Chapter 6: Only Hope

"ANNA! Lukas, Jesse, what happened?"

"Lukas, did you kill her?"

"What, no!"

"Are you sure?"

"I'm telling the truth!"

"Are you su-"

"Axel, would a dead person be breathing?"

"Well it really all depends-"

"Axel, shut up."


Anna heard this as she slowly came into conciseness. She felt the warm heat around her and knew she made it through to the nether. At first everything was echoey, then it became clearer as Anna opened her eyes and saw Jesse, Ruben, Axel, Olivia, and Lukas.

"Anna!" Jesse exclaimed when she noticed Anna coming to. "Are you okay? Can you hear me?"

"I can hear all of you." Anna responded.

"Are you dead?" Axel asked her.

"Axel you idiot. I'm not dead." Anna retorted as Jesse and Olivia helped her stand up.

"That's great!" Axel exclaimed, clearly not having heard the first sentence Anna said.

"What happened?" asked Anna.

"A piece of cobblestone hit you and knocked you out. Lukas carried you through the portal." Olivia exsplained.

"Did Petra make it through?" asked Anna, standing up. Jesse shook her head.

"Why couldn't you save her?" asked Axel to Lukas.

"I...I just got scared." Lukas admitted.

"So you're telling me you got scared?" asked Axel.

"Guys, let's argue about this later. Right now, we should worry about Petra." Anna suggested.

The whole group looked at the portal.

"Come on Petra..." Jesse murmured to herself.

Then, Ivor suddenly fell through the portal.

"Ivor!" exclaimed Jesse. Then, a huge tentacle from the wither storm burst through the portAL and tore it apart. The group stood there, stunned.

"You again?" asked Ivor. "You ruined everything! You destroyed what could have been my moment of triumph!"

"Destroyed?!" screamed Anna, loosing her temper completely. "Well, look on the bright side, you destroyed something! Think of my dad, Petra, all those people, who could be dead or injured because of your foolishness!"

"Ah, yes, the girl. I saw her running...in the opposite direction. Foolish girl." Ivor added.

"Petra is not foolish. She'll be okay." Jesse told him.

"Listen, there's a secret system of minecarts that will lead you to another portal. You csn stay there until it blows ovet." Ivor said. "I'd love to stay, but...I have to go." Ivor drank a potion of invisibility and disappeared.

Jesse noticed the minecarts and motioned for them to come over to them. She and Ruben took one cart, Olivia took another, Axel took one, and that left Anna and Lukas to the last one.

"May I mention I suffer from severe motion sickness, have a fear of heights, and this seating arrangement is rather awkward?" Anna told Lukas as she stepped in front.

"Trust me. This is way more awkward to me than anything." Lukas responded, getting in behind her and trying to avoid an angry glance from Axel.


"So... your dad is Gabriel, right?" asked Lukas.

"Yeah... but sometimes I wish it wasn't. He's really overprotective. But now-" Anna exsplained before a sudden slant caused her to tumble into Lukas. She looked up and saw a massive drop.

"That is a drop. Very much a drop." Olivia said.

Shoot. thought Anna, seeing how high up they where.

"Lukas, it's not heights I'm afraid of...it's falling from them!" exclaimed Anna.

"Hold on really tight, close your eyes, and you'll be fine." Lukas told her.

So, Anna did just that.

And she didn't look for the whole rest of the ride.


The first thing Anna did once she got out was throw up next to a lava pit.

"If I have to go in a minecart one more time, I'm going to have a heart attack." she said once she stopped vomiting. She wiped her mouth and went back to her friends.

"You okay?" asked Jesse.

"Yeah. Just some motion sickness. Happens every time I go in a minecart." Anna told Jesse. "Now, where's that portal?"

"Right over here." Jesse told her.

The group of friends walked up to the portal.

"May I do the honors?" asked Axel.

"Go right on ahead." Jesse told him.

Axel stood there for several minutes, hesitating.

"I'll go first. You guys follow." Jesse suggested.

"Good idea." Axel said, stepping away from the portal so Jesse could go through.

A few minutes later, Axel, followed by Olivia, Anna, and Lukas stepped through.


"Woah. Where are we?" asked Olivia as they stepped out of the portal.

Anna looked around. She saw a ledge, a few zombies, trees, and a lot of grass.

"In the dark. In the middle of nowhere." Jesse announced sarcastically.

"Either way, we're going to need shelter. So I suggest we build a treehouse. We can see danger coming before it gets us." Olivia said.

"That'll take too long and we'll be exposed while we're doing it. We need to build something quick, like a dirty hut." Axel

"Let's go with the hut." Jesse suggested.

So, the group got to work on a small dirt house.

"After all that work,and we're still eye level with monsters!" Olivia exclaimed.

"I mean, we could have gone multi level, but... it's cool." Lukas said as they all went inside.


The group sat around a small fire in the middle of the ground. Anna took notice Lukas was sitting off in a corner on the far side of the dirt hut.

"Oh man..." Axel said. "I have to tell you guys something... but you have to promise not to freak out."

"Spit it out Axel." Jesse said.

"I have cookies." Axel said. He handed out some cookies. "One for me, one for Olivia, one for Anna, one for Jesse, and one for Ruben."

Anna realized Lukas didn't get a cookie. She walked over and handed him half of her cookie.

"Here. You need to eat too." Anna told him.

"Thanks Anna." Lukas responded.

After everyone finished their cookies, there was another bought of silence.

"Would you rather fight a hundred chicken sized zombies, or ten zombie sized chickens?" asked Olivia.

"Choose wisely." Jesse added.

"How can you be thinking about jokes at a time like this?" scoffed Axel.

"We can't just sit around and mope... we have to keep our spirits up." Jesse told Axel.

"No, we should be moping. That's exactly what we should be doing." Axel said. "Petra is still out there."

"I suggest in the morning, we meet at the portal and split up-" Lukas started to say.

"Who put you in charge?" asked Axel.

"Woah, woah, woah. Lets not fight here." Anna said, standing up. "Petra wouldn't want us to be divided or be fighting like this. She'd want us to work together. That storm is still out there, harming our homes, friends, and family. If we want to defeat it, we need to stand together... or fall apart."

There was a breif moment of silence.

"Anna's right. Let's get some sleep. We need an early start tomorrow." Jesse suggested.

"Agreed." Olivia added.


Anna couldn't sleep. Maybe it was because the dirt house was drafty. Maybe because the ground was hard. Or maybe she was worried for her father and way, she was having a hard night.

After an hour of failed sleep attempts, she sat up. Somehow everyone else had fallen asleep but her. Anna was too worried.

What if my dad died? I never even said sorry for the argument this morning. And what if Petra didn't make it either? Anything could have happened to her... I'm so worried for her... she thought.

Ruben walked over to where Anna was. He nudged her leg gently. Anna looked down at him.

"I'm okay boy." Anna whispered to him. Ruben climbed onto Anna's lap. Anna stroked the top of his head.

"Thanks Ruben. I needed that. I'm just so worried. About my dad, Petra, myself, everyone. I just can't sleep." Anna whispered to him. Anna shut her eyes to hold back tears. "You should head back to Jesse. She needs you more than ever."

Ruben climbed off of Anna's lap and went back to Jesse.

"You're still awake?" asked Lukas, sitting up. "I couldn't sleep either."

"I'm sorry. Am I keeping you up?" Anna asked.

"No. I'm keeping myself up." Lukas responded, walking over next to her. "I just can't stop thinking of the Ocelots... Maya, Gil, even Aiden. They could still be out there. Hurt or worse."

"Petra. She's like my sister. After my stepmom died we pretended we where related. And i'm so worried for my dad. We got into an argument this morning and I never said sorry. And when I had the chance to, I didn't. I couldn't bring myself to even say 'I love you'. I don't want him to think his daughter doesn't like him. And, what if I never see him again? What if he's dead?" asked Anna, tears brimming her eyes.

"It's going to be okay. We'll make it out of this. We'll survive togather or not at all." Lukas told Anna.

"We have to stop that storm. We're all the world has left. We're the world's only hope." Anna told Lukas. "We can't get separated. Not now or ever. Before I got separated from my dad, he gave me his helmet. There's a saying he always told me: 'We are warriors. And warriors always come home.' We have to go home. We have to survive."

"We will Anna." Lukas said. "We will. I think we should both try and get some sleep."

Anna laid her head down on Lukas's lap and closed her eyes.

"Thank you Lukas. I think I can sleep now." Anna told him as she drifted off to sleep.

"Me too Anna." Lukas told her. "Me too."

That chapter was so long!

We'll catch up with Anna next time!

I apologize if the story isn't MCSM word to word. But I did play a few levels on a long distance car trip, so I will try to get it more exact.

This is Summer saying Sayanora!