Lukas raised his eyebrow, tail twitching as his ears quivered a bit, shaking some more ashes off of his head. "Okay, did I miss something here?" he asked.

"Yeah, what's up with you?" Jesse asked, mildly enough. Especially considering the calming potion had more than worn off by now.

"What's up with me?" Petra asked, voice getting rather loud and frustrated, "what's UP? I'm tired of all this useless portal-hopping trying to find our way home! 'What's on the other side of that portal? A lake of fire and netherrack? Awesome! Let's go there!'" she made a dumb, hokey voice.

"Okay, first off, I thought this portal would lead us to the Nether or something, at which point we could just wander back home. I did NOT know it'd be- er- Fire World," Jesse said, for lack of a better name. "Second, we're all pretty frustrated, Petra."

"Yeah, what Jesse said," Cassie said, trying to wipe some ashes off her glasses but just succeeding in smudging them around. Jesse handed her a handkerchief, which Cassie took with a grateful nod and began to polish at the glass furiously.

"I know, I know, it's just- it's not really GETTING us anywhere!" Petra grumbled, another frustrated sound coming out of her throat.

Jesse hesitated, before looking over at Lukas. "Lukas, you're on fire again."

Lukas started squirming, his tail thwacking everything in a three foot radius (which included Jesse) in an effort to put the fire back out.

"See... ugh," Petra sighed, "this is what I'm talking about. We're stuck in a rut- go through a portal, avoid dying long enough to get back to this STUPID hallway-"

"Wash, rinse, repeat... yes," Ivor sighed, scratching at his head and looking around at the mile-long hallway filled with portals.

Cassie grunted and crossed her arms. "Wish my aunt and her friends had at least left some signs around- it would be nice."

Jesse sighed, rubbing her head. "Yeah, unfortunately it's not like we have directions about how all this works. It'd be nice to have... I dunno, like a map or something. Honestly, at this rate I'd settle just for a sign that's labelled... well I don't know what our world'd be called, but yeah. So of course, there's going to be some trial and error-"

"- and error, and error, and error, and error, and error," Petra said, throwing her hands into the air and marching off down the hallway.

"Petra?" Ivor asked, a rather bewildered look on his face. Cassie finished the statement for him. "Where are you going?"

"There may not be guideposts," Petra said, looking around at the portals and giving them a rather disgruntled look, "but SOMEONE'S gotta be able to tell us how to navigate these stupid portals."

Petra stopped in front of one portal that glowed a bright red. "Okay, this one's redstone," Petra said, looking at it and then turning back to her friends, "Redstone means smart people. Hopefully smart enough to help us find the way home."

"Petra, I promise, we'll find the portal home," Jesse said, calmly.

"It's that or die trying, right?" Petra asked, sarcastically.

Jesse was about to open her mouth and say, 'Actually, yes, that does seem to be the case' but that just didn't seem like a good idea right now.

"So what are you saying?" Lukas said, tail flicking in agitation. "That you've made up your mind, you're just going through this portal and that's it? What if we run into another psycho-White-Pumpkin mansion?"

He realized what he'd said a second later and gave the deadpan Cassie an apologetic look. "Um, no offense."

"None taken," Cassie drawled.

"Maybe that's what I AM saying," Petra said, sharply, gold eyes beginning to glow with angry heat, "maybe I'm just saying that I'm tired of Jesse calling the shots every. Single. Time."

Jesse felt as though someone had just punched her in the gut, and her eyes widened a bit as she gaped at Petra.

"Whoa! Maybe- maybe we should all calm down," Lukas said, looking around nervously as Cassie and Ivor glanced between the spider and Blaze hybrid as if this were some sort of bizarre real-life soap opera. "R-right?"

Jesse dropped her gaze to the floor, looking and feeling incredibly uncomfortable. "Sorry, Petra," she said, softly. "I guess I do take charge a lot of the time..."

Now it was Petra's turn to look uncomfortable, her gold eyes no longer glowing with red-hot anger. "Well... I mean, you do tend to make pretty good decisions a lot of the time. Even if you are a dork sometimes," she joked a bit.

Jesse smiled a little at that.

"Sorry, I'm- I'm just frustrated."

Jesse rolled her eyes at all the portals. "Oh yes. Because any sane person would NOT get frustrated when running through an endless hallway of portals," she drawled, sarcastically, making Petra laugh a little.

"See?" Lukas asked, tail twitching a bit as he relaxed, "It's okay! Friends... being friendly! Everybody being cool!"

Cassie covered her mouth as she coughed, but when she removed her hand her lips were still twitching a little bit at the corners.

Jesse took a deep breath and looked back up at Petra. "Well, Petra, if you think that portal's the one we should go through..."

"I do," Petra said, giving a nod.

Jesse put her lower hands on her hips, smiling slightly. "Then that's what we're gonna do."

Petra just gave the spider hybrid a little sheepish smile. "Thanks, Jesse."

And she turned and walked through the portal, Jesse following her-

The moment she hit the portal, though, she knew something was wrong or... different about this one. It was still the bead curtain feeling...

but there were also small tingles of electricity that stung Jesse every couple of seconds.

Even with every single one of the other portals, she'd never gotten a feeling from any of them. Not a specific one, anyway.

Which made Jesse wonder what was going on with this portal, and if they hadn't just made a terrible, terrible mistake.

A/N: Yay! Crown Mesa (I think that's what it's called? I don't know) is next!

I hope y'all are ready for PAMA, Harper, and other interesting stuff!

No new reviews :)

x.X. A.L. X.x.