Waking up in the Overworld in his now ethereal and ghostly body was not quite as pleasant as waking up in…wherever he'd been before. As Herobrine attempted to grasp at the warm threads of light that were his memories of that place, the feeling or, rather, the knowledge that this process was familiar and would produce no result informed his decision to focus instead on trying to figure out his current circumstances.

With one look downwards, Herobrine—the ghost of Herobrine—was met with his own dead body and reminded for the fifth or sixth time that he had, in fact, died. White eyes stared emptily at his own corpse for a few moments, taking note of the dried blood puddled beneath the rather shallow wound on the right side of his body. Though he was sure that the sight would send chills down his spine had he still been alive and well in that body, he couldn't help but to tightly clench his fists.

It really had been a stupid, pathetic death.

After a few moments more, he relaxed his hands and lifted his head to take stock of the world around him, spinning—floating?—on his heel. He remembered this forest—not this location in particular, though. His corpse lied amongst some bushes in some inconspicuous part of the forest, nowhere near that human's house or the clearing by it. He might as well have been buried underground. He also did not remember it being day time when he'd died. How much time could've possibly passed between then and now?

Well, that didn't really matter now.

Quelling his thoughts, he shut his eyes and took another slow spin around. He already knew the forest was magical, but he'd never looked at it like this, not in a while at least, and he did not know what he was expecting. All around him were wisps and patches of different shades of greens, some brighter than others, but generally dim. He opened his eyes when he realized that he had already gone around twice without noticing anything different, then sighed in frustration. Either he was farther off from the humans than he'd originally thought he was, or the forest's auras were too densely packed for him to be able to discern anything. With how weak the ghost's form was and how drained he was before the last time he teleported, he surmised that both statements were most likely true.

And so, choosing no direction in particular, but minding where his body was, he strolled away from his corpse.

It was a week after the unfortunate incident before Steve finally hopped on Markus, with Grape in tow, and returned to Verdesa. Seven days of guilt. Seven days of avoidance. Seven days of no sleep.

"Dude, you look like shit," Jason informed him helpfully, as if he didn't already know that. Steve inhaled deeply and sighed, pressing his hands into his eyes, which were no doubt red, for a moment before hopping off the horse and handing the lead to the guard.

"I know."

He took a few steps into the village with the ever excitable Grape at his side before turning back around, his tired mind finally picking up on the fact that a certain someone was missing from the other side of the road. Jason sighed and stood up straight from the pole he'd been leaning on, stretching his arms above his head.

"That idiot actually took time off to try and find the cats that Gavin told him about. Can't believe him…" Steve probably would've laughed and felt bad about it on any other day, but today he simply nodded in acknowledgment and continued into the busy village. It wasn't until Steve received even more looks of concern as well as the periodical questions of "Are you okay?" and "Where have you been?" from various people did it occur to him that maybe taking the main road to Alex's wasn't very ideal, since he was currently trying to avoid the attention of others. He nearly turned into Michael's place—he was much closer by, after all—but he hadn't even told him about the harassment from the stranger, and he didn't think he was up to explaining all of that, along with the incident seven nights ago, to him right now.

He turned onto the path leading right, making a point of staring straight ahead as he passed by the library. Even so, he found his thoughts turning to the librarian in a more sympathetic light than they had been for the past week. Knowing Gavin, he was and probably had been in a similar state of unrest as Steve was.

Steve only knocked once on Alex's door before it swung open. Alex, with her orange hair in a high-ponytail and wearing high-waisted black pants, boots, and a green button-down, greeted him on the other side, a disgruntled expression on her face. She blinked a few times before the bow in her hand promptly fell to the floor, and Steve was nearly tackled to the ground in a very tight hug.

"Steve, what the actual Nether?! I thought you'd died or something!"

He cringed at the choice of wording but quietly returned the hug.

"I was about to come looking for you and everything, even Michael was gonna come with me," Alex said as she released him, walking around to push Steve into her house. Grape, recognizing that she was also allowed to enter, proceeded to dash into the house and run laps around the living room. "You look like—"

"Shit. I know."

"Mkay, glad we're on the same page." Alex shut her front door behind them and picked up the fallen bow. "Go take a nap, you need it," she said, patting his back. "And then you're 'fessing up on why you disappeared for a whole week. Gavin REFUSED to talk to me… Anyway. Go sleep."

Steve sent Alex a grateful look before promptly flopping onto one of two dark couches, and, within a few minutes, he was out like a light.

Steve woke up in a bed that wasn't his, to a conversation he couldn't understand. He yawned, rolling off of his stomach and onto his side before sitting up. The magenta blanket which he'd been neatly tucked under slid onto his lap. Quietly, he surveyed the room he was in as he tried to make out what the voices on the other side of the door were saying, to no avail. He could, at the least, figure out that there were three people—Alex, Michael, and someone else who spoke so rarely and quietly that he couldn't recognize them—and that he was now in Alex's guest room. With a sigh, Steve climbed out of the bed, returning the blanket to its original state and, as slowly as he possibly could, he cracked the bedroom door open.

He was right about Alex and Michael, and he soon found that the unnamed third voice was Gavin. Alex sat between the two men on one of the couches, her eyes shut with a scowl on her face and her arms crossed over her chest. That didn't necessarily stop Michael, to her right, from leaning over her to rather heatedly shout-whisper to Gavin, to her left, who was turned away from both of them with his eyes closed as well, his leg rapidly bouncing. He'd somewhat expected for Gavin to look as sleepless as he did now, but not Michael, who was in a state of disarray that he'd never seen before. It was when Gavin slid the glasses off of his face, stood, and walked away from the two of them that Steve chose to open the door a little wider and step out of the room. All three pairs of eyes were on him in an instant, the room suddenly becoming very still.

"Hey," Alex greeted warmly, betraying her previous expression entirely.

"Hi," Steve responded unsurely. Michael slowly returned to his own space again as Gavin and Steve cautiously made their way into their seats, Gavin replacing himself next to Alex, but leaving a significant amount of space between himself and her, and Steve on the couch across from them.

The four fell into a long, uncomfortable silence.

"So…" Steve began, running a hand through his hair. "How's everyone doing?"

Alex threw her hands up and exclaimed, "Oh, Notch! No," surprising everyone else in the room. She slapped her hands back down on her lap. "Stop. That's not what we came here for. Gavin, or Steve—preferably Gavin—can you PLEASE start explaining what the Nether happened. Has been happening. Notch."

Gavin visibly shrunk into himself, pressing himself further into the couch and away from Alex, so Steve took the liberty of beginning the tale of the past couple of weeks.

"Alright, okay, okay. Let's—okay, so. I already told Alex about this but there is- was...there was a man who'd randomly started bothering me about three weeks ago, I didn't know why and I didn't know who he was. Right before my last visit here he...almost set my house on fire, and so I decided I'd finally try to do something about it…" Steve trailed off and expectantly looked towards Gavin. In truth, he was really putting off having to admit to what was probably a murder, but Gavin should have some words to say about it. They were once again plunged into a tense silence, until Gavin's feeble voice broke through it.

"I...I'd had a bad feeling. Since about the time you said that the stranger had started bothering you. It kept getting worse. And then I had this- terrible dream. I couldn't remember all of it, but what I remembered…" Gavin shifted so that he leaned forward, his hands gripping his knees. "Steven, I tried to warn you," he began, his voice growing even quieter than before. If his icy, blue eyes were piercing with his glasses on, then Steve couldn't even begin to describe how they were now, silently pleading for an answer.

"Please don't tell me you…"

"Try not to do anything regrettable, Steven."

His feet were moving faster than his mind was—

It hit his side instead.

Stinging wounds.

Grape's barking.

A very, very bad mistake.

It was the feeling of droplets of liquid on his hands that brought his mind back to the present.

"I did, didn't I?" Steve's quivering voice was barely above a whisper as he lowered his head. It was as if the whole week he'd been gone hadn't happened, and he was back to that night. "I…killed him."

He was blind to Alex and Michael's dumbfounded looks, to the color draining from Gavin's already pale face as he leaned back in the couch. It was Alex who broke the new silence, her eyes darting between Steve's trembling form and Gavin's.

"What- Okay, no, waitwaitwaitwait. What do you mean killed—I thought you were gonna…" Alex laughed a bit, hysterical. "Just...just give him a warning shot to the leg?"

"I meant to!" Steve shouted, his head snapping up. "I didn't even—I tried talking to him and then I got pissed and we started fighting and he almost killed me- he almost killed Grape and I panicked—oh god," he murmured, pressing his palms into his still watery eyes and leaning back into the couch. "I killed someone. I took someone's life. Oh, fuck—"

Warm hands came to grasp at his wrists, and he allowed them to pull his hands away from his face. Michael, who stood above him, now let go of Steve's hands and put his hands on his face, wiping away some of the tears that ran down.

"Breathe."

Steve took a deep breath in, and exhaled it.

"Who threw the first punch?"

"H-He did, but—"

"And with Grape? What happened, there?"

"He looked like he was about to attack her, so I- I meant to just stop the hand holding the sword and…got him in the side instead."

"And did you try to help him?"

"No. I mean, yes, but he…he disappeared before I could do anything."

"Disappeared?"

"Teleported. I guess."

Michael nodded to himself before sitting down next to Steve and bringing him in for a hug. When he pulled back, he firmly placed his hands on Steve's shoulders.

"Steve, you did nothing wrong. You were just trying to approach him peacefully, like you said, and things got out of hand. At that point, you could only defend yourself, right?" Steve swallowed, nodding slowly.

"Right," he echoed.

"And, hey. You said he teleported out, right? He might not even be dead. Might've went home to go lick his own wounds before you could," Alex shrugged. "I dunno about you, but I know that people who're already tired out typically wouldn't be able to cast any kind of spell, let alone something like teleportation. He's probably fine."

"Yeah, but…he hasn't. He hasn't come back since—"

"The point still stands that you only did what you had to do," Michael interrupted, taking his hands off of Steve's shoulders."Two weeks, huh. Gavin, I don't understand you. You knew about the possibility that this would happen for two weeks and did nothing?"

Gavin's leg began to bounce again, and he responded without looking at him, venom dripping off of his sharp words. "I do deeply apologize, Michael, I do not typically try to act before understanding the full picture first."

"Guys, stop—"

"Forget about what you knew or didn't know, you still could've given a heads up about it or—something! So? What does it mean? Let's not delay giving out this prophecy of yours; what'll happen to Steve now?"

"I told you that I didn't know what was going to happen until the night before. And I still don't understand it!"

"If one more person," Alex began, her voice dangerously low and quiet. "shouts in my house today. There will be no discrimination. You'll be punched in the mouth, and you'll leave."

There was another tense lull of silence.

"Can we…not talk about this anymore. Please." Steve was met with quiet agreement. He scanned around the room, feeling like he was forgetting something. Several somethings. "Where's Grape? And Anna?"

"Library," Alex said. "Gavin meant to take a day off anyway, so Marie was taking over. She's there with them."

"Speaking of," said Michael, standing up and heading towards the door. "About time I picked her up."

"Yes, leaving," said Gavin, also standing up to leave. He didn't head towards the door, though, instead opting to slide his discarded glasses back onto his face. Steve shifted in his seat a bit before standing up as well.

"I'll, uh. I'll go with you. I want to…" Steve trailed off, running a hand through his hair as he looked between Gavin and Michael. "…check something out at the library. Thanks, Alex."

"Yeah, yeah," Alex said, turning around in the chair to face the three. She opened her mouth to say something, but shut it and, instead, gave Steve a two-fingered salute. For the first time since last week, Steve smiled, and he returned the salute. With that, the three men departed from Alex's home and made the very short trip to the library. Steve noted, with slight dismay, that the sun was already beginning to set, casting the town in an orange glow. He hadn't realized he'd slept for that long. He was sure that Alex wouldn't mind his impromptu stay.

Marie, Anna, and Grape all sat to the left of the library doors. Anna sat to Marie's right, leaning on the woman's arm but no less interested in the book that Marie was reading aloud to her. Grape's fluffy black head rested upon Marie's lap. Marie lifted her head up as they approached, brushing some of her dirty-blonde hair back as she did so.

"Ah, you're back."

"Papa!" Anna all but leapt from her seat, running into her father's awaiting arms.

"Had fun? Are you ready to go?" Anna was silent for a few moments, looking down towards the book Marie had in her hands, but a yawn seemed to make the decision for her. She nodded before resting her head on her father's shoulder. "Thanks for watching her today."

"No problem. She was fun to have around," Marie smiled. Michael returned the smile before turning to Steve.

"Will you be alright?"

Steve nodded. "I'll probably head back to Alex's after this, it's getting a bit too late for me to go all the way back home now."

Michael hummed quietly. With a "Goodnight," and a narrow-eyed glance towards Gavin, the blacksmith left. Steve sighed and looked to Gavin, who muttered something beneath his breath before storming into the library.

"Hm. What's wrong with my brother this time? Should I even ask," Marie queried, patting the fur ball in her lap.

Steve shook his head. "Nah. Can you watch her for a couple more minutes? I'll go talk to him."

"Any longer, Steve, and I just might have to keep her," she said, grinning slightly. She waved her hand dismissively. "Nah, I'm joking. Go ahead."

Steve thanked her and quickly followed the librarian into the library, passing through the tall shelves and different sections until he reached the desk at the back. Despite the time, there were a few people roaming around or seated at a desk or on the floor. He found the bespeckled man crouched down, searching through the shelves behind the desk containing quite the collection of music discs with a misplaced amount of concentration. Gavin didn't bother to look at Steve as he stood above him, nor when he crouched down next to him.

"I'm sorry about that," he began. "He…he must've been really worried. I hadn't really told him about all this, so…you know I don't blame you, right? I don't think he really does, either."

"You did," Gavin said, still not pausing in his search. "You must've, at some point. You didn't stay out of Verdesa for a week all because of what had happened."

Steve was silent. He brushed a hand through his hair before letting it fall again.

"Either way, you don't owe me—"

"You know what? Yeah. I did blame you," Steve cut in. "But that was stupid, and I'm sorry. I don't know what I could've done for things to turn out different, but I'm the one who didn't listen to your warning at the end of the day, right?"

Gavin's expression softened and he finally seemed to find the disc he was looking for, pulling it out of the shelf and standing up to put it into the amplified jukebox. A soft tune began to flow throughout the library and he sighed. Though he didn't say it out loud, Steve quickly figured out that all was forgiven. On his part, at least.

"You wanted to talk to me about something," Gavin stated as Steve stood up next to him. He expected a change in topic but his face still contorted into an expression of confusion.

"I—what?"

"Come now, Steven, you don't think I didn't catch onto your lie at Alex's to appease your angry lover. You were avoiding something. What was it?"

"He- we're not dating—and I really did just want to check something out."

Gavin simply stared at him, his expression blank and deadpan.

"Okay, okay. It was about the dream you had. And…the guy."

"What I told you was all I know, Steven. The rest was too vague for me to understand. …I saw you confronting that man. It…it went a little better then it did in the dream, I suppose. Whoever he is, he's important. After your confrontation, there was a series of colors…white, blue, yellow, green. There was a forest, and then a woman I had never seen before."

"…That really is vague. I don't have any idea about any of those things, either. And, the man. He…he had white eyes. Did you see that?"

Gavin cocked his head to the side. "White eyes? No."

"White, glowing eyes…that's what I wanted to look up. Didn't Fiora say in one of her final journals that all the Aetherians were basically wiped out?"

"Steven. Are you suggesting that an Aetherian was the one who harassed you?"

"I don't think there are any humans with eyes like that. Do you?"

"It's just been so many years…"

"Well, we can just double check. Give me the journals."

Fiora Wright — November 13th, 1338 — 7:45 AM

Current Objective: Learn more about the mysterious beings who recently appeared.

It has been...2 days since those mysterious beings appeared. It...feels a bit odd to refer to them as "mysterious beings" when they really are quite human, after all—for the most part. There are definitely a few surface level traits that sets some of them apart from us, things I have mentioned before, such as hair and eye color, as well as their magical abilities, but, aside from that, they really are nothing special. I mean that in the kindest way possible, by the way, they really are quite nice. Anyway. I'll tidy up around here before heading out to find out more about them.

17:08 PM

Truly, they are mysterious beings—they have as much of a clue of themselves as we have on them. I talked with both them and other humans who have been in contact with them to gather information on some things. Let's start with the general things we know.

General Appearance: Aside from hair and eye color, just like a human.

Hair: Most have what we would consider natural hair colors, though a few of them have more rare hair colors that they seemed to have been born with, such as rich red or bright green—even white.

Eye Color: Nearly all of them have very peculiar eyes. Shades and colors of the whole spectrum of the rainbow, even pitch black or white exists amongst them. Their eyes tend to glow, both during the day (less noticeable, obviously) and in the dark. Even those with "normal" eye colors have a certain glow to them. This glow seems to fluctuate depending on various things.

Magic Ability: Now, I'm no sorceress...

"Steven…?"

The voice that called to him was less than a whisper, but it still somehow managed to startle Steve out of world of the journal in his hands. He breathed a sigh as his tense muscles relaxed once again, re-settling into the chair he was sitting in.

"Alright maybe I deserved that a little bit but really, Gavin? ...Gavin?" The man trailed off as he confusedly looked around him. He knew he'd joked about the librarian practically being a ghost, but this was on a next level; the librarian was nowhere to be seen. With one last quick look around, Steve huffed a bit, setting the journal down on his lap. "I'm not playing this game with you, dude. Really—"

"Oh, good, it was not a coincidence. You can hear me, correct?" The voice, smooth and deep, was much clearer now, and seemed to come from somewhere he couldn't quite pinpoint. He blinked several times before his expression fell, sinking into his seat.

"Oh. I know what this is," he muttered darkly, slowly opening back up to the page he was on.

"Oh? And what is it? Enlighten me."

"It's my guilty conscience speaking to me or something, I dunno. 'Cause I killed—I might've seriously hurt that man. I'm talking to myself? I'm talking to myself. I am going crazy."

"You felt guilty about killing me? Aw, how sweet. No, but you are not crazy. Not for the reason you think, anyway. I want you to think very, very hard, Steven. Harder than you may have ever thought before. Be honest with yourself, now. Who do you honestly think you're speaking to?"

Though Steve felt more than vaguely insulted, he couldn't find it in him to care much about that. Rather, he decided to focus on the fact that these thoughts that he thought he was having were not, in fact, his, and they very much belonged to someone else somehow, no matter what he consciously or even subconsciously thought about himself at the moment. For the umpteenth time, he was brought back to that moment—not the final blow, but to the moment that he finally noticed what he should've noticed before. His eyes lowered to the journal in his hands. And as the dots began to connect, a translucent shape materialized before him. He looked up.

The man's eyes were…empty.

"Did you figure it out?"

White.

"Steven? Did you find what you were looking for?"

And glowing.

He barely took notice of Gavin, who now stood directly next to the stranger he must've definitely killed, because why else would this phantom be here? His eyes slowly made their way to Gavin, before shifting back to the ghost, before shifting back to Gavin, who was now trying to figure out whatever Steve could be looking at.

"Steven?"

"Yeah...no. No. I'm gonna go to sleep, Gav, thanks a lot," Steve said, now making a conscious effort to wholly avoid looking at or touching the phantom as he stood up and dropped the journals into the librarian's unexpecting hands. Gavin fumbled with them for a moment before gaining his bearings and shouting after Steve, who all but ran out of the library.

"What? Am I missing something here?"

Distantly, he thought he could hear someone laugh.

What a menace. Anyway, hey y'all! As you've noticed this chapter was very much not on time. That's 'cause uuuuuuhhhhhh school. I'm getting my ass thoroughly kicked by it but! Not enough yet that I'll go on some long hiatus. Hopefully. So, instead of two updates a month, we'll be going down to one, unfortunately. So...see you around this time next month!