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Hybrids had a complicated history. It's not that Impulse had never thought about it or had its oftentimes gruesome and extensive complications presented to him at strange moments, but it's often easy to forget that Doc spent the first century of his life as a lab technician turned experiment, or that Grian only grew his full plumage after arriving at Hermitcraft, way into adulthood.
Impulse knows. He, like every other non-hybrid out there, knows. He just sometimes, you know, forgets. Or only realises that what he did was a problem after a few minutes and has to hurry back and apologise.
And then there's hybrids like Zed. Unlike Tango who didn't realise his full fiery nature until he was well into his twenties, Zed had always been a grass-eating, bah-bleating sheep hybrid who knew what he was, owned what he was, and encouraged others to recognise him for who he was since he first arrived in Impulse's life. Tango took a few years to light up the room, but Zed had always been one to smile with his full set of vegetarian-suited teeth.
And until that day, Impulse didn't realise Zed had any hangups about it. He just was who he was, shameless in all facets of his personality and body, his quirks were a part of him and no-one had ever forced him to take them away. Someone like Grian might have had their feathers plucked on previous servers, and Xisuma went so far as to keep his eyes hidden from the world to avoid triggering his ender-ish nature after a few too many close calls, but not Zed.
Which was why when Tango asked Impulse, "Have you seen Zed around lately?" it sent off the warning bells.
Impulse swallowed and looked away from his allay-silverfish-torture machine and made eye contact with Tango. It wasn't unusual for Zed to go off on a tangent, like the time earlier in the season where he spent five days AFK to get a specific kind of zombie villager, but Tango knew where he was the whole time. Zed was AFK, but not AFK; he had spent almost the whole time in his AFK minecart setup texting people or watching videos on his comm.
"He's not at his base?" Impulse asked mildly, and Tango shook his head.
"No, I checked anywhere I can think of. That's why I'm here. If he's not at his house or his farms, and he's not checking his comm, I figured he'd be with someone else."
Impulse pulled out his comm to check, and sure enough, Zed wasn't AFK. He sent off a message to him directly, 'Hey, are you around?' and then sent one to Skizz, too. 'Have you seen Zed?'
"It's, you know, fine," Tango began, running a hand over the flames on his head, "only I was going to drop something off at his base but I wanted him to be there to see it, you know?"
Impulse looked up, looked at Tango properly, and saw the unimpressed villager in a boat which was wearing full netherite armour.
"Wh—“ Impulse stopped himself. "What's the, uh. What's he doing here?"
"Who?" Tango asked. Impulse gestured and Tango laughed. "They're wearing full Thorns armour, dude! There's a death message where if you hit them and they're wearing Thorns armour, you get this message in chat-"
Impulse's comm buzzed and he pulled it out. Tango immediately went silent, shouldering in so that he could read the message as well. Skizz had responded, 'He's at my base. Just me and him, though. Don't worry baout it.'
"B-aout," Tango said aloud. "Tell him I've got Zed a present."
Impulse did so.
Skizz responded almost immediately. 'Busy.'
Tango snorted and removed himself from Impulse's side. He moved in such a way that he jostled the villager in the boat and made it slide to one side, almost off the edge of the rooftop that they were standing on.
"We'll go to Skizz's base," Tango decided, and then attached the lead connecting the boated villager to the fence inside Impulse's allay-silverfish-torture machine. "Come on!"
He launched himself up into the air and spiralled around, waiting for Impulse to fly after him, and all Impulse could do was sigh. There went his afternoon doing productive work and instead he was wrangling a sheep again. Actually, a sheep would be too easy to wrangle. A sheep hybrid, however, was enough trouble to warrant three of them getting involved.
A short time later Impulse landed on the roof of Skizz's pyramid and slid down the edge until he was on the floor. Tango landed beside him, adjusting his elytra until it lay flat on his back, and then they made their way towards the entrance. Inside, the strange, unusual sounds that always existed in Skizz's base echoed towards them, as well as the faint bleating of a sheep. Impulse winced, trying to imagine what could cause an animal, or Zed, to make such a noise.
That was when Skizz slammed a door open, making them both jump. Skizz kicked the door closed behind him and dragged the two of them back into the chest room by the shirt sleeves.
"Why are you here?" Skizz asked. "I said not to come!"
"You said you were busy," Impulse pointed out.
At the exact same time, Tango said, "You just told us not to worry about it! I'm worried!"
Impulse didn't want to mention it, but there was a distinct lack of sheep sounds coming from further inside the base now that Skizz had joined them. Did that mean Skizz had been causing them? What had they been doing?
"Are you...?" Impulse started to ask and then stopped himself. Skizz's cheeks began to turn red, possibly because he was flustered, but he might have recognised the confused realization on Impulse’s face.
"Where is he?" Tango demanded. "Is he in that room?"
Impulse took a step between Tango and Skizz. "Were you and Zed, uh, helping each other out?"
Skizz nodded slowly. "Yes, I was helping him. He specifically asked me. He didn't want to ask you."
Impulse's chest fell. Zed didn't want to ask them? But they'd known him longer and, sure, Impulse understood first-hand the allure that was the promise of being held between Skizz's arms, but surely Zed wouldn't have minded doing that and letting Tango and Impulse see it happen, right?
Unless this was something more than them having a cuddle. That would definitely explain the noises.
"What can you do that we can't?" Tango asked, voicing Impulse's thoughts.
"I'm—“ Skizz puffed out his cheeks as he tried to word it properly. "I'm gentler."
Impulse couldn't help it. He snorted.
"Skizz, we both know that isn't true," he said, putting an arm on Skizz's elbow. "Now come on. Tango and Zed have done this before. Just because he's wanting you doesn't mean we can't watch, right?"
This time, Skizz looked apprehensive. "Uh." He looked back towards the closed door and then at the other two. "Hang on. I'll ask."
Impulse could almost feel Tango's ears perk up at the mention of asking Zed for permission to watch, but Impulse still obeyed Skizz's wishes by standing back. Close enough to hear the whole thing, of course, but he and Tango couldn't see anything. It was tantalizing, though, being so close but not being able to look and touch.
Skizz knocked to announce his entrance and pushed through, keeping the door so close to his body that Impulse and Tango wouldn't have been able to see anything even if they had tried. They watched the plain stone walls and listened carefully.
"They, uh. They're here."
Zed's panicked voice came through next. "They're here!?"
"Sorry, it's just-" Skizz might have sighed or something, but there was a pause. "They want to see what's going on."
"It's private!"
"I know-"
"Very private!"
"They're worried about you!"
This time there was a distinctly Zedaph-y pause. Impulse knew that he'd been doing this for too long if he recognised Zedaph's pauses of all things. Tango inched closer to the door and pressed his ear against it.
"How much— uh. How much longer does this usually take for you?" Skizz asked, gentler this time.
Zed sighed. "If I'm doing it by myself? A few hours?"
"A few hours!"
"By myself! With you, though..." There was a small, shy chuckle. "I dunno. Have you ever done this before?"
"Never."
Impulse pulled back. Skizz had definitely done this with him before, and with Tango. Unless he meant with a sheep hybrid? That might be plausible, but it was unlike Zedaph to wait for so long to get what he wanted.
"Have you done this with Tango? Or— or Impulse?" Skizz asked.
Another sigh. "I usually go to a big server like Hypixel and ask someone to take care of me."
Tango's ears dropped and Impulse frowned. Why hadn't Zed asked them to lend a hand?
There was a long, sullen pause before Zed said, "Fine. Let them see."
"You're sure?"
"Yes."
Skizz's footsteps came closer and then he opened the door, but his expression didn't change when he saw the two of them so close. He made a 'come hither' movement with his finger and the three of them entered Zed's small, brightly lit room.
Impulse blinked, partly to adjust to the dazzling lights, and partly because Zed wasn't wearing any clothes.
Tango hurried forwards and wrapped Zed in a hug anyway, ignoring his nudity, and Zed gave a reluctant half-hug back. Skizz, no longer interested in dealing with Tango or Impulse, went over to the bed Zedaph was sitting on and grabbed... A pair of shears.
"Hang on," Impulse said with a chuckle, stepping back from Skizz, but Skizz just sat on the bed next to Zed and started to. He started to. Huh.
"Why are you shaving him?" Tango asked, so confused that he ended the sentence by laughing.
Zed drew himself up like a creeper. "This is why I said it was private!" he bleated and shoved Tango off the bed. "Stop laughing!"
Tango kept laughing. Skizz had to draw the shears back as Zedaph forgot his nudity and his half-shaved thigh and tackled Tango on the ground. Tango was too busy laughing, but Impulse could see the genuine hurt on Zed's face, so he came over to pry them apart, and then Impulse tossed Tango out of the room and closed the door. Almost immediately, Tango started to apologise for laughing, but Impulse locked the door anyway.
"Sorry," Impulse said, coming closer and wrapping Zed in a hug. "I just, we thought. We wanted to make sure you weren't hurt."
Zed huffed a warm, grass-smelling breath over Impulse's shoulder. Impulse carded his hands through Zed's wool and Impulse had to stop and pull at it a little. It was far denser than usual. Zed felt like a wild sheep, like one which had never been sheared.
"What happened?" Impulse asked, drawing back so that Skizz could at least try and continue with his job, cutting the hair close to the skin so that the thick, yellow wool got peeled off in clumps.
"Nothing," Zed mumbled, shifting his leg so that Skizz could get a different angle. "This always happens eventually."
Tango's whines behind the door grew more intense. Zed breathed in deep to keep himself calm, and Skizz moved on to shearing Zed's side. Impulse winced. Hopefully sheep hybrids were less ticklish than most people, since Impulse didn't like the idea of Zed flinching so close to those shears.
"How often?" Impulse asked.
"I need a full shear every year or two. Usually I do my face and head more frequently."
"And it's compacted like this..."
"Because." Zed breathed in deep. "Because I was AFK in the rain for too long. It became matted."
"Your chicken jockey thing did this?" Impulse asked, and it took a lot out of him to try and stop himself from laughing.
"Technically this happens whenever I go swimming, I just, you know, tease it apart immediately. This time it had a chance to dry, and then get wet again, and then dry..."
"Like socks!" Tango called from behind the door.
"Exactly!" Zed looked relieved when Skizz sheared a large chunk of wool from his side. "I was like a sock in a washing machine. It shrunk. The wool did. So now it's all tight and I need to get it off. How's that going, Skizz?"
"Just peachy!" Skizz's shears broke immediately. "Oops."
Tango knocked on the door. "Can I come back in, pleeeease? I won't laugh again! I'm sorry, I was so, you know, caught off guard."
"It's not everyday you walk in on someone shaving your friend's whole naked body," Impulse pointed out.
As Skizz got another pair of shears and came back to Zed's side, Zed hummed and hawed before agreeing. "Fine. But none of you are allowed to laugh when Skizz crutches me, alright?"
Halfway to the door, Impulse heard Skizz ask, "What's crutching?" But Impulse supposed they were all about to get a very thorough tutorial on how to shear a sheep hybrid.