The two of them opened the door and rushed in, before skidding a few feet and then stopping in front of a jukebox, from where the voice was emitting. Reuben nearly ran face-first into the jukebox before Jesse stooped down and scooped up the pink pig replacing him a few feet away so he didn't just charge right into it.
"What the-?" Olivia stared at the jukebox in dismay.
Jesse blinked in surprise at this, Reuben squealing slightly. "It's a recording!" she exclaimed, reaching up to touch her lip.
Olivia let out a frustrated groan and crossed her arms. "After all that, he's not even here?!" she complained.
The recording of Soren laughed slightly. "I, uh, should probably eat something. I'm positively lightheaded with excitement!"
Olivia continued, still frowning and sounding extremely frustrated, "We came all this way and for what?! We're no closer to Soren than before."
Jesse hummed thoughtfully, tapping her lip, before something occurred to her, and she looked at Olivia significantly. "Welll, this record couldn't have turned on by itself," she pointed out.
Olivia's expression lightened a bit as realization dawned on her face. "Huh. Good point. I guess he really likes the sound of his own voice, then."
Soren shrugged a little. "It gets a bit quiet sometimes."
Jesse looked back at the record, crossing her arms and shuddering slightly as all of them did so in perfect unison. "Well, maybe there's something useful on the record, if we can figure out what he's talking about..."
"I've worked up a simple set of building instructions to... inspire them."
Several eyebrows were raised at this.
"I will disguise myself and hide among them in order to observe them more closely," Soren finished.
Jesse's eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "Observe who more closely?" she contemplated, one thumb going to the corner of her lip.
Olivia had moved away a certain distance and was looking at a nearby wall of purple glass, squinting at it with a rather confused look. "I wonder why Soren built a purple wall. It's not completely opaque, though. Just really, really blurry," she commented.
Jesse came to stand next to Olivia, looking just as bewildered about what she'd just said. "What? What are you talking about? Liv, that's purple stained glass, not a purple-" Jesse had turned to look through the glass, but now she froze, face draining of color (this was obvious EVEN THROUGH THE PURPLE TINT) and eyes widening. "... oh. Oh. Do you think Soren was talking about Endermen?"
Olivia blinked at this question, before turning back to the glass and covering her right eye. Her own eyes widened. "Oh."
The screen zoomed out to show, on the other side of the purple glass, thousands, and thousands, and thousands of Endermen, teleporting about and picking blocks up at random.
"Endermen?" Cassie and Isa chorused loudly, staring at the ginger builder in complete disbelief, "you've- you've been experimenting with Endermen?"
"Soren, I know you've written a few books on the subject, but I never imagined-!" Isa exclaimed, sputtering slightly.
"I didn't realize you meant actually in your book-?!" Cassie blurted.
"How do you know he's written books about Endermen?" Ivor asked, turning to look at them curiously and making many members of the audience look at him- it was the first he'd spoken almost the entire episode. "He never published them, as far as I know."
Isa opened her mouth, perhaps to explain exactly how the two of them knew, but right then Soren interrupted defensively. "T-they're fascinating creatures! They're the closest living being that can do something akin to building, like we humans do! Admittedly, much of it is simply placing blocks down at random, but-"
"Soren, that's incredibly dangerous!" Gabriel exclaimed.
Soren opened his mouth to exclaim back, but Jesse's voice came onscreen as she stared through the window, eyes wide. "Endermen?" Jesse was gaping out the purple stained-glass window in almost comical shock. "Soren has been experimenting with Endermen?"
Olivia shrugged a bit, crossing her arms as she stared out the window with a disbelieving shake of the head. "Everything ELSE about this guy has been kind of pointing to crazy," Olivia mumbled thoughtfully.
Jesse hummed at last, putting her hands on her hips, still staring out the window. "I suppose everyone needs hobbies," she said finally. "Even if they're... very, very, VERY dangerous." A short pause. "You think he's really training Endermen to build stuff?"
"Of course!" Soren grinned.
Olivia shrugged again. "I think HE thinks he's training Endermen to build stuff," she replied.
Soren's face fell. Gabriel gave him a sympathetic pat on the shoulder.
Jesse hummed thoughtfully at this, before spotting a blueprint resting on a chest nearby. Jesse blinked at it before heading over to the blueprint, lifting it up to show that it had to be one of the simplest designs of all time. It was made up of six blocks, five forming a capital letter 'L' and the remaining one sitting in the top right corner. The text said something about it being in all clay blocks.
"Whatcha got there?" Olivia asked from right next to Jesse, making the spider hybrid jump a bit. Turning around and tilting her head back to meet Olivia's eyes, she held out the blueprint. "It's some kind of crafting recipe. I'm just wondering why someone like Soren would need a recipe for a shape this simple."
Olivia leaned over to get a good look at the recipe, before her eyes lit up with excitement. "Because they're not for Soren, they're for the Endermen!"
Soren snapped his fingers with a grin. "Bingo!"
"This must be what he's trying to teach them to build!"
Jesse stared at Olivia with wide eyes, before nodding and pocketing the recipe. "Well, let's go find some clay blocks, then." The screen sped up to show them poking around the room, tossing clay blocks down to the center of the floor, before it slowed back down to reveal five clay blocks at their feet.
"That's weird... there's only six. How are we supposed to finish the design then?" Olivia wondered. Jesse's attention, however, was fixated back on the armor stand in front of the stained glass window. Slowly, Jesse moved towards it so that she was standing in front of it, giving it a weird look. "Um... Olivia?" she called back, slowly.
Olivia came back over as well, blinking at the suit on the armor stand. It was a full black bodysuit, with a hood that had purple eyeholes. "An Enderman suit... either Soren has a rather unique fashion sense or-!" Olivia's eyes widened. "Hold on a second!"
Jesse nodded and looked at the much taller stand next to it. "Looks like a taller one was hanging here, but it's missing... Soren must be wearing it! This is the disguise he was talking about!"
"It is indeed," Soren agreed, before running a hand through his already-unruly ginger hair. "I must say, though, it took quite a while to make. The smaller one was the first one, but the taller one is more... realistic."
"In order to walk AMONG the Endermen, you have to BECOME an Enderman!" Olivia exclaimed with a nod, eyes widening.
Jesse's face fell slightly as she seemed to realize something, and looked outside the purple stained-glass window. "Soren must be conducting his experiment right now... what with the missing suit and all."
Olivia's excited expression also fell, her eyes widening as she came to the same conclusion that Jesse had. "Which means, that if we want to find Soren..." The two of them turned to stare at the glass. "We're going to have to head out there to do it."
"You could wait for him to head back," Axel suggested.
Jesse thought about that for a moment, before shaking her head. "I don't think we have time to wait for him to come back. Besides, I doubt onscreen-me is all that keen on the idea. Present-me certainly isn't."
Onscreen, Jesse glanced at the Enderman suit, before back at Olivia. "Maybe if you tried to go, uh, more 'Enderman', and I put on the suit... we could find him?" she suggested.
Olivia looked at the suit, before shrugging and putting a hand on her hip. "Two sets of eyes are better than one. And we'd have a Plan B- if you got found out, I could just teleport you out of there."
"Endermen," Olivia muttered. "Why did it have to be Endermen? Why couldn't it have been- I don't know- giant chickens or something?"
Without another word, Jesse walked over to the Enderman suit. She looked at it for a moment, then down at her extra arms, before wrapping her lower sets of arms around her midriff and sucking in a huge breath. Quickly, she stepped into the suit, relaxing a bit once the suit was above her arms. Even though the suit bulged a bit awkwardly, it at least hid the fact that she had extra ones. She pulled on the gloves and then flipped on the hood, wrinkling her nose a bit before checking to make sure her arms weren't ripping through the suit. They weren't, of course.
Jesse turned around after finishing to see that Olivia had grown several inches taller than she'd already been. Her arms got longer and thinner, hands darkening to jet-black, both eyes turning faintly purple, and her outfit darkening a bit.
The two of them looked at each other for a moment, a tall Enderman with curly hair and a much, much, MUCH shorter one.
"Someday, far into the future, we'll look back on this and laugh," Olivia spoke, her voice oddly echoing and sounding a little warped.
"Not any day soon, I can tell you that," Jesse grumbled, making the two girls laugh a bit at that.
"I've already decided that only Endermen at peace build structures," the recording was still going, "when agitated, such as yesterday, they don't seem to have any interest in building things. Only... hitting me. With their fists. Repeatedly."
This earned a wince from both the two girls onscreen and most members of the audience.
Jesse trotted back quickly to the center of the floor and scooped up the five clay blocks they'd managed to scavenge from around the room as the recording kept talking. "Meanwhile, peaceful Endermen will move blocks to any spot on and on, until they somehow achieve... satisfaction, and walk away. Clearly, this will required further detailed observation." A pause. "I am so, so lonely."
Ellegaard gave Soren a bemused look. "Then why did you never come by and visit? I would've loved to work with you again. And I'm sure Magnus and Gabriel would've liked to see you as well."
Soren blinked at Ellegaard rapidly, as if he might be dreaming. "R-really?"
Magnus shrugged and slapped Soren on the back, ignoring the builder's quiet "Ow". "Of course, man! You're a little weird, but you're still a part of our group, aren'tcha?"
"Yes... it would've been nice to see you again," Gabriel said quietly, patting the builder on the back.
Soren's eyes lit up, a big grin spreading over his face. "That's- that's wonderful!"
Olivia frowned onscreen, thumbing the corner of her mouth. "How are we going to find Soren? I mean, the suits do look fairly realistic... and we can hardly just go up to every Enderman and ask 'hey, are you Soren?'"
This made several members of the audience snort loudly.
Jesse smirked at this onscreen as well. "You're part Enderman. I think you might be able to sense any... discrepancies."
"Fancy word," Gill joked. A few seconds paused. "Um, what's a discrepancy?"
Real-Jesse laughed. "Discrepancy means a lack of similarity between two things."
"Oh."
Olivia thought about this for a moment onscreen. "Okay. That seems pretty legit."
The two of them stepped outside, Reuben letting out a soft squeal of fear as Jesse turned around and slowly shut the door behind her.
A/N: DUN DUN DUNNNNN
Lol sorry xD
RQTC: Who's the best writer? Aiden or Lukas? xD
Personally I think it's Aiden. Boredom gives you extremely interesting ideas. Admittedly, Lukas has HAD many more exciting adventures, but Aiden has more time to work on his writing, 'cause, you know... jail...
DynamiteHunter6: I mean, he HAS been referred to as such, so...
EthanDaCabbage: (laughs)
Darkbeast Dend: :3 / It's okay :3 / Glad you like the song!
Kaos Ruin: (laughs) It's surprisingly pretty nice, once you get over the creepy factor.
LunarStarsMoon: (laughs) / (high-five) / (blinks) I... believe you...
S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Agreed!
AquaK13: De Nile isn't just a river xD / I know, right?!
rebekahtpe: Pillows. They're soft and cushy!
RapidSammi: I'm not going to discontinue it...
Emily The Avenger: (laughs) / Haha, yep xD / Oh, don't worry about it. That happened to me as well xD
pensuka: (laughs) No extra butter, please.
Rabbits rule: No problem!
x.X. A.L. X.x
