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Joining Hermitcraft, Impulse covered up his demon traits at first out of instinct, later out of guilt. How do you exactly tell the people you've known for a year you've been lying to them all this time? How do you avoid their anger after 3? How would you even start the conversation after 6? Impulse dug his hole of lies deeper and deeper until he simply swore to never show them, despite the guilt of lying to his now friends eating away at him.
Back when Impulse joined Hermitcraft for the first time, it took months to get him accustomed to the idea of a big server like that. He was late to the season, having been… summoned? Invited? He honestly had no idea. All he really knew was that he fell through a portal and was met by three members of the server, one of which he was glad to recognize as Tango, a good friend of his. Considering his start to the season was abrupt, and, as explained by Tango a long time later, he ‘looked like he was about to escape his own skin’, he never was quite formally introduced to the members.
Those first few months were rough. It had been the first time he was truly separated from Skizz in long years. He didn’t know how to trust people without knowing what his best friend would think of them. Skizz always had a way of knowing when someone had bad intentions. He would say it’s an angel thing sometimes, but Impulse knew the man was just scarily good at reading people. Impulse never was good with social skills - he was a bad liar, blanked when forced to improvise and, worst of all, was just untrusting of new people.
In his first season, he became something akin to an urban legend. Not every member was entirely sure he even existed at first, convinced it was some elaborate prank set up by the other redstoners, making up a person, building a base for someone that could never be caught hanging out in it. And even if you caught him in a conversation, getting anything out of him was like pulling teeth.
How was he doing? Just fine. What got him interested in redstone? He liked it quite a bit. What was he doing? Oh, that thing and that other thing…
It was a mess of anxiety, work, and homesickness all meshed into one. He liked the hermits, he really did! He knew being on Hermitcraft was an opportunity, and Skizz essentially forbade him from quitting, arguing it’d probably do him good to spend some time with other people. He wanted to argue, but deep inside he knew the man was right. They were joined at the hip from more or less the moment they met, back when Impulse was still quite young for such a long living hybrid.
It took time to get comfortable, but once he did, he freely shared almost everything about himself. Still, he never told the hermits he was a demon.
Prejudice against netherborns wasn’t as bad as it used to be, but Impulse still remembered when he was much younger in hubs and the hateful stares he got when his features were out in the open. Eventually, he’d put glamor over his traits until he could look just like a human. He never said it out loud, but one too many times he wished he could be an angel like Skizz. Most times the looks directed towards Skizz were hopeful, enamored even, and the people that came up to him would usually ask for help or enchantments, not try to spew insults at him.
Angel hunters were a thing though, and Impulse knew just how bad exploitation of angels for enchantments was. Skizz told him first hand of his, luckily short, experience at the hands of one of such gangs. The scars on his arms only added to the fear that particular story invoked in him. He promised himself he’d never think that way again.
(Interestingly, when they stayed together, neither the hateful comments nor the hopeful asks came. It’s as if they were meant to fit together, like pieces to a puzzle.)
It wasn’t until the first game that most of his friends learned Impulse was a demon. It was also the first time they met Skizz, though they both decided to not outwardly claim their relationship for the duration of the game. It was mutually agreed that they’d stay away, just in case anybody would try to take advantage of their bond.
Player glamor wasn’t allowed for the games, neither were really any other hybrid traits that’d allow any real advantage.
Wings were glamored into back tattoos - Skizz, Grian, Jimmy, even Scott, who Impulse didn’t even realize had wings to begin with, spawned in wearing each a necklace enchanted to turn them as such for the duration, with curse of binding attached, of course.
Some of the more important traits were covered up or blocked as well. Tango’s flames would still burst into a larger fire under high emotion, but in the games, they’d stay the harmless warm they usually were instead of burning whoever came near. Ren also claimed his hearing was worse than normal, and was quite paranoid due to that as well.
However, most importantly to Impulse, the layers upon layers of protective glamor he’d built up over the years were dissolved the moment he found himself in the unknown world. He was quite lucky they weren’t together upon spawning in. His horns weren’t big, so he fluffed up his hair, hoping it’d be enough of a cover. His tail he could probably hide in his pants. It didn’t really move as much as Tango’s did, so with a bit of work he’d get it to look natural.
Having come up with a plan, he figured he’d be safe. How long would a death game even take them? A couple weeks at most, everyone knew at heart they were all a bit bloodthirsty and a chance to do some good old pvp surely wouldn’t be passed on so easily.
His newfound and probably fake confidence was shattered as soon as he found the first two people - Cleo and Bdubs, his friends from back home, and the moment they made eye contact, any greeting on their lips was cut off. For a few seconds after that, Impulse silently checked over himself as best as he could - his hair was still messy, his tail tightly wrapped around one of his legs. He was fine, right? He was about to ask the pair if something was wrong when Bdubs finally spoke, and that made things clear for him. In his years of glamoring everything he could most days, he’s gotten to forget his eyes weren’t actually the dark brown hue he was so used to seeing, but an electric yellow, unlike the human disguise he’d used for years now.
And now they knew and everyone else would soon, as well, and-
Oh, he was panicking. And the two people who knew his biggest secret, biggest lie and regret were comforting him.
They ended up going mining, to get away from the light of the day and any curious eyes as Impulse slowly but surely once again came out of his shell and explained why he lied. Later on, with the sound of Cat playing near them, Cleo helped him untangle his hair, uncovering his horns once again. There was no point in hiding anyways, since at one look everybody would know he wasn’t human, he might as well spare himself the discomfort.
That night, around half the server gathered around, curious at the sound of music and wishing for some company, and even with his traits in open air, everytime he looked over his shoulder or around at the small crowd, he was met with not a single hateful look. Tango looked proud, having known a bit here and there from the years and his relationship with Skizz as well as Impulse before Hermitcraft, Scar (who himself was a bit more vex-like than usual as a consequence of the lack of glamor) was smiling, Cleo was only periodically looking at him as if to silently check in, and even the few people he didn’t know beforehand didn’t seem to care.
Skizz was, both surprisingly and unsurprisingly, nowhere to be found though, so after a week of meeting and seeing people and bases popping up on the server with no news of the angel outside of a quiet ping of a death on the evening marking their first full week in the game, he went out to see his best friend. It felt like his accidental achievement in admitting he was a demon wouldn’t truly feel right until Skizz knew and saw him like this.
Coming up to the safest yet ugliest man made meadow that could only be his best friend’s doing, he could only hear him at first, but once the angel saw him and noticed the nearly forgotten look he used to see everyday when they were young, he ran up to hug him, any previous agreements about not showing off their friendship forgotten in the embrace.
And sure, he’ll still have to deal with showing himself to the hermits that weren’t in the game, and he’s going to need to properly explain why he did what he did to the rest of the players. He’ll have to deal with people knowing without his best friend to help him form the words he needs to or to just hold his hand and be there for him, and most of all he’ll need to get used to the feeling of his tail lazily swinging behind him, and hair being out of place after years of growing without the horns obstructing it, and he’ll need to get used to the yellow colored eyes looking back at him in his reflection.
But here, hugging his best friend, head against his chest and lacking the usual heavy feathers all around them, a tail he hadn’t even realized he’d missed wrapped around Skizz’s leg like an anchor keeping them together, he felt truly free to be himself in what felt like the first time in the 200 years he’s lived. Hopefully after the game he’ll get to live twice as many in this warm feeling.