does anyone want to hear the greatest business deal ever?

He gets a response quickly.

<Grian> scar quit being a capitalist

<GoodTimeWithScar> Does that mean you're interested?

<Grian> of course im interested

<Grian> are you at the swaggon?

<GoodTimeWithScar> Yup yup

<Grian> ill be there in 5

Humming a happy little tune, Scar puts his comm away and prepares for Grian's arrival. He cleans up some of the nearby rails, putting them back in his chest monster, and wills himself to remember to clean the rest of it up later. For now, he has a customer!

The sound of feathered wing beats and feet softly hitting grass tells Scar that Grian has arrived.

"Scar! I'm here!" He calls, and Scar climbs out of the mess of chests and shulkers to greet him.

"Why hello there, G!" He says, brushing dirt off his dress pants. "Come, this way, this way." He motions for the other to follow and leads the way to Mumbo's bottle.

The area somehow looks worse now that Scar's seeing it a second time. Grian is noticeably gawking.

"Scar. What on earth is this?" Scar ignores his incredulous tone and smiles.

"It's my newest business venture! You said you were interested!" Grian blinks up at him, then looks back down at the signs and bottle.

"That's quite a few misspellings on those signs," Grian says, inspecting one closely.

"Oh, be quiet, I'm dyslexic."

Scar's comeback causes Grian to let out a sharp peel of laughter, which makes Scar giggle back. Grian punches him playfully in the arm before they both calm down and get back to business.

"Okay! My dyslexicness aside, I have the deal of a lifetime waiting just for you!" Scar strolls confidently forward, weaving between the mess of scattered signs as Grian follows him.

"Behold! One AFK Mumbo Jumbo, now available for the low, low price of ten stacks of dirt!" Scar says, tapping the end of his cane against the glass. Movement from inside the bottle catches his eye.

Did Mumbo move?

Nah. Probably just a trick of the light. Glass is weird like that.

Returning his attention to Grian, he notices the bird hybrid staring in slight astonishment, glancing between Scar and Mumbo.

"Only ten? Man, I'd pay you a whole shulker full for this!"

"Wait really? I mean- oh! I just got word! The, uh, demand has just skyrocketed! So the price is now twenty-seven stacks of dirt instead of ten!" Scar says in his most convincing voice, which even he can tell is not convincing at all.

Grian laughs at him, that pesky bird.

"Relax, Scar. If you need dirt that badly, I don't mind paying up." Grian spreads his wings. "I've gotta go grab a shulker of dirt, I'll be right back," he says as he takes off.

Scar doesn't have to wait long. Grian is back, brown shulker box in hand, in record time.

"Here you go, twenty-seven stacks of dirt conveniently kept in a shulker box just for you." He sets the box down between them.

With no further fanfare, Scar grabs the shulker and breaks open the glass bottle, freeing Mumbo at last.

"And here is your Mumbo Jumbo. Thank you for doing business with the Swaggon." Scar does a little bow and begins to walk off when Grian stops him.

"Wait, Scar-" Scar turns back to Grian, one eyebrow raised.

"Yes?"

"How am I meant to get him home?" 

Scar… had not thought that far ahead.

"Uh…"

No words are exchanged between the two as they each think about a solution.

"I did not sign up for this!" Mumbo shouts suddenly. 

The unexpected noise makes Grian yelp, and Scar shrieks and latches like a koala onto Grian. For his credit, Grian manages to hold all of Scar's weight without dropping him or toppling like a house of cards.

"Oh sweet baby Jellie, Mumbo you startled me!" Scar squeaks, still hanging on to Grian for dear life.

"It's well deserved!" Mumbo says, crossing his arms. "You dragged me out of my base, all the way to your Swaggon, and then put me in a bottle and sold me! For dirt!"

"Well I didn't want to spend my diamonds on dirt!"

"But you'd sell me ?"

"I-" Unexpectedly, Grian wraps his arms around Scar's waist, and starts to shift him around. "Whoa whoa whoa, Grian- Grian wait stop whaaat are you doing?!"

"I'm trying to put you down. You're heavy, you know!"

"Griiiiaaaan, nooooo , you're gonna drop me!" Scar whines, holding onto Grian even tighter than before.

Mumbo chuckles when Grian groans in faux annoyance.

"I see you're in quite the predicament there, Grian," Mumbo says, grinning behind his mustache.

"I can see that. Mumbo, you take him," Grian orders, pulling Scar off himself and holding him out like a wet cat towards Mumbo.

"What? Why?"

"I did buy you from Scar, right? Shouldn't that mean you have to do whatever I say?" A sly smirk decorates Grian's face. Mumbo playfully glares back. "C'mon, Mumbo, my arms are getting tired." 

"Oh, fine," Mumbo huffs, but lifts Scar out of Grian's hold and allows the other to wrap his arms around his neck and legs around his waist. Grian not-so-discreetly takes a picture with his comm.

"Delete that," Mumbo demands.

"Delete what?"

"The photo you just took."

"Photo? What photo? I didn't take any photos," Grian says, not at all convincingly.

"Grian."

"What! I didn't do anything!"

"Yes you did! Grian, I saw you!"

"Maybe you should get your eyes checked, Mumbo Jumbolio."

Mumbo takes a step forward. With his arms still wrapped around and stabilizing Scar, who's still hanging onto him and watching the scene unfold, it's a lot less intimidating that it would've been otherwise.

Grian snaps his wings open and takes off without fanfare, leaving Mumbo in the dust.

Mumbo grabs rockets from his inventory.

"Wait, Mumbo," Scar speaks up, "Youre not gonna follow him, are you?"

Mumbo stays silent, widening his stance.

"Mumbo…?"

The shrill screech of a rocket mingles with the shrill screech of Scar as Mumbo takes off after their avian friend.

A/N: scar's a business man with a business plan, what can i say ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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