Chapter Fifteen: Saving The Worlds (or thinking about it)
The Aether Labs were in considerably serious upheaval (Noting the fact it hadn't been blown up for the nth time, which is actually an achievement).
It may or may not have something to do with the two dogs- sorry, gods currently running amok at the speed of sound inside it breaking things.
"BRAT!" Jeb roared. "STOP MOVING AND COME HERE SO I CAN KILL YOU!"
"NO!" Pyrien yelled back. "IF I STOP MOVING YOU'LL KILL ME!"
The two seemed to be presently engaged in a game of cat-and-mouse, with Pyrien scampering (at approximately the speed of sound) along the shelves and seemingly trying to play the-floor-is-lava and Jeb charging around on the ground (at approximately a bit less than the speed of sound) attempting to catch the pest while trying not to damage his precious lab equipment.
Pyrien scampered and Jeb bulldozed. Then Pyrien just 'happened' to knock an anvil off a rack, which also 'happened' to fall on Jeb's head. Anvil and head came together in a contest of who-can-squish-who, and the anvil came off considerably second-best, which meant Jeb now had an impromptu metal hat that 'happened' to obscure his eyesight and had the shape of his head imprinted into it.
Which just led to more colourful and ear-destroying loud cursing. Pyrien proceeded to head in the direction of the Lab storage facilities.
There was a Boom! and a crash that followed as the troublemaking boy-god succeeded in escaping into the storage facility.
"WHEN MY HANDS FIND YOUR NECK-"
Abrupt silence.
Pyrien peeked out from behind the doors and cast a cautious look at the swirling portal in the Dimensional-whatsit.
Yep, he was gone.
The wires Pyrien had nudged into place was tangled into an indescribable mess over the opening of the strange device. One of Jeb's shoes were caught in it.
Pyrien tiptoed over to the device and peered in, making sure not to lean too far over the side. The swirling portal glared back as if to say and what are you looking at? No Jeb suddenly jumped out of it to scare the tripes out of him. Pyrien shut the lid of the device and huffed a sigh of relief.
Then Jeb materialised behind him.
Pyrien, caught up in his scrutinisation of the box, did not notice until the Inventor tapped him on the shoulder.
"AAAAAHHH!" And then there was a hole in the roof from where Pyrien had achieved take-off through.
Pyrien managed to land himself from his superhuman jump with breaking anything, not even the roof he landed on (Another achievement). After a few moments of Jeb not showing up and decapitating him on the spot, Pyrien hesitantly stuck just enough of his face over the hole he made to see Jeb standing in a resigned way in what was left of the Aether Labs.
"Come down, Pyrien." And just in that moment, Jeb actually looked his age. As he was over several thousands of years old, this was a terrible sight to behold. "I will refrain from murdering you horribly. There is some bad news I should have informed you of."
Pyrien looked down his nose at Jeb. "Please don't tell me Notch got drunk while I wasn't watching. I would hate to have missed that."
"Be serious, Pyrien." Jeb sighed, without even rolling his eyes (This day was full of achievements). "The worlds may be at stake."
Pyrien wrinkled his nose distastefully. "It would be awfully inconvenient to have the worlds ending now, wouldn't it? Alright, gimme some intel, old man. I'll see if I have the time to save the world."
After all, it's really nothing he hadn't done before.
The Wallswatch guard frowned down at Alex. She gave him the sweetest smile she could.
"No." The guard said finally, looking torn.
Alex arranged her face into one of desperation. "Please, sir. My gran's dying over there. I couldn't make the time to apply for a pass."
The guard's expression went through several rapid transformations. "I'm sorry, miss. I can't let you pass without a form."
Alex sighed inwardly. "Alright then." she said resignedly. "You can't say I didn't try."
The guard frowned some more. "Wha-"
That was as far as he'd gotten before Alex whipped her frying pan out of her Inventory and clocked him on the head with it.
The guard dropped like a sack of fertiliser. The others on the Wall expressed varying degrees of alarm and a small platoon of soldier swarmed down to apprehend the orange-haired teen (Though since she was a Crafter it would be best to not make assumption about her age).
A few moments later, the entire force stationed at Floodmark Watch were lying unconscious in a mountainous pile of limbs, and Alex was replacing her frying pan into her Inventory.
"Ashariel, Moronic Idiot." she called. "These nice people have just agreed to let us pass." She prodded the head of an unconscious guard with her foot.
One dripping wet boy and one dripping wet Netherwolf emerged from the cover of a nearby thicket of trees.
The stupid boy sneezed. The wolf sneezed, and shook water everywhere. Alex skipped back a step to avoid being spattered on.
"Where are we going n- choo!" he sneezed again.
Alex gestured ahead of them, at the other end of the gate. "What does it look like, halfwit?" she said in an acidic tone. "We're crossing the wall illegally, you dumbass."
"I thought you said we were going through the Nether!" The boy complained loudly. "It would have been much more heroic!"
Alex rounded on him, eyes ablaze. "Be quiet, you fool!" she shouted. "You have no idea, do you? You have no idea!" She exhaled and spoke again. "Life is not a fairytale." Alex hissed coldly. "Do not let me hear of your 'heroic' nonsense again. The Nether is not something to be trifled with. You would only enter it if you had no other choice."
The terrified boy nodded quickly, anticipating the re-emergence of the dreaded frying pan.
"Besides," Alex murmured to herself, "We're making up for lost time. The others would be quite a long way ahead by now."
If they haven't died yet. She added.
There were dead people everywhere. Dead other things, too. I couldn't identify most of the corpses.
At this point, I had gotten enough evidence to identify this dream as a nightmare, and very much looked forward to waking up. It was one hell of a realistic dream and didn't even have the decency to be about something good, like, I dunno, mining. Or food. Food was good.
I flinched as a spike from a dragon's tail hit the ground near me. Everything had gone quiet again- mostly because everyone was dead.
I don't know what happened to the boy with the golden eyes or the man. In fact, I don't know anything of what happened after the 'challenge'. There was just this blank bit in-between. Whatever was responsible for the dream sure left a lot of plot holes and in my opinion, desperately needed an editor. Definitely one and a half stars.
The village was mostly burnt and ruined and suffered from some other nasty things that I couldn't quite identify but left a lot of dead people in its wake.
The skies were grey. Fog everywhere. I couldn't see fifty meters in front of me. Then, like a snap of a finger, energy whipped through the still air.
The man stepped into view. He looked like he woke up on the wrong side of the bed- no, scrap that, he looked like he woke up on the floor, and then lost a fight with a furnace who had a cactus for a buddy. Half of his face was literally glowing red-hot and there were multiple slash marks and dents all over his body. Of the boy there was no trace.
Probably dead. There was a lot of it going around.
Clink, clink, clink.
Chains jangling. The man turned a foul-tempered look in the direction the sound was coming from. A limp figure was dragged through the mist in chains and deposited roughly in front of the man. It looked like the boy from earlier, though something about him felt so entirely different I was instantly convinced it wasn't the same person. Like the one before, he had black locks that obscured one eye from view. The other one was closed.
The man smiled and stepped forwards, his battleaxe scraping across the path.
:Your brother was most insistent on asking after your wellbeing:
The figure didn't reply.
After a while of waiting the man got bored and raised his axe.
:Fight me:
The chains melted away. The boy's eye opened just by a tiny fraction and I caught a glimpse of silver. The corner of his lip curled upwards just a little-
a smile like the edge of a blood-slicked scythe-)
"Very well. Do keep in mind that you asked for it."
Suddenly, everything went still and all colour leeched out of the world.
A whisper of shadow, and the girl from before was back again. Though this time there was something different about her, something wrong.
She looked around in desperation, one of her hands clamped on the side of her neck. She spotted me and ran towards me.
"Hi." I said uncertainly.
"This is awfully unorthodox, I know, but-" she blinked. "Oh no. Oh no. Steve."
She looked terribly disappointed. I briefly wondered what it was that I had done this time.
The girl made a face. "Oh doggone it! Wrong time, wrong universe, definitely wrong person. Great job, me."
"Thanks," I said dryly. "Who's the right person? And if you have the time, would you mind telling me what the Nether is going on?"
She opened her mouth to say something and suddenly coughed.
It was then I noticed the rivulets of red seeping through her fingers, and that she was drenched in liquids of various colour and there was steam and light rising of her in puffs. Having spent time in the Aether, I correctly interpreted the different substances as ichor, which is to say, godly blood. I almost choked on my tongue.
"No time, sorry." she interrupted me before I could say anything. "Tell the one who calls upon the Void that-" she paused a bit and coughed again, a trail of crimson escaping down her lip. "Tell him I'm sorry. Tell him to look to the future, and that the worlds are wide and full of wonders-" another cough blotted out whatever else she was trying to say.
"Wait-" I started.
The scene began to fade out entirely. The last thing I saw was the world of anguish behind the blood-coloured eyes.
I woke up with a cry of frustration and immediately noticed something very strange.
Horus leant against a wall, his head tipped back. Everything about him indicated that he was asleep. Everything but his eyes. They were opened, barely, just by a slit. But that still wasn't the strangest thing.
No, that would be the hint of silver light pulsing out from under his eyelashes.
Alex, being Alex, had thoroughly raided the Wallswatch post, which meant they now had horses. Fine ones at that.
Fine horses frogshit. It didn't stop them from throwing their riders and bolting when the ground rebelled against all restraint. Which, in other words, meant that it seemingly took umbrage against the tiny nits and lice walking all over it.
"Ai ai ai ai ai!" the idiot wailed as he was tossed bodily from his horse and almost trampled to a miserable and inglorious end.
Alex leapt just before the horse bucked hard enough to throw her. She twisted around and smacked the rebellious horse with the flat of her blade hard enough to knock it out. The animal crumpled to the ground at the same time as Alex's graceful landing. The other horse ran off to seek the horizon and escape from utter stupidity. Ashariel ran after it for a while then decided he couldn't be bothered.
"I am very sorry for this." Alex murmured to the unconscious and mud-splattered horse as she gave it an apologetic pat on the head.
The moron spat mud and rolled slowly to his feet before slipping again. He simply pushed himself to a sitting position and stayed there.
Alex frowned down at him. "Now look what you've done. We've got just that one horse between us now, and you know who's not going to be riding it."
The boy groaned. "Me."
Alex gave him a sweet smile. "Quick as always." she agreed. "Now get your arse off the ground and start walking. I'll even give you a head start."
"What?!" the lackwit sputtered. "You can't just leave me behind!"
"I can. And I'll prove it if you don't move fast enough. Run along now, there's a good boy."
The Netherwolf woofed and gave Alex a puppy-eyed look that clearly said c'mon-that's-just-unreasonable, which was totally and utterly wasted on her.
Andras gave a sigh that reeked impressively of misery and started trudging at a pace that reeked even more of misery.
"What was that, anyway?" the boy asked halfheartedly, not really expecting an answer.
Alex paused just as she cast a spell of awakening on the downed horse. For a while, she was not sure what to say. Then she made up her mind and decided to actually tell him something (For once).
"Something extremely unwelcome and possibly unpleasant and probably very, very powerful is intruding in our multiverse." she said reluctantly. "The earthquake just then is what's called a weft shake. It's a warning to the Guardians."
"Guardians of what?" the boy blinked stupidly.
Alex's scowl came back in full force and she vaulted upon the back of the now-awakened horse. "I'll tell you if you're still alive by the end of today."
I prodded him a little.
"Hey...? You awake or asleep? Or just being creepy?"
No reaction.
I poked at him again. "Y'know-"
Before I knew what was going on, my back was suddenly pressed against a wall and there was something very cold and possibly deadly sharp at my throat.
Silver blazed, and then faded back to dark, bottomless blue.
Horus removed his scythe from danger range and walked away. Feeling more than a hint peevish, I called after him.
"Kindly tell me what the Nether that was about. Oh, and also the weird silver light thing. Last time I checked, there wasn't a problem with my mental health, so don't try to convince me I imagined that."
Silence.
"Don't you dare dot dot dot me!" I shouted. "This cavern is keeping me sufficiently in the dark and you do not need to do it too!" my voice bounced off the said cavern and stirred the invisible spirits into a frenzy.
He paused.
"I do not think you would want to know." he said quietly. "Giving you nightmares and depriving you of sleep would not help us accomplish our goal."
I threw a glare at his back. "I'll be the judge of that. You'll deprive me of more sleep if you keep me wondering."
He looked at me over his shoulder. It was a lifeless look, one devoid of all emotion or purpose.
"Very well." he answered in an utterly blank tone. "Do keep in mind that you asked for it."
...do keep in mind that you asked for it-
Where did I hear that from?
"The earthquakes before." he began, "They are called weft shakes. They are essentially a warning system built to alert the Guardians of a unbeneficial presence in home territory. Which is to say, our worlds."
I blinked. "Guardians?" I asked.
"Every Realm has at least one, Or at least, should." he walked closer to me and flicked his fingers almost lazily. A hologram sprang up, with four glowing spheres, each a different colour.
"Jeb in the Aether." A crude picture of a smiley face with a beard traced itself over the white-and-gold sphere. "The Dragon in the End." A hologram of a tiny dragon flickered into life on top of the purple-and-black sphere and roared silently. "The Wither in the Nether." The rough shape of a thing with three heads appeared on the red sphere.
"Wait wait wait." I interrupted. "I thought it was Notch in the Aether and Herobrine in the Nether."
Horus didn't even look my way. "They are not Guardians. They are the one who created them, and everything else."
"Isn't Notch the Creator? Herobrine is supposed to, y'know, just... break things."
"One lesson that you have not yet learnt, Steve, is that the multiverse does not give a flying fart for what you do or do not believe."
"Oh..."
For a moment, no one spoke.
"Wait, what about the Overworld?" I prodded.
The hologram dissolved. "And therein lies the problem." he replied. "The Overworld does not have one."
Right. "And what does that have to do with what I asked you?"
"Everything." he answered with such icy finality that I knew to ask further was to risk transformation into a corpse. I stowed my resentment away for later and instead brought up another subject.
"You said you'd teach me magic."
Finally, he made eye contact.
"Yes, I do suppose I did." he sighed in a resigned way.
"So," Pyrien concluded. "The multiverse is in trouble and you, the mighty Guardian of the Aether, need my help."
"That is the essence of it." Jeb sighed regretfully. "In the case that there are any spies or traitors among us, you will not be missed. Besides, you are sufficiently powerful and, though I regret having to say this, intellectually advanced enough to actually be able to poke a dint in a powerful enemy."
"You sound so grateful that I am immediately drawn to the desire to serve." Pyrien murmured with more than a drop of sarcasm. "Why can't you just do it the old way? Notch and Herobrine double-team the sorry loser and beat the tripes out of him, and we all go back to sitting on our arses and getting fat."
Jeb sighed for the nth time. "Herobrine... is not who he was. Notch is missing, as you can tell."
"Yes yes, all very convenient. What exactly happened to the both of them, eh? Little family spat?"
Jeb scratched his beard. "That was the newest understatement of the millennia, but yes, you could say that."
"By the way," Pyrien said casually. "Who was the one who actually beat the bastard in the end?"
Jeb frowned. "Which one?"
"The one who killed me." The firegod sounded so calm it was as if he wasn't talking about his own death.
Jeb sighed again. "Notch and Herobrine."
"Yes." Pyrien clapped his hands. "So as my first idea as the saviour of the worlds, I'm gonna propose we find both of them and put them in an empty room with the said sorry loser. Problem solved."
"I told you Notch went missing-"
"What is missing will always turn up unexpectedly and most annoyingly. Probably between one's sofa cushions. I'm always losing things there." he grinned a lopsided grin. "Anyways, I'll find Notch somehow. He's probably ended up in a lost-and-found basket somewhere."
"I would not go in a fifty-mile radius of Herobrine if I were you." Jeb said darkly.
Pyrien's smile was so infectious the grumpy Inventor almost returned it. "No you wouldn't." he agreed easily. "Then it is a most fortunate thing that you are not, in fact, me."
Got camp tomorrow. Did this at midnight. If there are any unfortunate mistakes, please take it up with whichever god invented the ailment known as "lack of sleep".
-Nano.