The screen faded back in to Petra leading Jesse down a dark hallway, Jesse watching the redhead patiently. Petra finally slowed to a stop, staring at her shoes intently. "I feel bad about ditching everyone else, but I just wanted to talk to you about this alone," Petra spoke at last. "It's a little tough to talk about."
Several members of the audience frowned at this, but they didn't say anything.
Jesse responded with a warm smile. "Hey, whatever it is, you can tell me," she said in return.
Petra smiled back slightly. "Thanks for being so understanding," the redhead said with her own smile. Jesse reached out after a moment and gave Petra's hand a comforting squeeze.
The moment her hand squeezed, she released it, flinching back with a gasp. Her hand was smoking, but not from heat- now that they looked closer, frost had started making its way over Jesse's hand. "Petra, you're freezing," she gasped, rubbing her hand slightly, eyes wide with surprise.
"Wait- what? Petra is half Blaze," Hadrian said, his eyes narrowing in confusion. "Why would she be cold enough to make frost form on Jesse's hands?"
"That's very odd indeed, Hadrian," Mevia murmured, looking confused herself.
Petra rubbed the back of her head, glancing away before speaking again. "You got me away from the Witherstorm... but I'm worried that I didn't get away soon enough."
Petra paled as she finally realized what was wrong.
"Petra?" Jesse asked in confusion.
The redhead pulled her sleeve up to reveal that her left arm was no longer gold, but in fact a shade of silver. A strange purple mark was radiating along her upper arm and part of her elbow, looking slightly like a bruise. The veins in her arm that weren't turning faintly silver were a disgusting shade of purple, angry red flecks decorating her arm.
Lukas's eyes narrowed, before they widened, and the arm that was resting on Jesse's shoulders tightened, making the smaller girl squeak inadvertently. "Oh my Notch," he said softly. "I thought- I thought it was a myth or something."
"What's a myth?" Cassie asked, looking from the blonde to the screen. "What's wrong with Petra?"
Lukas didn't respond, staring at the screen in stunned surprise.
"Oh my Notch!" Jesse immediately gasped, eyes widening. "Holy crap, what are we doing down here?! We need to get you help!"
Petra shook her head a bit. "I don't know if there's anything we can do, Jesse," she replied quietly, before hesitating for a moment. "... do you know what Wither is?"
Jesse blinked, taken aback by this question. "The- the Wither? Of course, we've been-"
"No, Jess," Petra cut her off softly, "just Wither. Or... Wither Sickness, I guess."
Jesse's eyes widened. "Wither Sickness..." she breathed, so quietly that it was nearly inaudible. Certainly most of the audience couldn't hear it, although their eyes also went wide at this.
"And I feel like it's just going to keep getting worse."
"But- but you're half-Blaze!" Jesse spluttered, waving all six of her arms in the air like pinwheels, "how in the name of Notch did you get Wither Sickness!?"
Petra simply frowned down at her arm. "I don't know..."
"Well, we should go back and tell the others!" Jesse exclaimed, "w-we can get help-!"
"You can't tell anyone about this!" Petra replied, looking alarmed, but before any of them could say anything, a creeper trotted into the hallway, hissing loudly as it flashed white, preparing to explode. Olivia yelped, and Lukas jumped. Maya and Gill bumped heads, Nell yelped and fell off the couch, and several more people flinched in surprise.
"Creeper!" Petra shouted, rushing away before it could explode right in her face. Jesse was not quite so fast or lucky.
The explosion blasted a hole in the floor, Jesse falling through it, before her hand smacked into the stone ledge and she clung on with one hand, dangling from the stone ledge.
"Grab my hand!" Petra shouted, running back over, "I'll pull you up."
Jesse reached up with one of her uppermost arms and grabbed ahold of Petra's hand, as her legs kicked in thin air, scrabbling for a hold. Immediately, frost started smoking on her hand, the black-haired girl shivering with the cold as she held onto Petra, who was struggling to pull her up. Petra's arms were shaky, her forehead was beaded with sweat, and even though she'd just started she looked exhausted.
"Oh my Notch," Jace said quietly.
The frost was creeping up Jesse's elbow when the girl's hand slipped, Jesse's eyes having glazed over, and her entire body toppled backwards into the hole.
Half of the audience gasped, while the other half's eyes widened.
Jesse slammed into the stone ground, the amulet bouncing out of her pocket, but the spider hybrid didn't move even as the amulet bounced away, starting to emit a dark blue glow, and landing several feet away from Jesse, lighting its way through the darkness.
"Blue...? Blue!" Stacy exclaimed, "that's Ivor!"
Ivor let out a sigh. Great. More screen time.
Lukas wasn't focused on that though, staring at the screen worriedly. The screen had gone blurry, Jesse blinking slowly through the blurriness, before the screen slowly started coming back into focus, a pair of hands having grabbed Jesse's shoulders and started shaking. "Jesse!"
The screen slowly and finally came back into focus to show Petra from Jesse's point of view, the redhead shouting and shaking Jesse. Some Blaze Rods were fading away in the background, although they looked more silver and purple, like her arm, and appeared to be falling apart. Petra's breathing was also labored, and-
Jesse leaned forward, squinting at the screen. "Are- are you crying?"
And indeed, Onscreen-Jesse's eyes widened as well, because Petra's gold- no, wait, those were dulling to a dull silver as well- eyes WERE filled with tears, Reuben next to Petra and shivering. "Jesse, I- I just couldn't- I'm so sorry!" Petra said, voice beginning to reach a hysterical pitch in panic, "Jesse, are you okay?!"
Reuben let out a worried little whine as Jesse sat back up, wincing slightly. "Haha, yeah, sorry- I just kinda went out of it for a moment. You're the one that's sick, anyways. Take care of yourself first, I'll be perfectly fine," and she smiled at Petra.
The redhead slowly relaxed a bit as Jesse struggled to her feet, fiddling with the buttons that clasped the cloak shut. "Okay..." She then tensed again as Jesse placed the cloak around Petra's shoulders. "Wh-what-?"
"You're freezing," Jesse replied, buttoning the cloak up and adjusting it with a quick tug, "you probably need this more than I do."
"Thank you, Jesse," Petra said, smiling at the black-haired girl.
Jesse returned it quickly. "No problem, Petra. You'd do the same for me."
Onscreen, Petra was staring at Jesse with this bewildered look, before her eyes relaxed again and she also got to her feet. "Thanks, Jesse."
Jesse nodded, before the two of them continued forward, Jesse retrieving the amulet and then walking forward through a doorway into a lit room. The two girls winced and blinked hard as their eyes adjusted to the light, before they actually got a good look of the room and they both gasped.
The room was HUGE, even bigger than the cavern with the doorways and the amulet where they'd gone their separate ways, glowstone resting on almost every surface. On the floor in the center of the room, was an amulet-themed decoration. It looked like a huge, beautiful library.
"That- that is a LOT of books," Em goggled. "Like, no offense to bookworms in here, but holey COW that is a lot."
"This is a ton of books," Petra gaped around at the room, "who needs this many books?"
Jesse simply hummed and shrugged. "Soren, apparently."
They came to a wide gap between two bookcases, spotting a figure with their back to them as they walked into the room, which was filled with- you guessed it- more books. Petra's eyes widened, and her fists clenched. Jesse looked at Petra, then back at the figure, who was muttering aloud to himself. "He must have something useful in here! He has to! Why would he have so many books, was he just... collecting them?"
Soren shook his head. "You'd be surprised how much of my free time is spent reading books. Some of the books in the library aren't really that long, either. And some of them are mine."
"Oh, you write books?" Jesse asked in surprise, turning to look at the builder.
He grinned. "Indeed I do. Quite a few of them, too."
"He's very good at writing love stories," Magnus said, unexpectedly. All of them turned to look at Magnus, making him shrug at them as if this were nothing.
"What? I do read sometimes, y'know. I'm not allergic to it or anything."
"He can't possibly have read all of these..."
Jesse's eyes widened, and she stepped forward. "Ivor?" she asked, her voice having dropped to a whisper.
Ivor turned, eyes narrowing at Jesse, who happened to have stepped in front of Petra. "Trying to interfere with my plans again, I see," he sneered, "your tenacity is commendable, but misguided. You found your way in here, so now you may find it back out again. Immediately."
Jesse simply sighed. "You're cheerful as ever... I can't see why I wanted to see you so much as a kid-"
She gasped and grabbed at her head again, flinching slightly.
The screen zoomed into Jesse's head into a little spider-Jesse, the girl bouncing off the floor and dropping some knitting and a book onto the floor the moment the Order came in. "Is Ivor here today?" she asked eagerly. "Last time, he was teaching me how to make Potions of Strength... um..." and she tilted her head to one side, a confused look coming over her face. "O-or was it a Draught of Strength...?"
"You were right the first time," Ivor stated quietly, watching the screen silently.
Gabriel made a little face that made little-Jesse's smile fade and her shoulders slump a bit. "Sorry, Jesse- he said he was too busy making Potions of Healing."
"That's probably our fault," and Magnus gestured at his cheek, which had a small scar on it. "I got that from racing Gabriel on my sheep."
Most of the audience blinked at this. "Um... what?" Stampy asked finally, sounding bemused.
Magnus hummed mildly in comprehension. "Oh yeah, I remember that... I crashed into a tree and nearly fell off a cliff. And Gabriel fell off and nearly broke his arm."
"I did dislocate it," Gabriel reminded him.
Ellegaard snorted. "Yeah, Ivor was livid when you two got back."
"I still say I won."
"No you didn't!"
"I say you both are idiots," Ellegaard replied, rolling her eyes. The warrior and the Rogue turned to face her in perfect unison, identical offended looks on their faces. "Hey!" they chorused.
Jesse giggled at this. She wasn't the only one.
Soren was snickering in the background as Ellegaard rolled her eyes again and patted the Rogue on the shoulder, giving him a faint smile. "But... you're less of an idiot," she remarked, smirking faintly.
Gabriel rolled his eyes. "Thank you so much, Ellegaard," he joked sarcastically.
Little-Jesse had been steadily drooping the entire time, and Lukas poked his face in next to hers, making her look at the ocelot hybrid. "Hey, don't worry," and he smiled cheerfully at her, "you can spend some time with me and Soren! He's teaching me how to craft weapons today."
"No, no!" Axel burst out, making Lukas hiss in surprise as the creeper hybrid waved his arms and nearly smacked Magnus full in the face, "You should stick with me and Magnus! He's gonna blow something up!"
"Um, don't you do that every time...?"
Jesse's meek little comment made the audience snicker as Olivia shook her head, attracting Jesse's attention, "We're learning how to use redstone torches today!" she offered.
"Gabriel and I are going to practice. I think I'm getting closer to beating him!" Petra exclaimed, bouncing up and down in a hot excitement, actually floating into the air each time with each bounce.
"Aww, you're super cute as a kid," Jace teased. Petra smacked him, but she was still grinning at the mocha-haired boy next to her.
Jesse shook her head a bit. "I think I'll stick with Petra today, but thanks, guys," she said, making the other three pout at her in disappointment.
The screen switched to show Jesse doing a backwards roll and landing on her butt with a little 'oof', blinking in surprise with a wooden sword in hand. Gabriel lowered his own wooden sword, arching his eyebrow at Jesse. "You're usually not knocked down so easily... you okay?" He paused, before crossing his arms a bit, mouth setting into a thin line. "You're still upset about Ivor, huh?"
"Yeah..." Jesse tilted her head to one side with a sad little sigh, Petra looking sympathetic off to the side.
Ivor blinked; it was obvious that he was startled by this sad little comment.
"I really was looking forward to him showing me how to make an Elixir of Strength... no, Brew of..." Jesse stuttered for a moment, before huffing, green and red eyes narrowing in irritation. "And for him to remind me what the potion's called."
The screen zoomed back out, Jesse's eyes flying open, and she looked up. Ivor had this odd, frozen look on his face for a moment, before he closed his eyes, expression hardening, and he stepped forward towards Jesse. "Out of my way."
"Wait-" Jesse began, but Ivor pushed her out of the way.
He came to a sudden halt a second later, a stone sword pointed at his heart. "Oh, you're not going anywhere," Petra snarled.
"Hurrah for Petra!" Lukas cheered. Axel, Olivia, Jesse, Jace, and Maya threw their hands into the air. "HURRAH!" they all chorused.
Petra grinned at them, although it fell a moment later when she spotted Aiden delivering a kick to Maya's knee.
Ivor's face blanched a bit onscreen as Petra started backing him up into the room. "Petra?"
She grinned, but she'd just backed him into a sword stand, and he grabbed a gold sword before she could do anything about it, slashing at her. Petra blocked it, sending sparks flying. "Foolish girl, I-" Ivor snarled, eyes hard but shiny, for some reason.
Petra cut him off. "Shut up. I don't care what you have to say." She blocked another swing from Ivor, sending more sparks flying.
"I'm just going to take you down."
A/N: Awwe, the hybrids as kids :3
RQTC: DUDE THIS WAS AT 4000 VIEWS A FEW CHAPTERS AGO WHEN DID I GET 5000?
LunarStarsMoon: Ahh, I see.
Kaos Ruin: They probably won't, but there will be Ivor x Jesse family fluff. AND LOTS OF IT xD
DynamiteHunter6: (grins)
EthanDaCabbage: Ooh! I want some.
Catlover5667: Meow :3
mEEplePeoPLe: RQTC stands for 'Random Question of The Chapter'
AquaK13: And here it is! x3 And thanks! Glad you like 'em so much, haha xD
x.X. A.L. X.x
