Minecraft Story Mode: Transport
Chapter 7
The team scurried into a spacious room as Jesse's cries of fear rose and dropped. A zombie Pigman stared idly from a distance.
The Ghast was close behind, furious and bloody red eyes wide open.
They ran as a group until they got to a small self-mined hill leading down to a minecart station.
"This must be what Ivor was talking about." Olivia told the group, pointing at it, right before the Ghast unleashing a head-turning cry a few blocks away from them.
The Ghast opened it's mouth and shot a fireball at them but before it got too close Petra pulled out the golden sword that Steven dropped, and sent the fire-charge back to the Ghast, missing it by an inch.
Petra growled in frustration before running towards the minecarts with her hurried friends.
They each quickly jumped into their own minecart and heard the Ghast wail no sooner. Axel turned to see it floating right towards them.
"Everybody, hold on!" Jesse advised with a loud, nervous voice as the carts began to move. The Ghast did nothing but weep and watch them leave.
The minecarts were moving along a single-block railway which was built above a pool of lava.
"Wow. The Nether." Jesse marvelled in a whisper making Petra nod.
"Pretty incredible, right?" Petra asked persuasively, having been there before. Jesse did nothing but nod in agreement.
"Yeah…" Olivia commented sarcastically. "Nothing more incredible then a dimension with a LOT of lava. And fire. And other things that could burn you to death." She continued.
Suddenly, Reuben gave a scared oink, signalling to something up ahead before taking ducking into his cart with a shiver.
"Oh no." Jesse shouted as he saw the horror of what was up ahead. After a short length of straight tracks, he saw nothing. That nothingness only meant one thing.
"Oh that's a drop. That is very, very much a drop." Lukas exclaimed in fear.
"What are you walking about, new guy?" Axel asked without looking in the direction the rest were, "What dr-Oh crap! You weren't kidding." Axel admitted, finally looking at what they were seeing.
"Here we go!" Jesse shouted thrilledly throwing his hands in the air.
When they dropped Reuben let out a long scared whine. While Olivia covered her eyes, Petra grinned with excitement. Meanwhile, Lukas held on for dear life, and, likewise to Jesse, Axel threw his hands in the air.
After hitting the bottom they were rushed across a railway that was filled with Glowstone and torches.
"Oh, no." Jesse whimpered as theu approached a wall that was blocking the entire half of the room.
"Duck!" Lukas shouted. They quickly obeyed, hiding behind the minecart's short walls and waiting until the wall passed above their head before cautiously sitting up.
Relieved, Jesse looked back, glad to be past the first obstacle, but not noticing another wall he was about to slam in to.
"Watch it!" Olivia shouted, causing Jesse turn around and quickly duck for his life. Jesse sighed with relief as he sat up. He wasn't about to go down yet!
The carts rattled into another section of the track under which lava pooled, supplied by a lava waterfall that bathed the tracks ahead of the group with blazing magma!
"Okay, so I'm not the only seeing that we're running out of track, right?" Axel asked in horror having had seen the wall of lava.
"No!" Lukas whimpered in shock and fear.
As they neared their impending doom, Olivia's eyes caught on a switch and one could say that she got wilder than the lava was hot. "Jesse that switch! Now! Do it!" Olivia ordered Jesse in a hurried frenzy. Jesse glimpsed at the switch. As much as he would've rather gone over a list of reasons why such a stunt would be deadly, he had no choice or time to reconsider.
Jesse worriedly leaned out of his cart and put his hand out. "Ohhh, arms don't fail me now…" Jesse moaned to himself as he reached for the switch. As soon as he was close enough he pulled the switch. "Ye-ah! Woo!" He shouted as he was overwhelmed with feelings of success, horror and general amusement.
After a second of moving the minecarts came to a complete stop and the floor started to move down. "Haha, wow. I thought something bad was going to happen there." Jesse admitted to them as they stared back with equal relief. "But, heh, guess everything's going to be…" He was interrupted by a loud and unsettling clank as the minecarts moved a few blocks before dropping onto a split-path system. While Jesse, Reuben, and Petra were forced to go left, Olivia, Lukas, and Axel were moved to the right.
"Jesse, Petra!" Olivia worriedly shouted at the trio that was getting further away.
"No!" Axel cried before they raced off on separate paths.
"Wait!" Olivia shouted while being pushed around.
"Oh, man!" Axel yelled as he started getting dizzy.
"Uhhhhhhh, Axel? Olivia? Petra? Reuben? Anybody?!" Jesse felt himself getting a bit scared as he realized that he was by himself.
After a moment of the rattling minecart, Jesse could hear Reuben's scared whines and Petra's golden sword in battle a way off. Jesse reached a section where the walls were full of holes and he could see Reuben and Petra dodging a persistent Skeleton. Petra swung her sword at him but he was stubborn and fired at her with ease.
Jesse thanked Notch as the rails neared each other and their minecarts were side by side.
"Hang on, you two!" Jesse shouted, at the same time standing up and pulling out his stone sword.
The Shelton didn't notice him until he hit it and got ready to pull an arrow at him. The Skeleton soon fired the arrow to which Jesse dodged and retorted by stabbing it in the rib's and throwing it in the lava.
"Petra, Reuben!" Jesse happily greeted the grinning duo. Petra picked Reuben up and joined Jesse in his minecart. "Okay, guys, remember when I said everything was going to be just fine before? I know I was wrong THEN but I have a very good feeling about this time-" Jesse spoke ironically as a Ghast floated into sight.
"Whoa!" Jesse and Petra cried seeing the flying mob.
Not too long after, the Ghast turned around and two more took its side while the first one fired a fireball.
"Duck!" Jesse shouted right before the three ducked avoiding the Ghast's fireball although the it bonked of the sword Jesse was holding, going directly back at the Ghast who cried out in agony as the charge burned into its ghostly flesh.
Jesse leapt into a battle stance with a nervous look. Petra looked on with an antsy feeling, but could do nothing to help with Reuben on her lap.
The angry Ghast fired at them again forcing Petra and Reuben to duck. Jesse stared at the fireball, readying his sword. The heated orb raced towards him but instead of coming into contact with Jesse's human flesh, it instead was rejected by Jesse's sword. It launched backwards in the opposite direction and burned into the Ghast, killing it.
The remaining two Ghasts avenged their third with fireballs which Jesse easily rejected simultaneously. On contact, the Ghasts erupted into horrific wails as they died instantly.
Jesse grinned in satisfaction while Reuben looked back with a loud squeal of approval. Petra seemed impressed by Jesse's skills, "Not bad, Jesse."
"Well! Ghasts are officially crossed of my to-see list. Done with Ghasts. Never need to see them-" As Jesse chattered nervously, the minecart rolled past another gaping hole in a wall where a Ghast watched menacingly. The rails careened to the right and ended them trailing straight toward the Ghast who looked on with bloodlust.
"Ahhh crap." Jesse groaned as he glared at the floating monster above them before it shot a fireball at them and nearly blew Petra and Reuben's minecart of the track! Reuben squealed in terror and hopped into Jesse's minecart and shivered in his arms.
"This is bad, this is bad, this is bad." Jesse chanted continuously as the minecart rolled up the incline. Before they could scream 'No more Ghasts!', the cart zoomed off the edge of the hill, flying right past the Ghast who moaned upsettedly. they were all shot of the edge of it flying past the Ghast that watched them as they moved by and made an upset moan.
The three gripped the edges of the minecart before they landed with a clatter on the other side of the tracks. They rolled peacefully from then on as if the tracks and minecarts were trying to suggest that nothing had happened. Nothing at all.
They turned their heads with a swipe, only being able to stare at each other after the death-experience they had all had.
"Is…" Jesse gave a very light laugh, unable to finish his sentence before Petra took over.
"Is everyone okay?" Petra asked them as she checked them over.
Nobody answered for a minute until Axel spoke up, "I mean I'm not dead. I guess that's pretty good." He told Petra with an unsure voice, still pretty shaken up about what he just went through.
"Ditto. Ditto with the not dead." Olivia spoke in a calm voice, but not being okay with what she saw.
"I just can't believe that you come down here all the time Petra… This place is awful." Lukas commented to which Petra nodded in agreement.
"You know how you have those experiences you remember and reminisce about for the rest of your lives?" Jesse asked with a forced grin.
"Yyeesss...?" Petra replied though she wasn't sure what he was trying to say.
"Yeah..." Axel sounded just as confused as Petra.
Jesse grinned a bit before the smile was replaced with a serious look. "This isn't one of those. Let's never discuss this ever again."
He didn't have to tell them twice to know that they agreed with him.
The minecarts' rattling echoed through the Nether as the group slowed to a stop. Jesse's eyes were fixed on a self-built spiral which served as a platform for something.
"Can you throw up… like, inside your body?" Jesse asked his friends as they walked toward the spiral staircase, following after Reuben who was already climbing.
"Uh-huh. I know because I just did, about five times." Olivia explained upsettedly.
"Wow – look at this place!" Jesse spoke amazedly about what he was seeing as his voice echoed off the massive walls.
"All these tracks converge at this point. You could probably get anywhere in the world from here." Olivia pointed out, pondering about the Order of the Stone's work.
Jesse confusedly narrowed his eyes a bit before he faced a Nether-portal that would soon take them out of that hellish dimension.
Unknown to the group, Petra was lagging behind and clutching her arm a bit. She weakly narrowed her eyes at her arm which felt numb and cold. She began to notice that her breaths her ragged but the instant she realized it she felt like she would collapse at any moment.
She picked at her sleeve, managing to pull it up a bit to inspect her throbbing arm. The sight that reached her blurred vision made her eyes widen in horror and shock.
"There's the portal!" Jesse cheered happily.
Lukas walked up to it and face the group, "This is what Gabriel was talking about." He told them.
"That's our way out." Axel said determinedly, walking up to it.
"It must lead back to the surface." Olivia mused.
"The surface is also where that creature is." Lukas said a bit worriedly, making Axel freeze in place.
"He's right. We have no idea what we're walking into. It could be dangerous." Jesse spoke, making Axel look down scaredly while Petra walked up the stairs in the background. The gang turned to face Jesse when he had finished talking, except Reuben who stared at Axel.
The group looked at Axel expectantly,to which he responded by turning around and rubbing the back of his head nervously. He looked the portal over multiple times as he pondered his own safetyl. Lukas and Reuben stared curiously at the portal as well.
"Thanks for being so brave, Axel." Lukas said gratefully, obviously expecting him to enter it.
"All right. I'm gonna go. I'm going. I'm going right now." Axel told the group. After a few minutes of standing, he turned to face the group again with a scared look before turning back, "Like, right now."
"I'll go first." Jesse sighed, knowing that Axel was just going to keep stalling.
"That's not what I was saying." Axel told Jesse, putting his hands on his side's and raising one half of his uni brow.
"I'm going." Jesse repeated determinedly, putting his hands on his sides.
"Well, if you absolutely insist." Axel agreed reluctantly, not wanting to said Jesse out there, but not wanting to go himself.
Jesse walked up to the portal while everyone looked on worriedly. Axel got a look of shame, and Reuben fussed angrily.
"Well – see you guys on the other side, I guess." Jesse said his goodbyes nervously.
"Be careful." Olivia warned.
"Thanks Jesse." Axel thanked Jesse for possibly sparing his life.
Jesse looked at the portal nervously before walking through it.