They are always there, even when you cannot see them. They will always know where you are, and they will find a way to get to you. So go ahead, turn your back for just a moment, you will hear that dreaded hissing behind you. And then you will die. It's nothing personal, it's just what they do, what they must do: it is their way, the are the death that walks on legs.
However...one day something...strange happened...but we will get to that
Many beings think that creepers do not have any form of social groups, and they would be somewhat incorrect. Creepers do not seem to have much culture only because they are efficient, cold, and calculating beings. Their semi-nomadic society is based entirely around efficiency, not just in the art of killing but in everything. Creepers gain no names, rarely speak, and forgo many of the others aspects of normal civilization as, to them, they are all a waste of time the green beings could be doing things they deem much more important. However they are not wholly driven by instinct. They are far too clever for that to be said. They are simply very focused on their goals.
There is one regard, however, in which Creepers soften just barely: parenting. Though that small amount does not count for much. Still, creeper children are so protected it is rare any other being will see them until they are grown. These young creepers are usually practically born with the efficient mentality of the adults. There are a few exceptions, of course, but creepers are not cruel to their own and at least protect these exceptions until they can take care of themselves. Which is the situation we find one particular young creeper, born with several abnormal red spot marks all over him.
From the start he seemed too curious to the others, always trying to figure out what exactly made his brethren explode, how to make it stronger, and if there was a way for them to survive it. The other creepers tolerated this, barely. But none the less he grew and aged until he was old enough to leave, and though he would have had no choice in the matter, he did so willing, eager to explore the world.
But the world is a dangerous place, full of all dangerous sorts. There are some who would wish the mobs of this world extinct. But the creeper did not run into those, but the group he did run into, certain folk would consider much, much worse.
As he wandered through the world, it was not long before he came across a small human camp. Curiosity overcame cautiousness and he slowly made his way nearer and nearer the firelight. Oddly, when he reached the small ring of light he didn't see anyone or anything for a moment. Then out of the shadows leapt a man, he had on a sort of black trench coat outfit and a bandanna covering his lower face, holding an iron sword and rushed the creeper. The green being, overcome by instinct in his moment of terror, shut his eyes tightly and began to hiss.
The battle yelling of the man he had seen stopped and was replaced with him beckoning to others that must of still been hiding. The creeper could tell by their footsteps that they came out and got near him. He stiffened out of worry and confusion. Why was nothing happening? He kept hissing until he had run out of breath, then he gasped slightly for air as suspense or not he decided to open his eyes. He saw three more figures had joined the one with the sword in front of him. One spindly one seemed to have their entire left side comprised of metal and machinery while the right side was organic, another was short and wore a sort of apron and a welding mask, while the final one was dressed up in a tuxedo, monocle, and top hat. The one with the welding mask began to circle around the creeper and look him over.
"How odd," they said after a long moment, "this little guy didn't simply not detonate, I don't believe he can...check him over, would ya?" He said the last part specifically the the half metal one who nodded and looked at the creeper for a moment.
"You're right..." He said when a slight beep sounded, "scan says he lacks the activator along with the detonator. A bomb with no fuse, so to speak."
"Make for a rather devious little prank," nodded the fancy looking on, "though not much else."
"Little prank?" Said the one with the welding mask, "this guy would scare the shit out of anything he snuck up on and no one would be the wiser! Plus those red spots seem an awful lot like blood."
"That's true. Makes it look like he's killed once or twice. And I've always known creepers to be intelligent," the welding mask one piped in, "with a bit of teaching and work we could probably set up a whole routine around this guy. "
"I'm up for it. Getting sick of being beat up," said the one with a bandanna, "people would run from a hissing creeper instead of turning to fight like they do with me."
"Especially if we made the creeper seem like it could explode as many times as it liked and survive," added in the mechanical one.
"So it's decided then, I suppose," said the one in the tux, "we'll take him with us. But he'll need a name..."
The creeper was about to ask who they were first but decided against it as he remembered humans couldn't understand his kind. He just sighed slightly, the sound coming out as slight hissing as it looked down. The one with the bandanna came over to him, tugging the cloth off his face and revealing a friendly, if mischievous grin with a tooth missing here and there. His face was was marked not just with scars but with heavy wrinkle lines from smiling, as though he rarely stopped doing so. His hair was a dark red rebellious mop that seemed to be trying to overtake his face with the scraggly beginnings of a beard.
"Don't worry, little guy, we won't hurt you, not if you don't hurt us," he smiled a little more, he seemed to mean what he had said and the creeper nodded slightly then the man put his bandanna back on, "I vote we call him Shen."
"Shen, hm?" Said then one in the suit, "I suppose it sounds alright, all things considered. Shall what does he think of it?"
"Why bother?" said the one with the welding mask, "he's just a dumb animal."
"Hush your mouth before you agitate him, fool," snapped the suited man, "many of the creatures that roam the world are beyond sentient, they simply speak a language which humans cannot normally decipher. Now then, little friend, would you enjoy the name Shen? Keep in mind, though, if you accept the name, you join up with us."
The creeper tilted his head in consideration for a moment, then nodded happily. He was excited that he had made friends so soon, and they seemed rather intelligent.
"Well then, that's settled. I suppose we should reveal our names now that you'll be traveling with us," nodded the man in the suit, "the fellow you met first would be Dak, our cyborg companion goes by Cryo, the moronic masked fellow is named Bar, and I am known as The Gentleman though I am sometimes referred to as simply Gent for sake of time."
"We could have said our own names," Bar mumbled under his breath. Dak elbowed him hard in the gut. Gent shook his head and got close to the creeper.
"We may be a tad disorganized as of current, but With your help, our new friend," he said slowly, grinning, "we will become the greatest griefers in the world."
The creeper did not know what the word 'griefer' meant, but something about it stirred a feeling within him and his mouth formed itself into a smiled that was filled to the brim with mischief..
In an amount of the time that followed, the creeper learned a lot about the small group of greifers as they prepared for his 'debut' as they called it: he would watch from the safety of the shadows as they went on their mischevious missions. From these observations, It was made clear that Dak, despite his average build, was the correct choice for the group's cheif fighter; when that bandana got pulled up over his broken smile, it was as though he felt no pain and gained so much strength it made his banged up iron sword into a chainsaw, so much so that The other members had taken to calling the bandana the 'Juggernaut Mask'. As such, he never wore armor and refused to enchant his sword. But when the bandana came down that smile would always light his thin face.
On the other side of things was Bar, was a wretched fighter, but the small man made himself immeasurably useful in other ways. Bar was who you went to see when you wanted something to go boom; he was a expert when it came to explosives, knowing exactly how to place TNT to destroy and entire chunk with just ten peices. But his genius was not at it's height with TNT alone, the man was always experimenting with new explosive forces, successfully creating hundreds of bombs and denotating objects for the troupe. Though one does not make a bomb without a few things blowing up in your face, he could be heard saying many times: he had experienced so many failed experiments that he was physically incapable of removing his welder's mask...probably for the better. But even without seeing his face, anyone could tell you his temper was more explosive than his bombs.
The one with the coolest temper was definatly Cryo. To say that the half metal man was cold enough to fit his name was an understatment. But his chilly attitude seemed to help him be more precise: He studied each target and within minutes he was able to tell you exactly would they would do under the vast majority of situations. And he was intelegent in more ways than that; he kept a neatly organized shelf filled with disks containing data and info on any and everything imaginable. And Just as Bar made new explosives, Cryo was often seen inventing an entirely new tool for the group, from grappling hooks that could pull peices out of walls to a remote that could trigger redstone devices from a distance without even being connected to them. Of course his signature invention was what earned him his nickname: he had a small device built into his robotic arm that encased anything he hit with it in a large block of solid ice.
And then, of course, their was the ever peculiar Gentleman. The fancy looking man certainly lived up to his name, always peculiarly polite; even while using his oddly thin, rapier like diamond sword in combat he was always complimenting his opponent or giving them advance on form and stance. But despite being as cordial as he was, anyone who thought for a second that Gent was not dangerous was quickly proven wrong. There was many reasons he was in charge of the group: his combat skills were unmatched, even with the Juggernaut Mask on, even Dak would fall to Gent's skill in a matter of moments, none of them had ever seen the monocle wearing man beaten in a swordfight. Likewise the fancy human's intellect was beyond incredible, constantly outwitting even Cryo's vast stores of knowledge. The man was beyond well taught in the ways of both scholarship and combat, though from where none of them knew. But the main reason he was leader was that his mind was not just powerful, it was devilishly devious.
And it was his idea that became the major project for the group for a while after taking in Shen. While they could not understand his language, Gent had the idea to create a new tounge based around noises that both the humans and the creeper could produce and understand. Not only would this new language allow them to communicate both ways with Shen, but it would make so that their enemies and targets would not understand what they were saying. This plan would take a huge amount of time to develop and perfect, but they all agreed that like Gent's ideas, it was genius. Between their missions, they were constantly working on the new language for the next few months.
«^»«^»«^»
From the branches of a tree in the forest surrounding a nice looking, moderatly sized house came a peculiar series of clicks, hisses and other odd noises. Five more series of sounds answered from different locations. To untrained ear it simply sounded like animals in the woods, but to the beings who made the sounds, it was five signals that five entities were ready to enaxt a plan: to them the sounds formed words and sentences.
"Place is mostly empty," one of the beings said in the strange language, it was Cryo, now speaking quietly through a comm device he had invented, "just an unarmed guy gardening out the back, and two guards in the house itself, they're both pretty quipped up. Only way into the celler is through the house."
"And busting open a new way would get too much unwanted attention," Bar pointed out.
"Should we set up a distraction?" inquired Dak using the same tounge, "old guy seems like he'd be jumpy, light at night as it is."
"Get him to call out the guards, then take them down," Gent answered, "Shen you up for it?"
"Always am, my friend," called a fifth voice in the language: Shen.
"Good," The Gentleman answered, "well, time to get to work, fellows."
Three shadows moved through the trees to a position near the front doors of the house, while two more slowly crept behind the high stone wall lining the house's garden, just outside of the ring of light made by the torches. When the gate opened as if blown by the wind, the man, not quite old yet but far from young, of course went over to close it, out leapt Shen, hissing loudly as he gave a sharp twitch of his head to one side. The man scrambled back as there was a flash and an explosion engulfed the creeper, blowing the fence apart. But the dust settled and Shen still stood there, glowering at the man who screamed in terror.
It was seconds before the guards came bursting out the back door and rushed towards Shen, but Dak leapt out from behind the green being, flashing Shen a smile as he pulled the bandana over his mouth and nose, and like that a raging fire seemed to engulf his eyes. The nearer guard swung his diamond sword in a swipe that would have taken out Dak's neck, but the warrior raised one hand so fast it blurred and blocked the blade with his unguarded palm. As a single drop of blood rolled down his wrist, Dak raised his sword and bashed the guard in the nose with the hilt of his iron sword, and the armored man crumpled unconscious. Dak cracked his neck gently as an arrow sunk into the back of his sword arm, but the warrior did not drop his weapon, only tightened his grip on it as in one fluid motion he spun around, yanked the arrow out with his cut off hand, and threw it back at the second guard who had fired it. It flew with such force it peirced right through the man's diamond armor and sunk deep into his hip, causing him to crumple to the ground and quickly pass out in pain. Dak removed his bandana, the mischevious smile returning as he went to examine the wound he had created. After a moment he nodded and turned towards the aged man.
"We don't kill people if we can avoid it, so don't worry about these two, they're fine. But we only do that" he said in normal human tounge, gesturing to the two gaurds with the second part, "to those who get in out way. Understand?"
The man nodded and sat down, back against a wall with his hand over his eye. Dak nodded a bit and switched back to the clicking and hissing of the peculiar language they had spoken in before.
"How'd I do, Shen?" he asked, smiling
"Great as always," the creeper responded. Then they heard Gent speak through their coms.
"We've done what came to do, excelent job you two," the sophisticated voice spoke out, "meet up at the randevous point."
"On our way," Dak chuckled a little. He nodded at the creeper and they both fadded off into the trees. When the owner of the house came back, for they were away the old man was simply a friend and gardener, they would find countless amounts of various hard to find treasures gone, their celler dishevelled by explosions, and their house filling up with chickens originating from a series of dispensers filled with eggs hooked up to a redstone pulse circuit.
This mission had marked their five hundreth success in a row, over a span of three years. By this point they had become quite infamous for many reasons: for one because they never used the same plan twice making them unpredicatble, another reason was because of each member's extreme skill in their feild. And of course their biggest factor was Shen, who had become know in some circles as the Blood Creeper, feared far and wide as being a creeper to survive their own explosions, and explode infinitely.
Of course, Shen didn't really explode. Those in the group know as well as you do that he couldn't. But they had worked long and hard to develop a form of bomb that would be placed and camoflauged on Shen's person; it exploded like a normal creeper when activated except that the blast was regulated not to damage Shen himself. It was activated by the creeper moving his head in certain ways, like a subtle twitch to one side, like he had just demonstrated.
He had been a real help to the group: both as a scare factor and because his creeper instincts allowed his first thoughts on plans and tacticts to be things the humans in the group wouldn't think of for hours normally. In return and to keep him safe, They each taught him several things about their respective arts; combat, science, etc.. But what Shen most took a shining to was learning explosives, he could very often be seen learning the destructive artform from either Gent, Bar or both. He quickly mastered the skill and with his creeper instincts he was on the verge of becoming better than Bar.
Life was good for the griefers, or at least the ones in their group. And when they returned to their base, they would have a celebration, five hundred was an impressive number of consecutive successes for people like them, after all. They all met up at the roundevous location, an old, gnarled birch tree they'd found, after which Gent nodded happily at what they'd collected and the report of the battle. Then they bandaged up Dak's new wounds, and headed out, each already eager for the next raid.
But then things went bad. As they strolled through a small ruined village, torches suddenly lit at various places in a circle around them. The group stopped, confused but readying themselves for a fight. They placed their backs against a wall just as several figures clad head to toe in strangely shaped armor came into the circle of light, surrounding them. One stood slightly more forward than the rest.
"Time to pay for the terror you have caused, scum" they said, brandishing a massive sword.
The group of griefers practically began laughing. Bounty hunters were always after them, but even massive groups like this were barely a hinderance with how skilled each member was. Dak raised his bandana over his face, his eyes lighting up with that strange fury as he charged the warriors' ranks on one side, while Cryo and Bar focused their ranged weaponry on the other. Gent calmly stolled towards the apparent leader, his rapier drawn.
"En Guarde, good sir," the curdious man with a slight bow, "now I must premptively apoligse for what I am about to do to you."
"Do not say you've won before your opponent lays dead, fool," said the man, effortlessly making a show swing of his sword, "and I shall not be dying anytime soon."
Shen was glad he was not expected to rush into fights due to his lack of means of attack. He was going to enjoy what he was about to see. He knew the other fights would be interesting, but there was always something fantastic about watching Gent fight, especially when he seemed outmatched like this. Shen smiled as the monocled man effortlessly parried a swing from the large soldier.
"Your weapon may be powerful," Gent said, jabbing at a chink in the other man's armor, "but when it comes to combat, stance, and speed are also important factors. And your stance is rather poor, even for one wearing armor. You shout turn slightly to the side to minimalise the amouns the amount of strikable space."
In response the large man made a jab at the Gentleman, who merely stepped slightly to one sude and struck another gap in the armor in the seconds it took for his opponent to pull the sword back.
"Further more, you should really attempt to be less predictable," the astristocrat stated, using the tip of his rapier to redirect an attack so it missed him entirely, "you only seem to know a few manuevers and are not cycling very well between them. Though perhaps you ar simply uneducated. Tell you what, we can put this whole thing behind us and I will teach you the art of swordsmanship. What do you say?"
"STOP TALKING!" the large man said, gripping his sword with both hands and driving it down, in an attempt to slice straight down through Gent. But the curtious cavalier preformed the most excellent parry and the sword drove deep into the ground two or so feet from him, the extra downward momentum causing the large man to fall off balance. He fell onto his own sword slightly, not enouh to hurt him, but enough to damange his armor badly.
"Well, my man, it would seem I have triumphed," Gent said calmly, lowering but not sheathing his blade, "now call off your other men before they get hurt and be on your way. Unless you are thinking of taking up my offer to teach you, of course."
The large man growled as he got back up partially, to his knees panting. Gent looked at him curiously for a moment and eld out his hand to help his opponent up. The armored man took it and began to stand up. He looked into the older man's eyes, a grin suddenly coming to his face.
"Thank you for not killing me," the bounty hunter breather as he reached his feet. Then suddenly he add in a snarl "It will be the worst mistake you ever make!"
With a small knife in his hand he lunged forward towards Gent. When the man was almost within slashing range Gent made a slow, deliberate thrust. The tip of his rapier sank into a crack that had formed in the man's iron chestplate, and through the double momentum it kept going and before long found the man's heart. He stopped his charge, eyes going glazed as Gent lowered the blade and the man's body slipped off of it.
"And that, good sir, is la fin," the Gentleman said sadly, "good day..."
That was one thing that set them apart from most griefers: each member of the group despised killing. Mischeif in all forms was well and good, and sometimes to make mischeif you had to hurt a few people. But killing...killing simply sat wrong with them, maybe because past their devious minds and impish hearts, they were all good people. But one way or another, in this world, everyone has to do things they hate, now and again. And this was one of those times. Gent had hardly known the person, but at the very sight of him dead, the curdious man's legs began to shake and a tear dripped from behind his monocle. Shen walked over to him slightly.
"Are you going to be okay?" The creeper asked slowly.
"I...I believe so," Gent answered, some of the noises used for words catching a little in his throat, "we'll just have to make sure he gets a proper funeral when this is done..."
With that the monocled man shook his head and grinned a bit at the creeper.
"Now then, the loss of their leader is clearly already demoralizing them a bit," he said with a nod to the now skiddish seeming crowd of guards (the ones who didn't have their hands full with other group members), "let us get back into the fray, shall we?"
The creper nodded and was about to turn to see how he could help, when suddenly there was a flash and smoke filled the area. Shen tried to find a friend or a wall, but he bumbed into a shape he did'd recognise and suddenly everything went dark.
When he woke he foundhimself in a cage not far from a small fire in a place that looked far from familiar. There were two figures, each with a sword at their belt and a pile of the armor the bounty hunters had had. One grinned and pointed towards Shen, and the other got up and walked over to the small cage, sword in hand.
"We may not be able to take down the humans in that group," he said slowly, "but without their 'blood creeper', it won't be long before they fall apart."
He readied his sword to make a stab that would sink straight into the creeper's heart. But before he could complete the action, three arrows suddenly sunk into his back, each one smoking strangely. A tremor moved through the mans body and his eyes rolled back as he collapsed onto the ground. The other man leapt up and looked around confused, when a small storm of strange potions shot of the darkness in the woods. The second man staggered, looking sick, then fell unconcious as he face became slightly green.
Then, without warning, an enderman warped into the circle of light. He had a scar over one eye and tilted his head slightly as he looked at Shen. After a moment he rumaged a bit through the two humans' belongs and after a moment pulled out a key and unlocked the creeper's cage. Shen looked at him nervously for a moment, but then the two locked eye and the green being could tell this enderman only meant to help. Shen could tell the enderman had learned a fair amount from that second as well. After a moment, the tall being spoke in the original language of mobs.
"I think you've been out for a few weeks...your friends are very far away..." he said slowly, "but, if you come with us, we will do all we can to help you find them."
"Us?" Shen responded in the same tounge, just as a skeleton, a zombie, and a spider walked into the light.
"Yes, us," the enderman said, "we are friends. And there is nothing better for finding old friends than new ones."
"Alright, I'll come with," the creeper nodded, "my name is Shen, by the way."
"Nern," the enderman said carefully, grinning, "good to meet you."
—•—
"And that was about two years ago," Shen finished up, "we haven't always been looking, it isn't possible; sometimes we need to run or it takes a lot of time just to survive. But whenever we've had the time, Nern has always been trying to help me find those crazy griefers. He believe's their out there, and I do too."
"Wow..." Grim said quietly, "so if this Bar guy was as good as you say, and you might be better than him..."
"I've made plenty of new bombs and hollowed out quite a few caves with these guys," Shen said, "I'm our explosives expert after all. We all have something we excell at; I'm bombs, Dave's a redstone genius, Brink's the weapons guy, and Truam knows how to brew potions most folks haven't even heard of."
"What about Nern?" Grim asked, hesitantly.
"Nern is wise, it's like he has the universe itself in his mind..." The creeper trailed off for a moment, "but either way he's also an incredible builder. Now then, we should get some sleep. Nern will have us going again at sunrise."
"I thought you wanted me to tell you about my past?" The human inquired.
"I do, but not tonight," Shen said, "I'll hold you to it another day."
"Alright..." Grim answered, within seconds he could hear the creeper snoring. The human glanced at Nern, who hadn't moved in the two or so hours they had been talking. The enderman porbably hadn't even blinked. Grim wandered what he could be thinking about, sitting on that chest. He sighed, deciding to try to find out another day. And before long he too, was alseep.