Word: Player

Apologies if it seems a little strange- I tried to do a more dialogue-heavy story, but I'm not used to that. Hope it still makes enough sense! And double apologies for not uploading for so long- end of the semester and finals had me going crazy! But I will hopefully finish this soon, since I have free time now! :D Enjoy!

1.5k words

"And this game is called…?"

"Minecraft!" Milo beamed at Cavendish, before turning back to his phone screen. His character crouched and uncrouched in front of Cavendish, and it took Cav a second to repeat the action.

"Alright. And what do we do in this game?" Dakota asked, his character walking up to Cavendish and hitting him.

"Dakota!"

The ex-time traveller just laughed, looking at Milo to let him answer the question.

"Oh, well you can do a bunch of stuff! You can craft, you can mine, you can become a farmer, or beat the ender dragon- that's basically the boss of the game. It's great because there's no one way to play!"

"Interesting…" Cavendish managed to rotate his character's screen to look at Dakota, who was quickly crouching and uncrouching at him. Looks like he got ahold of the game quickly. "What should I do first?"

"Get some wood- it's basically the first thing you do in any world!"

"Okay…"

It wasn't long until Cavendish was getting a hang of the controls, helped on by the kids, Dakota accidentally (yeah right, 'accidentally') hitting him a few times.

"Dakota, can you help me with this fence?"

"Sure thing, Cav."

"..You're just standing there."

"I am, yeah."

"Vinnie-"

"Pfft, yeah, yeah, I'm coming over, just-"

"AHH CREEPER!"

"HOLD ON MILO, DON'T LET IT DESTROY THE PIG PEN!"

"NOO, THE PIGS! ZACK! THEY'RE ESCAPING!"

"Oh my god, please stop screaming you guys, I have carrots."

"Here, Melissa, I have more fences, just get those pigs to that corner-"

"Thanks, Cavendish."

"No probl-"

"THERE'S ANOTHER CREEPER!"

"Oh my god."

"What the- the server closed down!"

"Oh, sorry guys! My phone suddenly died."

"Take your time, Milo, I was about to die to a skeleton!"

"What's copper useful for?"

"Uhm-pretty blocks? I'm not really sure. They just gave out that update not long ago. We've been waiting for you two to play, so we didn't explore much."

"Aww, that's sweet. Ya hear that Cav, they were waiting for us to play with them!"

"Yes, now, please help-"

"Oh god, hold on, I'm coming, THAT'S A WITCH-!"

"Woah. That's a lot of iron. You guys were busy."

"Yeah, so, here, Zack. These are for you, make yourself some iron gear, we'll go to the nether later. Milo, come here."

"Thanks Melissa! You think we're ready?"

"Absolutely not. Let's go!"

"Wait, how do I make armor again?"

"Guys."

"Hold on a second Dakota."

"Guys?"

"Yes, yes, Dakota, we heard you-"

"GUYS WATCH OUT!"

"YOU COULD HAVE TOLD US THERE WAS AN ARMY OF WITHER SKELETONS THERE EARLIER!"

"I WAS TRYING, NO ONE WAS LISTENING! ZACK BEHIND YOU!"

"AHH, MILO, MELISSA, HELP ME, IT'S GOT ME!"

"DAKOTA-"

"OH GOD, WE WERE NOT READY AT ALL!"

"..."

"...Those blazes were not worth it."

"Yeah...but look on the bright side! We got the rods!"

"Milo, we lost all of our gear-"

"Kids."

Everyone looked up from their phones, snacks, drinks, and a few casualties of Murphy's Law lying about them. Mrs. Murphy smiled down at the, pointing back at the wall clock that fell without warning. She walked towards it, picking it up and saying, "It's a little late. And it's a school night."

"Oh, wow! Sorry, Mrs. Murphy, we hadn't realized how late it had gotten! We apologize, we didn't mean to keep them up."

"Oh, it's no problem! I'm glad you were all having fun, and enjoyed dinner! However, these little gamers need to get some rest, I think there's a field trip tomorrow, isn't there?"

Milo jumped up from his place on the floor, narrowly avoiding hitting his knees atop the coffee table. "That's right! I completely forgot about it! Are you guys sleeping over?" He looked over at Melissa and Zack.

Melissa also stood up, stretching, Zack following suit. "Nah. Since it's a field trip, I need to get ready back home. Zack?"

"Same here."

"Alright." Milo nodded, turning to the two ex time travellers who were also getting ready to leave. "Did you guys like the game?"

"Heck yeah, kid! Has more to it than I thought. Can't wait to continue later, I'm sure we can beat the ender dragon quickly!"

"Same here- it was better than I thought! We'll continue later, though you need to get ready for the night now."

"Yeah, I guess. See you guys later! Have a goodnight!"

"Cav."

"Yes, Vin?"

"I'm bored."

"And that's my issue?"

"Caaaaaav!"

"Fine, fine, stop whining. What do you want to do?"

"...want to play Minecraft?"

"Vinnie! Stop hitting me!"

"Whoops! Sorry, I didn't mean to!"

"...That's a lie!"

"Nooooo. Me? I could never lie!"

"...

"Get back here, I'm going to kill you."

"WAIT, CAV, NO, I HAVE SO MUCH STUFF-!"

"Hmm. You know what? I like it."

"Really? You didn't like the initial idea."

"Yes, well, it's grown on me. It's a rather nice design for a house. Near the lake, a forest, and a flower field. Plus, we have other biomes nearby should we need them."

"Yes! I knew you'd like it!"

"You know, your gloating is making me regret complimenting it."

"Hey Cav."

"What?"

"...wanna put your minecraft bed next to mine?"

"VINCENT!"

"What?! What, what's going on, is everything okay?! Give me cords, I'll-"

"THERE ARE CATS!"

"...excuse me?"

"THERE ARE CATS IN THIS VILLAGE! QUICK, LOOK UP HOW TO TAME THEM!"

"Oh, my god, Balth. One sec-

"...Is there one that looks like Catendish?"

"Look!"

"What- Dakota, what is this?"

"Look in the chest!"

"What the- how did you make all this? I didn't know you could make cake. Or pumpkin pie. Or cookies."

"Here, put them down here!"

"Are those our beds?"

"Extras. I made us a little overnight picnic area! We can eat cake and watch the sunset, and sleep!"

"...How long did it take you to make this, and how many of our resources did you use?"

"Just enjoy the moment, Balthy."

"Oh my god. Vinnie, hurry!"

"Just hold on a second, Cav, and stay in that hole. You'll be fine as long as you stay there."

"Vinnie, I'm going to starve!"

"Yeah, I hear that. Give me those cords again."

"1124 and 324. I think more are gathering outside."

"Give me the y coordinates, Cav, I'm almost at the bottom of this- OH MY GOD, THAT'S A LOT OF MOBS-!"

"I TOLD YOU! RUN!"

"Do you think we have enough?"

"Balth, I don't think we'll ever have enough stuff to deal with the Nether without the kids. Ready?"

"I guess you're right. Let's g- wait!"

"What? Why are you going back? Cav, c'mon, don't chicken out now!"

"I'm not chickening out! Here!"

"...Oh."

"Yes, you forgot your gold boots. Let's go."

"Heh, gold booties."

"My word."

"Okay, I think that's enough rods. C'mon, Vin, let's go back the way we came from, I don't want to get lost. Just don't break the gravel!"

"Yeah, yeah, I know! I might like to joke around, but I don't want to do all this over again either. I still think we should've bridged over the lake instead of crawling on a gravel island."

"It's faster this way."

"If you say s- oh no."

"Is that-?"

"RUN, GHAST!"

"THE GRAVEL!"

"NOOOO, THE LAVA!"

"...

"WE HAVE TO DO ALL THAT SHIT AGAIN?!"

"Please don't swear, Cav, it doesn't suit you."

"Okay. Finally. Ready?"

"Yeah. Put the last eye in."

"Let's go."

"Okay, Cav, put the bed and block down, I'll try to get her with that! Keep shooting arrows at her!"

"Okay, she's in the middle, hurry up, go, go!"

"I'm go-OH MY GOD I'M IN THE AIR!"

"Get back here, hurry up!"

"I'm trying! Did my stuff fall off the edge?"

"No, it's still here, Vinnie, I'm out of arrows!"

"Steal some from me, she's so close!"

"Okay, I shot her- YEEES!"

"YESSS, BALTHAZAR! YOU GOT HER!"

"WE DID IT!"

Cavendish looked up suddenly as arms wrapped around him, and he fell backwards, one hand on his phone, the other wrapped around Dakota.

"Dakota! I'm going to die to endermen, get up!"

The Italian did as he was told, scrambling up and helping slash at the endermen that were chasing Cavendish. Once they got the egg and jumped in the portal ("There's an actual story to this? I thought it was open world." "Eh, they've got to make it interesting somehow, right?"), they returned to their little home, setting their trophy near their animal pen.

"How wonderful...that was so much fun!"

"Yeah, now kidding. Totally worth it."

"Agreed...although, can we please go to sleep now? We stayed up way too late for this accursed game!"

"Pfft- yeah, okay."

Thank you so much for reading! If you enjoyed, or want to give a piece of constructive criticism, please leave a review! As for the copyright question review- I believe that you can, so long as you aren't showing/saying that you own the franchise! Apologies again if the dialogue-only chapter seemed strange, the beginning was meant to be chaos, but it hopefully still made sense! I hope you have an absolutely fantastic morning/afternoon/evening/night, and make sure you take time to enjoy a bit of free time, especially if you're taking finals or have a stressful holidays or something! Take care of yourself!