Chapter 12: It's not Betrayal

What is it 0000?

"I think I'm hurting him."

Why is that?

"He's locked himself in his half of the rooms. He barely spoke to anyone at breakfast. He hardly ate anything at all."

This is all normal behavior for 4979 to exhibit.

"But I'm making it worse."

At first glance, yes you are.

"You should pull me out. Put me back to sleep."

Are you worried?

"Yes. I am."

Do not be concerned. If you begin to damage 4979 in such a way that I believe it will be permanent I will remove you from the game.

"Okay."


Player woke up to someone banging on the door of his room. He hauled himself up, thinking that he probably slept through lunch and an NPC was sent to check on him. He tousled his own hair and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes before pulling opening the door.

Hero shoved the set of leather armor into Player's chest, making him stumble back slightly.

"We're going mining," the man said as he dropped the helmet onto Player's head. It landed slightly askew, covering one of his eyes, and Player reached up automatically to push it into place.

"I have enough stuff," Player protested.

"No you don't. The prices are going up. There are two of us now: twice the price."

"Can't you pay for half of it?"

Hero paused, then said, "No."

Player scowled at him, "then you can starve. What do I care?"

"You'll starve too. We pay together."

Player took a breath, "Bullshit. When did you learn all of this?"

Hero held out an envelope, already open, "It came while you were napping."

Player took the envelope, scowling all the while. He opened it, pulled out a piece of smooth white paper, and read it. Hero was right: pay together or starve together. Not that he couldn't get food elsewhere on his own, but it was the principle of the thing.

And the new rate was ridiculously expensive. It appeared that diamond-ranked gladiators had quite a quota to fill. Either that or Hero had several violations on his account and was still paying off the fines. Whatever the reason, the rate would drain all of Player's resources within the week.

"Fine," He said irritably, "Mining."

Hero smirked at him, "Good. I expect your practices to be much more impressive than what I've seen before." He was addressing Player's ego. It worked.


A few minutes later, Hero wasn't smiling, "This is it?" He asked, looking at the unassuming hole in the ground of the open world with more than a little discontent.

Player rolled his eyes and stepped over into the void without saying anything. With a whoosh of passing air and a breathless moment suspended in darkness, he dropped into the abyss of the cave. A second later he landed in the deep pool of water that had formed naturally. He gasped at the cold, opening his eyes to the bubbles and shimmering upside-down surface of the water.

Player kicked upwards, broke the surface of the water, and heard Hero above him, laughing. Player hauled himself out of the pool, water running off his back and out of his hair. He shook himself, throwing droplets over the dry stone and several mushrooms that had sprung up nearby since his last visit.

Hero's voice called down to him, still filled with humorous delight, "You okay down there?"

He was laughing without knowing if I even survived the fall, Player thought. Aloud he said, "Fine. Your turn."

There was an uneasy second of silence, and Player opened his mouth to shout some snide encouragement, then a shadow blocked the light and Hero dropped into the cave, a blur of blue. His landing in the pool wasn't quite as neat as Player's, and it sent up a mighty spray of water, soaking the other man again.

Player looked down at the puddle seeping over the stones and knit his eyebrows, holding his arms out away from himself. What on earth was he doing? This was absurd.

Hero surfaced from the water with a gasp. He hauled himself out of the pool, still chuckling. His eyes were casting an eerie white glow around the cave, barely enough to see all of Hero's body. The man shook his head as Player had, blurring the outline of his eyes and throwing water around the space. A few of the drops hit Player.

Hero stopped, blinked his glowing eyes, and looked around slowly, then at the man standing still a couple yards away, "What?"

Player felt himself flush all the way up his neck to his ears. He turned away, trying to act as if nothing was wrong. Damn gladiators and their physical prowess. If Spark and Ivy hadn't already been drooling after gladiators for their entire lives, they would certainly start to if they ever saw Hero with his clothes plastered against his skin.

Pull yourself together, he told himself. This was why this partner business was a bad idea.

Player removed a torch from his inventory and held it up, allowing the light to flicker off the rough-hewn walls of the cavern. Hero let out a low whistle, his eyes adding to the torch's light.

What was it with this guy? Player wondered savagely even as he started walking. He'd never come across such an irritant in his entire life.

But he couldn't be angry when he was down in the caves, and soon enough Player was smiling slightly, his hand already straying to the pickaxe on his back. Hero had backed off slightly, and was now following a few steps behind, gazing up at the arching ceiling of the cavern.

Player turned and waited for the man at the entrance to the real mines, guarded by a simple wooden door.

Hero stopped and blinks through his glowing eyes, head tilted slightly at Player.

"This connects to the main mines used by the stone and iron rankers," Player said, "be quiet, or they'll be all over us, asking for help."

Hero wrinkled his nose, "Will their partners be in there too? Some of them might be gladiators."

"I doubt it," Player said, but Hero was already hauling on his diamond armor, which had been tucked away in his inventory grid when he jumped into the cave. The man set the helmet on his head, tamping down the hair that had begun to stick up on the top of his crown.

The man twirled his diamond sword easily, as if it weighed no more than a feather, "Let's go."

Player rolled his eyes and leaned in close to the door. He peered through the glass of the upper half, cloudy with rock dust, but nothing was moving on the other side. He pressed his hand against the wood, felt the lock click open as the game recognized his coding. He pushed it open.

Beyond the door there were torches on the walls, lighting up the narrow staircase all the way down to his usual mining spot. He'd taken the time to replace the square blocks with stairs. They were easier on his legs.

Hero stood uneasily at the top of the stairs, looking down at Player, already halfway down into the cave.

"What's down there?" He asked.

"A cave," Player said, "some strip-mining tunnels, a new place I just cracked open."

Hero sighed and followed Player. He hurried until he was close enough to Player to make the man nervous, then slowed down. The diamond sword dragged along the smooth stone wall of the passage. It was so sharp that it doesn't even shriek, just cut through the rock like butter.

Player practically jumped down the rest of the stairs all in one go to get enough space between them so he couldn't feel the moisture from Hero's still-damp clothes.

He stopped at the bottom of the stairs. There was a light at the end of the fresh tunnel where there shouldn't have been a light. It wasn't the cave that he discovered while Clarence was down in the mines, but it was more visible from the central hub, and so more people would have tried it first.

"What is it?" Hero asked from behind him.

"Someone's down my tunel," Player replied. He slung the pick off his back. No one should be down that tunnel, and the very thought of some stone-pick idiot with their hands on the resources that he dug through a hundred blocks of stone to get at made his simulated blood boil.

Hero set one hand on Player's shoulder, pushed him back half a step, and took the lead down the narrow tunnel in the stone. That pissed Player off more than ever. He could take care of himself, but this wasn't the time to argue about these things. He could get mad at Hero later if he had the guts to.

As they approached the open end of the tunnel, voices become audible. It was four people, not bothering to talk quietly. Player recognized them.

"I don't know," Ivy was saying, "it just feels wrong."

"Come on. You've seen the new numbers. We need to supplement our incomes." That's Bit talking.

"But coming down into Player's mine? I just don't like it."

"He won't know," The gladiator who she'd paired with, Gaimon is his name, said, muffled because he was farther back in the cave, "he'll just assume it's someone else."

"He's a diamond ranker," said the voice of Bit's blonde companion, "he probably has more loot stored up than he knows what to do with. Any miner ranked higher than stone is a hoarder."

"That's what I'm saying," Ivy protested, "we're crossing a diamond-ranked miner who tunnelled through a hundred blocks of stone to find this cave. Don't you guys think he'll be angry?"

"Nah," the gladiator said, "the guy is too nervous to do anything. You saw the way he acted at breakfast; he's about as dangerous as a bunny."

Player felt anger rise in his chest, forcing down all of his other emotions. In front of him Hero growled, the corner of his mouth twitching downwards into that familiar scowl.

Player turned around and backtracked all the way back down the tunnel, jogging. He popped open his inventory grid and selected a bucket. This he dipped into the pool of lava, being very careful not to touch any of the fluid himself. Thus armed, he ventured back into the tunnel, holding the piping hot bucket well away from himself.

Hero had hollowed himself an alcove in the tunnel wall, and he stepped into it as Player approaches.

"After you," he said. Was it just Player, or are the man's eyes a little brighter than before, as if he shared some of Player's rage?

He stepped in front of Hero and walked down the remainder of the tunnel. Beyond the entrance to the cave he could see Ivy standing, hands on her hips. Bit was higher up on the wall of the cave, using a stone pick to pull blocks of iron ore out of the wall.

"Don't worry about it, Ivy, there is absolutely no way Player is going to know we were here. Why do you care so much anyway? We've only known him three days."

Typical; everyone was always stabbing each other in the back where resources and money were concerned. How many times had Player heard that sob story: "oh, my teammate killed me in survival games, they pushed me off the edge in skywars, they took all of the stuff we were going to split fifty-fifty?"

Bit continued, "Even Clarence said that he won't care. Player was down here the other day, inventory stuffed full. He won't even notice if we take-" he breaks off as he registers Player coming through the tunnel. "Oh."

Ivy turned around and saw him.

There was no doubt in Player's mind that he was flushed red with anger and pain at hearing that Clarence had a hand in this, but at this point he felt it was justified. "Get out of my mine," he said, annunciating each word clearly and precisely. His voice was stronger than it ever had been around the farmers before.

Ivy took a step back, "Hi, Player."

Bit climbed down from the wall awkwardly, "Take it easy man; we're just getting a couple iron ingots, nothing major."

Rage flared in Player's stomach, "Nothing major? I dug through at least 200 blocks of solid stone to get into this place. It took me all day. The damage to my pick alone cost what all the crops on your farm are worth ten times over, and it's 'nothing major?'"

"I mean...well," Bit paused, brow creasing, "what the hell is your pick enchanted with to cost that much?"

Player didn't fall for those tactics, "I'm going to say it one more time: get the hell out of my mine."

Ivy was bristling now, rising to the challenge, "There are four of us down here. I've seen you fight before: you're not that great at it. How are you going to take all of us, one of whom is a gladiator, all by yourself?"

Player grinned, "I've dealt with people down here before. I know a couple tricks."

Bit's companion stuck her head through a hole on the other side of the small cavern. For the first time, Player registered that her item was a stone pickaxe. She didn't look nervous at all, "So do I," she said, "you won't get me."

"Last chance to leave quietly," Player said, his voice dropping back to its regular tones. They were all staring at him, and for the first time their gazes didn't make him cringe.

Bit crossed his arms, "No."

Ivy followed suit, raising her chin stubbornly.

There's a shout from Player's left, where there's a sharp turn away from the group. Gaimon rushed forward around the corner, Player saw him out of the corner of his eye. The man had his sword drawn back, ready to strike.

Hero was still in the tunnel, and Player didn't feel like trying close combat with a gladiator right then. He put one hand on the red-hot bottom of the bucket, used the other one to pull the handle back at an angle where it wouldn't burn him, and tossed half the lava in the metal container into the gladiator's face.

The shout turned to a scream of pain, and Gaimon dropped to the floor, writhing as the lava sears through both his skin and his health points. He stopped moving within seconds, and his body dissolved. He left behind a set of iron armor and a few measly resources, which were incinerated by the molten rock.

Bit and Ivy looked suitably nervous.

Player sighed, "Keep what you have: I don't care, but get out."

Hero finally came out of the tunnel behind Player, hefting an iron pick in one hand and a handful of redstone dust in the other. He looked around as if he had just noticed what was going on, then looked down at the pool of lava seeping its way into the cracks in the stone beneath. He didn't say anything, but his eyes narrowed a fraction, the luminescence that was emitted from them sharpened in response, clearly visible in the dim lighting of the cave.

Bit and Ivy both visibly swallowed, looking suddenly more nervous.

"Okay," Bit said, "we're going." His blonde companion stepped out from her tunnel and joined the little group as it moves towards the opening of the tunnel.

She was just passing the two men when Hero moved. He exchanged his pick for his sword in one motion and brought it around without ceremony to pierce her back. She didn't make a sound, just dissolved into black snow which settles to the ground around the pile of her resources, among which are several diamonds and a single glimmering emerald.

Damned miner, Player thought, wishing that the jail time for being killed in the open world was quite a bit longer than it was. Both of the casualties would be actively participating again tomorrow morning. He should have foreseen that issue: she knew what she was doing.

Hero bent and picked up the gems. Bit and Ivy didn't even notice the girl's death. They wouldn't until they were out of the cave.

Player stepped forward and bent to pick up the door that they must have taken off its hinges on their way into the cave. He walked a few steps into the tunnel and set it back in its original place. It wouldn't stop people, obviously, but generally other miners respected the doors' significance as barriers.

That done, Player crossed the smallish cavern that had been so dark and full of promise on his last visit. He sank down on a block of stone that jutted from the wall. Above his head, a redstone ore deposit glowed with a crimson light that reflected off a gold ore not far away. The farmers really had no idea what they were doing if they left all this be.

Player put his head in his hands and closed his eyes. He breathed deeply, letting the quiet of the caves calm him down. What a relief it would be if the millions of tons of rock above him would give way and crush him below their weight. Of course, it would be a temporary relief here, in the game, where mortality was a mere concept, but a relief nonetheless.

It didn't occur to him to consider Hero until Player heard footsteps approaching. He looked up at the man looking down at him.

"Do you feel betrayed?" Hero asked, his head tilted just so, an inquisitive expression.

Player took a deep breath. "No," he said, "they're just doing what people do. They have no one to answer to, so they do whatever they please."

"Then why are you sitting here?"

"I, uh," he looked down at his clasped hands, "I'm hurt that they knew how to come down here, not because they did. Clarence must have told them where to go."

"The one with the big dopey eyes?" Hero asked, a sneer in his voice, "that's why you feel betrayed by?"

Player nodded, not trusting himself to speak. He put his head in his hands again and felt a tear run out of each eye. It was peculiar that they should be allowed to cry in the game. There was no point to this expression, other than to express pain or fear or sadness.

Player was being stupid anyway. Stop crying, buck up, be a man, he told himself, and for the love of god, get yourself under control and stop thinking about these things.

Then Hero said the most unexpected thing, "Do you want me to hurt him?"

Player raised his head to look at him, so surprised that he couldn't do anything but gape, his mouth slightly open. Hero was looking back at him through slitted luminous eyes, his face creased into an expression that Player could only describe as malevolence. His eyebrows have become two slanted slashes across his forehead, his mouth a grim line, downturned at the corners. He looked, Player thought with the abruptness he was used to when what was the game and what was not the game clashed in his mind, like a king about to pass judgement on a particularly petty thief and show no mercy while doing it.

"Well?" Hero asked.

Player found his voice, "No!" he said, with such force that the look on Hero's face went from contempt to genuine surprise. "No, I don't want you to hurt him."

Just the thought of Hero, who moved so fast with a sword that he couldn't even see him, going up against the boy who drank milk straight out of the bucket and came down into the mines to talk even though he hated being so far underground made Player feel sick. The same sweet innocent boy might or might not have let slip where Player had found his next cave system, but nevermind that, and nevermind that he had shot Clarence and killed him in survival games. That was the nature of the beast, it meant nothing. And especially nevermind that Hero had been watching out for him for the two days since they had been paired up. None of that mattered; what mattered that if Hero went after Clarence, it would be a slaughter, and Player didn't Clarence hurt.

"Fine then," Hero said, "then start mining. We came down here for a reason, didn't we?"

Player sighed and stood up, "Yes, we did."

The smirk was back, but maybe it was a touch less self-satisfied than before, "Lead the way, oh great miner."

Player couldn't help himself: a smile tugged at his mouth. It was peculiar that the game let him smile as well as cry, and even do both at the same time. Hero was obviously overlooking the oddness of that, and Player was grateful for it.

He got to his feet, dusting off his hands from the moisture of his own tears, and took the familiar weight of the pickaxe off his back. "First thing is first," he said, and points upwards, "we need to get to that."

Hero tilted his head back, revealing a pronounced adam's apple and line of untanned flesh under his chin. He frowned, "What, do you want me to put you on my shoulders?"

Player shook his head, "No. I just need a few blocks of cobblestone, that's all." Though maybe the shoulders thing would work someday, if he ever got up the courage to actually touch Hero on purpose.

Hero shrugged and produced a few from his inventory, tossing the stack to Player underhanded across the space between them. Then he turned away and ambled down the tunnel, swinging his sword back and forth without purpose. Player watched him walk for a few moments, then shook himself and built a rough staircase to the ores above him, Hero watching with detached fascination from across the cavern as he loosened the blocks, then broke them so that the game interface kicked in and dropped them to the floor.

Player ducked his head down to look at Hero under the ceiling of the cave. The man returns his gaze levelly, and Player had to look away after a moment, stretching back into the hollow he had made for himself. What had he done to deserve such a partner as this?