"So." Olivia glanced at Jesse. "We should probably plan out how we're gonna build the creeper." The other woman nodded, and Axel turned to look at her. "I have all that wool. The scaffolding is already gonna be six-by-eleven-by-six. We can't go all the way around."

"Yeah, that'd take way too l-long." Jesse nodded.

"So if the body of the creeper is six-by-fifteen, the legs could be six-by-five, with three blocks vertically on either side of the bottom, and three blocks horizontally at the base of that." Jesse nodded again, but Axel just blinked.

"Are you picturing that in your head or something? That's really specific." He motioned with a hand to add emphasis. Olivia shrugged in response.

"Hey, at least it's planned out." She pointed out. Axel shrugged.

"Yeah," Jesse smiled. The competition was in view now. The whole thing was surrounded by fence, with a center platform and a few sectioned-off areas. The sign-in desk had someone at it already, and the gates beside it were still open. They had plenty of time.

"We know what we're building, we have all the stuff for it," Axel grinned, sharing a determined look with Olivia, "we are so ready." Olivia grinned.

"I'm not just ready to build," Jesse glanced back at her, "I'm ready to win." As she spoke, a random attendee- or was he a competitor?- walked past them, wearing a Soren hat from a previous con.

"Nice pig, losers." He sneered as he passed, walking off through the gates. Jesse flinched, Reuben gave an offended snort, and Olivia placed her hands on her hips glaring after him; Axel glared as well. They all stopped walking a moment, Jesse rubbing the side of her head in slight discomfort. Axel was the first to speak up again.

"Oh, great, there's Lukas and the Ocelots." He folded his arms as they started forwards again, albeit a bit slower than before. "The rivalry continues." Olivia followed his gaze to the front desk, where a small group stood around it, obviously signing in. Olivia noticed Maya first; she was standing to the left, her long hair easy enough to distinguish from her teammates' shorter hair. Lukas was the one signing them in, while Gill and Aiden stood next to the gate to their right. They each wore a black leather jacket, an ocelot head embroidered on the back.

"Man. They've got matching leather jackets and everything." Olivia tried and failed to cover her discouragement with apathy. Axel sighed.

"So cool…" He sounded just as discouraged. Jesse turned to say something, but Aiden had overheard them, and was turning towards them with a grin Olivia knew meant they were in for some insults.

"Well, well, well," he sneered. Gill and Maya turned to look at them as well. "If it isn't the Order of the Losers."

Maya snickered. "Great, the fail squad's here."

"Lukas," Gill was laughing as he spoke, bumping the blond's back with his hand, "get a load of these losers." Lukas turned, glancing briefly at Jesse, before sending a hard look at the back of Gill's head.

"Let's go, guys." Lukas spoke in a soft voice, before walking past them to the entrance gates. Maya and Gill followed him, almost disappointedly, while Aiden sent them a final sneer before turning on his heel and following his team. The woman at the desk watched them a moment, then turned and smiled at Jesse.

"Name, please?" She tapped a quill against the counter.

"Axel, and uh, how do you do?" Olivia shot Axel a sideways glance. The woman behind the counter narrowed her eyes slightly, raising an eyebrow.

"No, your team name." She smiled again. Axel blinked, and Olivia resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

"Team name?" Axel slumped. "We are not ready for this."

"So much for losing anonymously," Olivia sighed, placing her hands on her hips. No one responded to this as they each tried to come up with a name, all the while ignoring the muffled giggles coming from the Ocelots. Olivia glanced at Jesse; the other woman was rubbing an arm. She looked at Reuben, who was simply watching the trees. She swore she heard Aiden mutter another "Order of the Losers" to Maya, who snickered. For some reason, the two things connected, and Olivia tapped Jesse's arm. She turned to look at her curiously. Though, apparently Axel hadn't caught on.

"No name?" He glanced at Jesse. The woman behind the counter opened her mouth to speak, but Olivia cut her off.

"What about Order of the Pig?" Jesse blinked. "Y'know, because we have Reuben." For a moment, Jesse looked thoughtful, but after a second or two, her eyes lit up in understanding, and she nodded. Reuben oinked excitedly.

"Order of the Pig?" The woman started scribbling something on a clipboard. "Alright, you guys are in Booth 5!" She smiled again, then motioned to the gates. Axel was the first one to move, starting through the gates. He promptly got stuck; he lifted his hands a bit, looking at the fence beside him, then placed his hands on either side of the gate and pushed. He struggled for a second, then managed to swing forwards and escape. As he did, the Ocelots started snickering again, walking off to their own booth. Olivia followed Axel in, rubbing her thumb with her index finger. Jesse and Reuben were right behind her.

When they found their booth, Olivia saw right away that the Ocelots had the next booth over. They were digging around in a chest they had brought. Olivia placed a hand on her hip, sighing as she turned away from their booth to examine the space they had. The back corner was on a bit of a hill, but other than that, it was very flat; plenty of space to fit their build.

"Is that a freakin' beacon? They have a freakin' beacon?" Olivia blinked, looking at Axel, then back at the Ocelots. "Freakin' beacon?!"

The added emphasis wasn't going to waste; sure enough, Lukas was pulling a beacon from the chest, walking over to where they were placing their other materials. Aiden was holding a block of pink stained glass, saying something to Lukas as he passed. Maya pulled some blue stained glass from the chest and followed Lukas.

"That's stained glass." Olivia glanced at the growing pile of colorful glass in the Ocelot's booth. "They aren't just building a beacon. They're building a rainbow beacon!" Jesse moved to stand next to her, peering at the glass a moment. "We're gonna lose." Jesse didn't say anything, and Olivia didn't need to look to know why Axel wasn't talking. "Close your mouth, Axel." He presumably did so. "We should probably stop staring at them-"

There was laughter. She had spoken too late; Gill had noticed them, and motioned with a hand while looking to Aiden. "Look, it's the Order of the Losers." Aiden glanced over his shoulder as Maya grinned. "Again."

"Good one, Gill!" Maya laughed. Olivia narrowed her eyes, placing her hands on her hips.

"We're just looking," she said flatly. Aiden turned to face them, grinning.

"There'll be plenty of time for you all to look at it after it wins and gets shown at EnderCon." Gill and Maya stood smiling behind him.

"You're being unpleasant." Axel shifted behind Olivia.

"Maybe not all of you." Aiden folded his arms. Olivia didn't like his tone. "EnderCon doesn't allow outside food or drink." He turned his gaze to Reuben, narrowing his eyes. Reuben flinched and backed up, hitting Olivia's leg with a wing. When Jesse didn't respond, Aiden turned his gaze back to her. "I'm talking about your pig!" Jesse still didn't respond; Olivia glanced at her to find she had a conflicted look on her face, torn between hurt and defensive. "I'm saying he's food." Olivia turned to glare at him.

"Quit wasting your time, Aiden!" Lukas was standing by the chest again, motioning at their pile in annoyance. "We've got work to do!" Aiden watched the blond a moment. Olivia grinned slightly, and he turned to glare at them again.

"You're lucky I'm busy." He sneered.

"Hey, Jesse." Olivia flinched in surprise, turning towards the source of the new voice. "Guys." A redhead with a blue bandana tying her hair back stood on Jesse's other side. Petra had approached from behind them, a pickaxe resting on her shoulder.

"Hi Petra." Jesse gave a small wave. She glanced past them to the booth.

"How's the build going?"

"Only time will tell," Axel spoke up, "but we're optimistic."

"Hey, Petra." Lukas walked forwards, waving to the redhead. "I forgot to thank you for that nether star." Olivia blinked. So that's where the beacon came from. It made sense, now that she thought about it; there weren't any shops that sold beacons. Not any that were in the area, at least.

"Hey Lukas. Not a problem," Petra casually shrugged.

"You helped these tools?" Axel questioned, causing Lukas to send him a look. Olivia glanced at him, then back at Petra.

"For the right price, I'll help anyone." Petra shrugged again. "Oh, I've got the dye you asked for." She dropped her pickaxe, leaning it against the fencepost. "How much did you end up needing?" Lukas waved his team away to continue preparing.

Olivia cleared her throat uncomfortably. "Enough for a hundred and twelve blocks." Petra wasn't the one who looked surprised. Lukas had raised his eyebrows from where he was digging through his team's chest again. Petra was digging through a bag, counting silently. Jesse glanced at Olivia.

"I-I thought Axel was gonna find Petra," she whispered. Olivia shrugged.

"Petra found me first."

"Here you go. Petra held out the bag, which Olivia could hear was filled with little dye containers. Petra herself was shoving a handful of them into her pocket. Jesse took the bag.

"Thanks again." Olivia shot the redhead a grin. Petra nodded once

"Sure, anything for a friend. Just get that back to me when you can, I kinda need it." Jesse nodded. "If you need anything," she continued as she picked up her pickaxe and walked off towards the woods, "you know where to find me." Olivia made a face.

"None of us know where to find you," she pointed out. Petra didn't even hesitate.

"Exactly."

"No hard feelings, guys." Her attention turned back to Lukas, who was walking back over. "If you're cool with Petra, you're cool with us." Olivia struggled to not roll her eyes at that. "So why don't we just forget about all this, and… Y'know, make this about how cool our builds are." He tried a wary smile.

"M-may the best team win." Jesse returned the wary grin. Lukas' smile turned casual.

"Careful what you wish for." Olivia struggled not to snort at that, opting to rolling her eyes instead.

Jesse moved off to a crafting table to begin dying the wool. Olivia followed behind her, pulling as much wool as she could from her pockets. Jesse took the first stack, as well as a sixty-four bottle collection of the dye containers, and placed them in separate squares on the table. Sure enough, the items shook in place for a moment, then slammed together with a sort of sloshing noise. Left in its place was a sixty-four stack of lime green dye.

Olivia separated the other sixty-four stack into a stack of forty-eight and a stack of sixteen. She passed Jesse the larger stack, and put the other stack with the remaining white wool. After a moment, the noise repeated, and Jesse passed her more lime wool. Olivia handed her the remaining white wool, taking the bag and pocketing it as she did so. Jesse pulled some squid ink out of her pocket, and soon enough, the items shook for a third time, and they had a stack of black wool.

"Ladies and gentlemen…" Olivia's attention turned to the center of the competition, where the woman from the front desk was standing on the center platform. She started to back into their booth again, as did Jesse. "Welcome to the EnderCon Building Competition!" Her words were met with clapping and cheers. "The winners of this year's competition will have their build featured at EnderCon. The winners will also meet, in person, Gabriel the Warrior!" Olivia clapped excitedly, turning to face Jesse, who was doing the same.

"Ocelots!" A collective shout caught her attention; she looked over at the next booth to see the Ocelots doing some form of handshake. "Ocelots!" Aiden and Gill were bumping their hands together, as were Maya and Lukas, before they turned and bumped chests; Maya with Gill and Aiden with Lukas.

"Whoa, handshake? We don't have a handshake." Olivia looked at Jesse, who shrugged mildly.

"I always considered our hands-in-the-middle thing to be a-a handshake," she admitted. Olivia blinked, sharing a glance with Axel, before turning her gaze back to Jesse.

"You've got a point." She shrugged, then glanced back at the woman in the center. "I'm still nervous, though."

"Hey, we can do this!" Jesse lifted her hands determinedly. "J-just stick to the plan, and everything will be fine." Olivia nodded slowly. "This year, the Order of the Pig can't lose!" She held out her hand, palm down. Olivia glanced at Axel, then shared a grin as the other placed his hand on top of Jesse's. Olivia followed suit, placing her's on top of his. Reuben balanced on his hind legs, and Jesse grabbed hold of one of his hooves. They glanced between one another, sharing determined smiles.

"Let's do it!" Axel grinned wider. They all retracted their hands, quickly getting into position.

"Building..." Olivia braced herself.

"Starts…" Jesse pat Reuben on the head, while Axel retrieved some wood from his pockets.

"Now!"


AN: A second chapter today since the last one was so complicated, heh. This one's also a bit longer than the others.

Ariza Luca: yeah, i did a lot of math. too much math. also, yep that's me! you're quite welcome, i really love hybrid! good job! :3c

Until next time!