Hello, this is Pastrinator64 with another chapter from THE GLITCH. Before I start, I would like to apologize for missing yesterday's posting due date; I was attending a Destination Imagination State Competition at Stevens Point the entire day and I got home way too late to even think. Anyway, now that that's cleared up, last time on THE GLITCH we watched as the Glitch's evil virus army caused mayhem and destruction in the Aether and Overworld at the same time. Also at the same time, we caught a peek inside The Void in the Glitch's magic prison. We watched as some cameo villains appeared, all readying themselves for a secret upcoming meeting. The good news is, after being captured by the Spider Clan Norman actually found a use for his "useless" block power! Now we find Norman and company traveling down into the ground in search of the Spider Clan's mutant.

Now, let the story commence!

Chapter 21: Revenge

Even in his complete exhaustion, Norman thought to himself that Jeff couldn't possibly take much more depression. He was right.

Jeff completely shut down after realizing that Esmeralda, his only family member, had left. As the last of their group began to dig a staircase down into the stone of the cave, Jeff followed slowly from behind, dragging his iron sword with a blank expression on his face. Norman had ordered the group to start digging down underneath the cave in hope of finding all of their stolen supplies, weapons, armor, and food. After that, they'd have to find the Spider Clan's mutant. After much complaining and yelling, they were forced to dig down through the stone with their bare hands, and the only way they could make it faster was to each work all at the same time. Norman didn't have any food to regain his strength, so he also stayed behind and pretty much crawled down the steps going into the earth.

After getting his needed rest from the previous ordeal, Danny kept trying muttering prayers to Notch for them to find their things quickly, but somehow he always managed to turn them into threats instead. The group was digging down for the longest most boring hour of their lives, but finally after that long wait a hole opened up in the next level down. Being th leader, Norman slowly and pathetically crawled over and looked down into the hole. Before he even got a chance to see what was down there, Danny decided to be clever and kicked Norman in the butt, making him fall down into the hole. Norman grunted when he hit the stone floor, which was ten blocks below, only relieving him of more energy. He sat up and muttered some very unpleasant things about Danny under his breath before looking around. He was in a 10x10 room of pure stone. Two torches lit the walls on each edge of the square room, and when he looked near the back he saw many chests lined up against the wall with a couple of furnaces mixed in.

Norman heard a thud from behind, and he scooted away from under the hole, seeing that everyone else was jumping down to meet him. Danny was the first down, and he smirked at how helpless and weak Norman looked.

"How was the fall, Noobman? I hope it didn't hurt too much."

Norman didn't even feel like retaliating. He crawled over to one of the chests while ignoring Danny completely, and miraculously inside was all of their food supplies. Norman chomped down on three porkchops to restore his hunger bars, and after a few seconds or so he began to feel less tired. By the time everyone had jumped down into the hole, Norman had gained back enough strength to stand. He took this opportunity to snatch Shatter back from a different chest and whack Danny over the head.

"That felt good..." he thought to himself.

Danny was about to strangle Norman, but Quinn stepped in and held up his arms.

"Dudes, keep your cool!"

"Shut it, you dirty hippie." Danny retorted.

With his newfound strength, Norman ordered everyone to each take a chest and its supplies. He did not. When someone (*ahem* Danny) complained that he wouldn't be carrying anything, Norman explained why.

"I know, I know. But the Spider Clan's mutant will probably be coming after me since I'm the leader, so I'm not thinking it would be best to leave me with anything important, alright?"

After all of the chests and furnaces and supplies had been stored away, Norman cleared his throat for everyone's attention again. As he slowly walked towards the group to make himself visible, he said,

"Ok, now that we've got our stuff back, I say we start tunneling—"

But before he could even finish his sentence, Norman stepped on a stone pressure plate that no one had noticed. He heard the sliding of pistons, and suddenly the entire floor opened up, sending them down into a dark hole. Most people either screamed over flailed around while falling, but then suddenly everyone was stopped by something soft and sticky. Everyone except for Norman, who fell right through the unknown substance. Norman landed instead on a stone pillar that just happened to be below him, and when he looked down he gulped and nearly lost balance. Below him was a large flat area of glass with pistons around the edges, and on the other side of the glass was about a hundred or so spiders, all hissing and spitting at him. Norman looked up and suddenly met a bright light. He could now see that his friends were all stuck in a thick jumble of cobwebs, only they weren't moving at all. Norman hadn't become stuck because of his block power, and at that moment he actually thanked Boris for giving him the block power of Cobweb.

Norman found that he could see very well through cobwebs at will, and when he looked through the barrier trapping his friends he saw that they were in a small room, only 25x25. Norman wanted to get out of there quick, so he did the jump-up pillar method, making a pillar of cobwebs all the way until he was standing atop the jumble of cobwebs. He wasn't sure how, but he willed the cobweb trap to become solid for him, and he quickly went about and freed everyone. As he came to Danny, he paused for a moment and smiled. Danny stared menacingly at him and said,

"You melon-headed freak, you'd better free me up, otherwise I'll rip you apart in a second!"

Norman continued to smile and said,

"I seriously doubt that. Maybe if you weren't in such a—sorry, bad pun—STICKY situation, you'd be able to hurt me. Then again..."

Suddenly, Danny's look went from angry to scared. He stared right above Norman's head and his lip quivered. Norman saw this and muttered,

"What?"

Suddenly, he felt something like pincers clamp around his neck and he was hoisted into the air. Gasping for breath, Norman turned his head frantically and met not a pair but eight giant glowing red eyes. At that instant, the random light that filled the room extinguished, leaving Norman to stare at the glowing red eyes for even more intense moments. Suddenly, the monstrosity hissed like a spider, only twenty times louder. The light in the room flickered rapidly, turning from bright to dark, confusing Norman's eyes completely—on a strange note Norman could even hear suspenseful background music coming from out of the walls. Using the flashes of light, Norman quickly backed up and stared at the giant spider before him.

He was facing a spider that stood five blocks tall and was ten blocks long and seven blocks wide. The spider mutant had eight legs that were three times longer than they should have been at seven blocks long each. From underneath they stretched out and swapped at their group, who had begun to fight. Norman ran forward and jumped up, thwacking the spider mutant in one of its eyes. Instantly, the eye he had hit hissed and extinguished its light, leaving the spider mutant looking like it only had seven eyes. Norman then thought to himself,

"Bailey, now would be a good time to start shooting its eyes out... BAILEY! OH NO!"

Norman had completely forgotten about the other victim of the deep-frying, and he had to wipe his eyes for a few seconds to prevent himself from crying. He had gone to the trouble of talking with Bailey about her life for nothing. He was able to come back to focus when a giant black leg swept him off his feet, sending him into the wall. Norman gasped and yelled out in pain, but he quickly healed himself with a porkchop. Norman jumped back to his feet and saw that someone else had knocked out the eye opposite of the one he hit. The spider mutant retaliated by climbing up the wall at supersonic speed—so that it was a blur of black and red. Norman watched as the creature made its way onto the ceiling in under a half a second, and it dropped down on top of Hilary, who barely managed to hurl himself out of the way. The spider mutant got up just as quick and repeated this, climbing up the wall in record time and trying to squash its victims. Norman had never seen anything move so fast, and now it was nearly impossible to slow the thing down.

"Wait a minute! I can slow it down!"

Norman raised his hands up towards the spider just as it fell off the ceiling, and it slowed down instantly, barely moving inside its cluttered barrier of cobwebs. This hadn't drained Norman very much, but he still ran forward. Norman jumped up and jabbed Shatter into another of the spider mutant's eyes. It hissed and spit slimy saliva—which thankfully turned out to be nontoxic. Norman hit another eye, and when he glanced over his shoulder he noticed that everyone was watching him. Unfortunately, that quarter of a second cost him greatly, because the spider mutant dropped down on top of him and pinned him down to the ground. Norman held up his arms above his head as the spider mutant used its front two legs to bash him up at an extremely rapid pace. Norman couldn't protect against this, and he felt a crack in his back. Suddenly, the whacks turned into whips. Every rapid slap of the spider's legs were sharp and painful, and Norman could feel gashes forming in his back. Suddenly, the spider jerked to a stop, frozen in mid-whip. Norman painfully lifted his head and turned it to look at the spider mutant. He saw Jeff standing atop the spider with three swords stabbed into every one of the spider mutant's eyes except the large middle one. His expression looked deadly as he said,

"This is for my son Jonah and wife Esmeralda who had to suffer because of the wrath of the Glitch! ALL OF YOU MUTANTS WILL DIE! THE NETHER IS YOU'RE ONLY HOME, YOU DAMNED CREATURES! I WILL NOT LET YOU KILL ANYMORE!"

Jeff let out a terrible yell and pulled out a fourth sword, which he thrust down into the spider mutant's final eye. Norman's stomach lurched when he saw the blade go down through the spider's skull and out the other end, spilling a blob of spider guts—which unfortunately spilled all over Norman's shoes. The eye remained flickering red for a few seconds, but then it faded away. The spider mutant let out a screeching hiss and then fell to the ground with a thud, right on top of Norman's already scarred back. Norman gasped in pain as Danny and Hilary rolled the giant spider mutant's carcass off of his back.

Norman felt someone slowly feeding him some cooked chicken, and he looked up to see Stephanie Flowerpot kneeling over him. Norman felt his gashes begin to seal up and heal, but when they were done he could still feel a dull burning sensation.

Norman stood up shakily and asked someone to place down some torches. He then wiped the spider guts from his shoes. After the room was properly lit, anyone in the group who wasn't badly injured replaced all of the cobweb floors with glass. They still needed to see down where the spiders were being kept from them. When Norman took a glance downward where the sticky pistons and glass were, he saw that the spiders were still trying to get at him. The spiders must've been smart enough to find an alternate path to get to them. Norman just assumed that they were down there for extra violence if needed, but the spider mutant had died before it could see the spiders loose.

Lizzy walked up to him once the floors were completely glass and held out something in her hands. Norman took it and gathered everyone around to see. It was the spider mutant's Doorway Drop. The drop itself was very boring in appearance, really. It looked like a long and thick pole colored black. Norman then realized that it was one of the spider mutant's legs. He tried placing it on the ground, and he gasped when it appeared. The leg was still intact at seven blocks long, but it sat completely still on the ground. Norman had a sudden idea and sat on the spider mutant leg, and he had barely even leaned forward when it shot in that direction at supersonic speed. Norman hollered like a cowboy and performed a fake twirl like he was using a lasso. He rode around the room at twice the speed of someone sprinting for a few seconds, but then straightened his back, and the spider leg stopped. On a humorous note, the spider leg moved like in the same motion as an inchworm. Norman hopped off and the spider leg fell flat on the ground. He wanted to know what it was called, so he quickly took the Golden Eye from his Blockpack—which he found in one of the chests from earlier. He looked into the golden pupil and saw both the name of the Doorway Drop and the mutant. After taking a glimpse, he turned to the group who were waiting impatiently.

"Well, we just faced the Spider Clan's mutant, which turned out to be named Tanglera. Also, Tanglera's leg is just called Tanglera's Leg, so that'll be easy to remember. Unfortunately, we still have to get rid of those spiders down there. Man, I wish Bailey were here, then she could just have the Mechacreeper blow up the whole cave." said Norman.

Suddenly, a dull explosion occurred from far away, somewhere above them. Everyone paused.

"What was that?" someone muttered.

Again, a boom echoed from somewhere distant, but this time it sounded closer. Norman looked at the wall above where they had fallen through the floor. Suddenly, a third explosion occurred, and the floor above them broke open, raining down much rubble and debris. Norman held his arms over his head and coughed a few times before looking back up where the explosion occurred. Suddenly, a face appeared from up above.

"Hey guys! Come up here! Blackberry blasted us a way out!"

It was Bailey! Norman's mouth hung open slightly and for a few seconds he was silent. Bailey waved her hand and beckoned them again. Norman looked around at the group, who were all either sighing with relief or letting out tears of joy.

"Alright, everyone! Apparently, Bailey is still with us! Everyone can use their blocks powers to jump up and out of here. You all know the jump-up pillar method, right?"

Using the jump-up pillar method, everyone in the group ascended up on their own blocks—except for Stephanie, who had to share with Hilary because of her flower pot powers. Once they were all up, Danny closed up the hole with bedrock so no one would fall in again. Norman saw Bailey standing there with a grin, and Butterball was scratching his back on the stone wall. He rushed over to Bailey and said,

"Bailey, how did you survive that lava deep-frying?! And where did Butterball and the Mechacreeper go?!"

"Well, it's kind of a long story." she murmured. "It's morning now, but last night I heard a scuttling kind of noise, and when I woke up I saw a giant army of spiders coming in from the east. I woke up Butterball and Blackberry and we put some distance in between us and the camp—I also took the time to find Hilary's pets, because they were also getting nervous and moving around. We watched you guys get carried away, and we followed behind the spider army until we reached the cave. I knew I had to come and save you guys, so I snuck around back of the cave and had Blackberry blast our way down. Eventually, we found this room, and we heard some yelling from underneath the floor, and then we blasted a hole through! There you have it." she explained.

Norman furrowed his eyebrows.

"Uh, who's Blackberry?"

Bailey turned around and pointed upward. Norman looked up and gasped when he saw the Mechacreeper staring down at him with its two giant eyes through a giant hole far above, blocking most of the sunlight. Still, one was smashed-looking and the other was perfect. It took him a few seconds to understand, but when he did he stared at Bailey.

"You named the Mechacreeper Blackberry? Of all the names you could pick, like Deathblast or Flameburst, you picked Blackberry? Nothing else crossed your mind, nothing at all?!"

Bailey shrugged and said,

"I think it's ok. Sorry I didn't ask."

Norman held his forehead and rubbed it to relieve an oncoming headache. After grumbling a few times, he breathed heavily and gathered his group's attention, leading everyone to the hole.

"Alright, let's get out of here!" he declared.

The entire group made their way up through the uneven hole, jumping and climbing the distance. After about a minute of jumping, they emerged into the sunlight of the day. The sun was just above the horizon. Hilary was very glad to find all his pets safe and sound. Norman paused for a moment along with everyone else, almost absorbing the sunlight. Norman's chest swelled and he took a deep breath of clean air. Only for a moment though, because at that moment he found himself with a mouthful of water. Norman choked and coughed, and then looked up after parting his drenched hair. He saw Blackberry (the Mechacreeper) sitting waist-deep in a nearby lake, soaking itself.

Norman looked back at everyone else groaning and holding their sodden clothes. He again glanced at Blackberry, who was staring at him.

"HSSSSHH, HSSSSHH, HSSSSHH!"

When Norman realized that it was laughing at him he muttered,

"Very funny, you over-sized rust-bucket..."

That's kind of cute, even for a giant metal explosive monster. Anyway, how will Jeff feel about the rest of the trip without his son nor wife? Will his grief overwhelm him and shut him down once more? And which clan will Norman have to face next now that it's two down, three to go? Find out next chapter in THE GLITCH!

*Pastrinator64 starts out the conversation*

"So, does anyone here have pets?"

*a couple people raise their hands*

*Enderwolf speaks*

"I've got an Enderwolf that can teleport when it barks!" he declares.