The screen faded to black a moment later.
Harper looked around at the others, frowning. "Should we take a break sometime during the episode?"
The others hesitated, all of them glancing at each other.
Finally, Ivor nodded. "I think that's a good idea. It's not good to just sit around indoors all day."
"Alright, so we'll break for lunch or something later," Soren said decisively, looking around the room. When they got a general chorus of assent (Hadrian just shrugged a bit), everyone turned back to face the screen.
The screen had already faded in to show the five of them (six if you counted Winslow) watching as the zombies were lurching up a staircase towards a bunch of houses. The houses appeared to be made of sandstone and clay, though... maybe there was some wood? (It was too far to tell.)
The screen switched again to show the five of them walking up the stairs in near-deathly silence, none of them even daring to cough or clear their throat or anything. The audience could understand, though- the complete bizarre quality of the whole situation made it a bit creepy for them all. Even Cassie. (And Notch knows that she's the genius when it comes to creepy stuff.) After what felt like an hour of walking up the staircase, they reached the level that the houses were on.
The houses were all elevated slightly, composed of what looked a lot like hardened clay. The floors looked like sandstone, and the roofs were made out of wooden planks. There were some decorative 'flags' along some of them next to the windows, and, well, the town, or... city or whatever it was looked really nice, but...
"I don't see any people... anywhere," Petra said, sounding a little worried.
Lukas was looking around at the architecture with practically glowing eyes, looking around fast enough that the audience was fairly certain he was going to crick his neck. "This architecture's fascinating," he breathed, "it's all sand and clay-based. It's awesome."
Ivor rolled his eyes a bit, although he didn't seem like he was actually all that annoyed. "Of course you'd say that. You're the one who was trained by Soren the Architect at age 5."
"Yeah, I do imagine that'd have something to do with it," Jace said, rubbing his chin with a mock-thoughtful look, before shooting Lukas a playful smile to show he didn't mean any harm.
"Well, it is interesting!" Lukas exclaimed, blushing a bit in embarrassment. "Don't you think it's interesting, Jesse?" He automatically looked at the petite girl who was almost always likely to be on his side. (Except when she was making puns. That was when she wasn't on his side.)
To the audience's surprise, Jesse was just staring at the screen, eyes narrowed at the screen. "Yeah, I guess... but what I'm more interested by is what the heck's going on here."
"Oh. Right." Lukas sat back a bit and coughed, cheeks tinted pink. In the excitement of seeing the new architecture, he'd kind of forgotten about the whole situation. (Good job, Lukas.)
Onscreen, Jesse was looking around when she spotted Cassie frowning a bit in Ivor's direction- almost as if she recognized the name 'Soren'.
"Hey!" Petra said suddenly, making the entire group look over at her as she walked off a bit. The screen switched to show a small pyramid of red blocks, stacked neatly near one of the houses. "Told you guys there'd be redstone!"
"Well for all you know, Petra," the narrator spoke up, making Jesse start a bit, "the people who live here are just idiots who thought the blocks looked nice and used it to decorate their city."
Jesse scowled at the sky, while Real-Petra scowled at the screen.
"Speaking of redstone," Ivor said, in a slightly quieter voice than the audience was used to, "I'd like to investigate those..." He paused, as if searching for a more satisfactory term.
"Chips," Cassie offered.
Onscreen, Jesse made a slightly squinty look, looking as if the name wasn't exactly her favorite. "They're chips in the barest sense of the word," the narrator said mildly, making Jesse glance back up at the sky. "But, y'know, whatever. It's better than calling 'em 'those thingies'."
Real-Jesse snorted a bit.
"Yes, those chips on the back of the zombies' heads," Ivor agreed, nodding to Cassie a bit as if to thank her for the suggestion. Cassie blinked at that in surprise, before perking up a little bit.
"Ooh, yeah," and Lukas perked up a bit too, ears flicking straight up with interest in his eyes. "I wanna see those too."
Jesse shrugged and joined in with them, going over to a pen with a bunch of zombies facing away from the opening of the pen. Ivor approached the zombie, before reaching up and taking ahold of the chip in both hands, starting to pull at it. A low buzzing sound began to... well, sound.
"Whoa, wait, what are you doing, D-" Jesse stopped mid-word again, cheeks beginning to turn faintly pink. "Ivor?"
"What on earth do you keep slipping up on?" Hadrian wondered, narrowing his eyes at the petite girl sitting on the floor.
Jesse just shrugged a bit, carefully avoiding his gaze. If he'd been looking very closely, he'd have noticed the pink blush forming on her own cheeks. "I'm sure it's nothing." (Yeah, sure, Jesse. I'm sure the rest of the audience totally believes you.)
Onscreen, if Ivor had noticed the slip, he didn't exactly let on. "What's it look like?" he asked, turning back around to face Jesse and loosening his grip on the chip, the buzzing sound fading out. "I'm going to rip this thing out of this zombie's head. For science."
Maya made a face suddenly, having suddenly gotten a mental image of Ivor ripping off... well, let's just say more than just the chip on the back of the zombie's head. "Oh... that could be potentially gross."
"They're... sleeping. Or something. It'll be easy!"
"I, uh... I wouldn't be too sure about that, if I were you," Harper said, wincing slightly.
Onscreen, Jesse simply blinked at that assertion. "Isn't that... a bit dangerous?" she asked Ivor, tentatively.
"More so for the zombie than for me," Ivor responded promptly, and turned back around to resume 'ripping out that thing for science', before pausing a bit, his face falling into a more concerned look. "... I think."
"That wasn't very reassuring," the narrator drawled, making Jesse glance up and shoot them an irritated look.
"This narrator- well- actually, the commentary's a little funny, sometimes," Aiden mumbled, crossing his arms a bit and squinting at the screen a little bit.
"... actually, he has a point," and Jace grinned sheepishly.
Aiden glanced at Jace rapidly, surprise entering his expression.
Jace noticed the look, and gave the other boy a friendly sort of grin.
Slowly, Aiden smiled back.
Ivor started to pull, harder and harder, the buzzing growing louder and more insistent as he kept pulling harder, and harder, until he was practically bracing one foot against the zombie in an attempt to yank it off- when suddenly, there was a dazzling flash of white, and Ivor was thrown flat on his back with a yell.
"Oh Notch!" Soren had a hand over his heart at the sudden scare. "Holy- what?!"
Ivor simply winced a bit. That looked like it had hurt.
"Are you okay?!" Lukas exclaimed, while Jesse just stared at where Ivor had just fallen, looking utterly nonplussed with wide eyes, before she simply went over and leaned down to help him up.
"It shocked me!" Ivor snapped, thankfully only sounding more annoyed than anything else. (Well, 'thankfully'.)
"Oh, okay," and Olivia let out a relieved sigh. "He didn't actually get hurt or anything."
"Yeah, that could've turned out worse," Sparklez sighed a bit himself.
"Well, at least we learned something new," Cassie offered as Jesse pulled Ivor back to his feet, from where she was setting Winslow down on the sandy ground carefully.
"And what would that be?" Petra asked, coming back over with a slightly worried expression on her face.
"They can't be removed. Not- not with our bare hands, anyhow." Cassie gave the chips an appraising look. "I wonder what would happen if you tried to work it off with a weapon..."
Lukas's ears twitched suddenly, and Lukas glanced up, eyes slightly wide, before he reached up and cupped a hand around his ear, cupping the ocelot ear with a look of concentration coming onto his features. "Do you hear that?" he asked, softly.
Jesse looked around warily. The screen scanned the landscape- before stopping as a person came into view, walking along some ways away. "Hey- there's someone over there!" Jesse exclaimed, raising her arm and pointing.
Harper felt her fists tighten in her lap.
Cassie leaned around Ivor to get a proper look. "Think he's friendly?" she asked, sounding a little anxious.
Jesse lifted one arm in a wave. "Hello?" she called. The person didn't even glance in her direction, simply continuing on his walk. Narrowing her eyes, Jesse flailed her arm even harder at him. "Hello?"
The person kept on walking.
Jesse lowered her arms, blinking a little bit. "Er..."
"Well... that's rude," Slab said, after a minute's pause.
"Facemeat doesn't like rude people," Facemeat grunted.
"Well, we don't know that he's rude," Jesse pointed out. "For all we know, he could just have horrible hearing."
"Hey, that was alliteration," Aiden said, grinning slightly. (Hey, that was... sort of alliteration right there.)
Onscreen, Jesse's lower two sets of arms crossed, while her uppermost left arm reached up to just scratch her head a little bit. "Well... maybe his... hearing is bad. Or something?" she reasoned, slowly.
Lukas shrugged a bit, simply looking a bit mystified. "Um, that makes sense... I... guess."
Jesse looked down at herself, before back up at the others. "Er, do one of you guys have like a cloak or something, 'cause... he might not be too excited to see someone with... well... y'know."
Petra shook her head, a disappointed look coming over her face. "That's right, I forgot."
"It's pretty easy to forget... once you actually talk to Jesse- onscreen, I mean- you tend to forget that she has extra arms," Reginald said, leaning forward a bit to get a better look at the screen.
"Yeah, but I'd still like to not scare everyone," Jesse said, sounding slightly amused.
Lukas patted his pockets experimentally, ears flicking a bit, before he shook his head with a small frown. "Uhhh, nope. Sorry."
"Well, I might... yeah, here," and Cassie fished out a wad of gray fabric quickly, before tossing it over to Jesse. Jesse's lower arms shot out and caught ahold of it, the wad unfolding in midair into a slightly overlarge gray cloak. It was a bit wrinkled-up from being shoved in Cassie's pocket, but it was good for the situation.
"Thanks," and Jesse quickly tossed the thing over her shoulders, her uppermost set of arms reaching up and doing the clasp, finishing moments before the cloak fully settled over her shoulders.
"Why did that look kind of cool?" Stacy asked, grinning a bit as she regarded the screen.
"Because I'm fabulous, of course," and Jesse struck a ridiculous pose that proceeded to send most of the teen-aged viewers into a fit of giggles and making the older ones roll their eyes with repressed grins. (Except for Soren and Ivor, who were grinning openly. Man, for two people who didn't get along at all in Episode 3 and 4, they sure had a lot of things in common.)
"Alright, hang back a bit, guys," and she turned around, the cloak swishing around with her movement, "I'm gonna go try to talk to him."
"Okay, just-" Petra paused, concern written over her face. "Be careful," she finished, a bit gruffly.
Lukas nodded in agreement. "Yeah, I mean- there's still a lot about this place we don't know."
Harper mumbled something like "You're telling me" under her breath.
Jesse gave them a cheerful thumbs up (making half of the audience grin), before walking towards the guy, who'd stopped at a chest and was rummaging through it. "Um, hi there," she said cheerfully as she approached, rubbing her head slightly awkward.
The guy just kept rummaging through the chest.
"Well, that's... rude," Lizzie mumbled, frowning a bit.
"Um, hello?"
Still nothing.
"This guy's got some nerve, ignoring a 17-year-old girl like that," Magnus grumbled to Gabriel, who nodded a bit.
"Agreed."
Harper swallowed, fists clenching in her lap, making Ivor glance at her- and then start a bit. Harper was extremely pale right now. And she looked just like she was about to throw up.
He reached over and touched her arm, making her eyes slide over to him, still looking sick to her stomach. "Are you... all right?" he asked, softly.
Harper opened her mouth. Paused. Closed it. And then shook her head slightly.
"No."
"Er, my friends and I could just use-" The man now looked up and turned to face Jesse as she drew almost level with him-
With a set of glowing, red eyes.
Half of the audience let out shocked yells, while the other half flinched a bit. Lukas's grip had abruptly tightened on Jesse, while Jace had jumped and clonked his skull right into Petra's chin. Ivor's arm instinctively tightened on Harper's, making the other woman wince, while Stampy had tried to jump into Dan's arms, Dan had tried to dive behind Stampy, and the two of them ended up on the floor in a tangled heap somehow. Hadrian and Mevia had both jumped and clonked heads, while Cassie had let out a shriek and hidden her face in Aiden's shoulder. Milo had instinctively grabbed the Founder's arm and tugged her over the back of the couch as well in alarm.
"GAH!" Jesse screamed onscreen, jumping back, tripping over her feet, and then landing on her back, propping herself up on her elbows and gaping at him as the man simply swiveled on the spot and walked away, the big red chip blinking on the back of his head painfully obvious. "Who the- what- huh?!" she stuttered out, green and red eyes the size of tea saucers.
Ivor skidded to a stop next to her, hauling her up to her feet and checking her over frantically, the girl still gaping after the man. "Oh dear- did you get hurt? Are you alright?" he asked.
"Y... yeah, I'm... I'm okay," Jesse eked out, eyes wide as she kept staring after him.
Cassie skidded to a halt on her other side, making Jesse glance over at Cassie. Cassie was blinking rapidly, hands trembling as she held her axe at the ready. "Did something go wrong? Do I need to hurt someone?"
Harper let her eyes shut, Ivor's grip on her arm firm.
Yes, something had gone wrong.
"There is something," Jesse spoke shakily, "very, very, very wrong going on here... we need to help these people."
Before anyone could say anything else, the screen switched so that the audience was viewing the group from farther away. A familiar set of clothes came dashing across the screen before doing a slider to the base of a staircase, Jesse's head snapping around to look at it just in the nick of time to see her slide to the staircase and then dash up it, leaving a small dust cloud in her wake.
"Harper?" Otto blinked. "Was that you?"
"Jesse?"
The spider hybrid looked back to her friends, blinking. "Someone just ran into that house... whoever they are- maybe they've got some answers." And with that, Jesse dropped to all eights and ran towards the house, the others following some distance behind. She whipped back to her feet as she skidded to the base of the stairway and then dashed up the stairs, before coming to a stop at the top of the staircase.
The screen shifted to show someone very, very familiar rummaging through a chest, muttering to herself.
Harper's eyes widened a bit.
"Um... h-hello...?" Jesse asked slowly, as the woman slowly stood up, holding...
... quite a few of the chips?
They were blinking, too.
"What the heck? Why are they just sitting around in a chest in someone's house?" Em asked, looking a little disgruntled.
"Yes, that, um... that looks a bit frightening to be decorating a house with," Isa said, wincing a bit.
The figure turned enough to reveal HARPER, holding an armful of the chips.
A/N: Haha! Yes! This is fun!
Lol I sound like Ivor with his 'adventure' xD xD xD
Congrats to giriri and LittleAngelbun for getting the entire list correct! You two get a oneshot/picture/animatic of your choice! x3 Just shoot me a PM or comment what you'd like, and I'll get on that as soon as possible!
RQTC: Have you ever heard a song and listened to it and then just abruptly started crying?
Yes. Multiple times.
azzhoe: Yes, yes you do.
giriri: Correct!
Toni42: Hehehe xD
LunarStarsMoons: (hugs) It's fine, don't worry.
AquaK13: Hehehe xD Yes indeedy. / No, otherwise I'd have mentioned you... / Hehehehe xD / Bai!
Dr . MKNoble: Yes, yes, and yes... that's not all, though. / Thank you! :3
LittleAngelbun: YEP!
That's all for now. Wow, I updated fairly quickly after the last one got put up... welp, hope you enjoyed!
BAI!
x.X. A.L. X.x
