The three of them walked into Endercon. They hadn't even gotten three feet past the initial 'gate' of the convention when Evie could hear the beat of the music booming through the area, vibrating through their feet a little- even from this distance from the actual source of the music.

"Let me know if you see Reuben anywhere," Jesse said, green eyes flicking over the area of the convention that they'd already entered with worry.

"Don't worry, Jesse, I'm sure he's fine," and Evie would've reached out to pat Jesse on the back reassuringly, even getting so far as to raise her hand and hover it over Jesse's back by a couple inches, before deciding against it- they really didn't know each other that well, after all- and lowering it again. "He's gotta be in here somewhere."

Despite Evie's attempt at reassuring Jesse, the black-haired girl's shoulders just sagged a little bit. "I sure hope you're right..."

"So," Petra spoke up, making Jesse and Evie both swivel to look at the redhead, "when we're making the deal, I need you guys to... let me do the talking. Okay?" And she shot them a quick grin.

Jesse didn't say anything for a moment- maybe to emphasize that she wouldn't be doing any talking, maybe she was still preoccupied over Reuben.

Evie glanced over at Jesse's face to see the girl's green eyes narrowed slightly in worry as she looked over at Petra.

Maybe it was both.

"I just... don't want anything to screw this up," Petra added a moment later, taking both Evie and Jesse's silence as maybe disagreement, or confusion.

"Sure," Jesse agreed, giving Petra an agreeing smile, "I'll let you handle it."

Evie gave a weak little thumbs' up and a small smile in agreement herself. She'd never been on a 'deal' before. Seemed kind of shady, but hey, she wasn't the one who usually did this thing. Petra did. And if Petra knew what she was doing, well, who was Evie to argue?

"And, if you want to be really useful," Petra suggested, "try looking intimidating."

"Petra, I already said this, I am literally as far from intimidating as I can get..."

Evie's weak little reply was cut off by Jesse turning to Petra a bit, still walking forward. "Like this?" she asked, voice holding a note of being eager to please Petra, and she punctuated the question by glaring at Petra and flexing her arms a little bit, letting out a little growl.

Evie shook her head a little bit, unable to hide a smile at that. Even when she was trying, Jesse didn't look intimidating. Like, at all.

"I'm... less scared-of-you, than scared-for-you," Petra replied simply.

Evie didn't even try to look intimidating for Petra's scrutiny. She was about as intimidating as a waffle. And unless you've got a phobia of waffles, that's really not intimidating at all.

"Jesse!"

The three girls turned to see the burly guy with the thick-looking green hoodie walking up, a little ways behind the shorter-but-still-taller-than-Jesse girl with curly black hair. Weren't they on Evie's team?

Upon being reminded of her team for the second time in an hour, Evie's eyes did a quick scan over Endercon. Nope, no sign of them anywhere. For now.

"And... Petra?" Olivia asked, sounding a bit confused.

"And... someone else," Axel added, his eyes shifting over so that he was regarding Evie with confusion.

"Hey. You guys know Petra. My new super-close friend." Evie was pretty sure Jesse was trying to sound cool. Unfortunately, she was failing miserably. Oddly enough, this was enough to put Evie at ease a little bit. At least she knew she wasn't the only dork here. "We're super-close now."

Olivia and Axel both looked at Jesse with deadpan expressions, while Petra slapped her palm to her forehead. Evie just hid her smile a bit sheepishly- being new to this group, she didn't feel like she really had the right to laugh at Jesse.

Jesse rubbed the back of her head after a moment, giving them all a sheepish smile. "I- ran into her while I was looking for Reuben. Oh, and this is Evie." She gestured at the girl with wavy black hair and amber eyes, who automatically stiffened under the sudden scrutiny from the other two before giving them a little wave and smile.

"Um, hi."

"Hey," Olivia replied, giving her a polite-enough nod, while Axel vaguely gave her a wave in her direction before turning to face Jesse with a sympathetic look.

"Couldn't find him, huh?"

"He'll turn up sooner or later, I just know it," Olivia spoke, but her voice faltered and it looked as though she were trying to convince herself of the fact.

Jesse jerked her head over her shoulder at Evie. "She's the one who ran off to go find him back at Endercon too. We found him, but before we knew what was happening, we were under attack by a zombie horde. I told him to run... it was for his own good." Now even Jesse sounded like she was trying to convince herself of the fact.

Axel paused, as if a thought had just occurred to him, before glancing over at the redhead. "What were you doing in the woods, Petra?"

"Nothing," Petra spoke casually, shooting a glance in Jesse and Evie's direction as telling them to not say anything. "Just... drawn by the sound of Jesse and Evie's high-pitched screams."

"They weren't that high-pitched," Jesse complained a bit.

Evie gave a self-deprecating shrug. "We would've been spider bait if she hadn't found us." She thought about mentioning her lucky hoe, but judging from the expressions both Jesse and Petra had given her earlier upon mentioning her lucky hoe (what was wrong with a lucky hoe? There was nothing wrong with lucky hoes), she decided not to.

"Sorry we didn't come with you, Jesse," Axel apologized, his expression growing more sober. (Sober as in serious. Not the other meaning.)

"But, hey, we won!" Olivia exclaimed in an overly bright tone, as if trying to sound optimistic, and as if that was some sort of cue, all three of them turned to stare up at the huge Enderman statue. Redstone sparks shot off behind it, and its purple stained-glass eyes glowed a bit.

It was... actually very realistic, despite being made out of wool and a few blocks of purple stained glass.

Axel's smile collapsed after a moment. "Abandoning friends in their time of need paid off yet again."

"Very lifelike," Evie spoke up, deciding to try to take their minds off of the whole thing so that they didn't just spend the entire evening feeling guilty. "I'm a little nervous to make eye contact with it."

Paradoxically, when Evie knew she wasn't supposed to look at something, she got an uncontrollable urge to peek at it anyways.

Olivia's smile also faded. "I still wish I'd gotten that part in the back to look better."

"I could've fit more fireworks in there... somewhere."

"Hey, I like it!" Evie paused from where she'd splayed out her hands for emphasis, amber eyes flickering up to the sky thoughtfully. "I mean, I don't actually know how much that counts for it. But you guys won, so other people liked it too!"

Jesse grinned, clapping Evie on the back. "Yeah, Evie's right. I'm proud of you guys!" she exclaimed, giving her teammates a cheerful smile.

"Awww, shucks," and Axel gave them both a little smile.

"Don't make me blush." Olivia paused, her expression growing more playfully serious a moment later. "Seriously. Don't."

There was a momentary pause as they processed this, before Petra spoke up, lightly, "Hey, Jesse, Evie, it's time to to see about that... thing."

Evie couldn't really talk, but subtlety didn't seem to be Petra's strong suit.

Jesse looked confused for a moment, before her eyes widened in comprehension. "Oh. Right. The- thing."

Apparently, it wasn't Jesse's either.

"Subtle," Olivia told her.

"Yeah-?"

"As a punch to the face."

Evie had to hide another grin at that. Olivia was nice and sarcastic, it seemed, despite the almost childish-hairstyle she sported.

Olivia let a slight smile come over her face at that a moment later anyhow. "Axel and I were going to head into Endercon anyway. See you in there?" she asked, casually enough.

"I heard there was free cake near the map booth!" Axel said cheerfully, as if that decided the whole thing. Olivia subtly rolled her eyes at him, although she didn't say anything.

Evie's grin grew even more. Yes, she definitely liked Olivia.

The two of them moved off, Petra watching them, before leaning over to the other two girls and pointing off at an alley near the entrance- one that was dark and, frankly, slightly creepy-looking. "Hurry- we're supposed to meet in that alley over there."

Yes, that seemed about right.

"Dark," Jesse whispered, as they followed Petra deeper into the alley, "dark. Very dark in here."

"You said it," Evie mumbled, glancing around them nervously. She might live in a cave, but even THAT was better lit than this alleyway. Seriously- mobs that spawn in the dark could spawn in this particular alleyway. Within the boundaries of EnderCon. Wasn't that a bad idea?!

Petra suddenly came to a halt, which caused Jesse to come to a halt, which caused Evie to run right into Jesse's back by accident. Evie felt her cheeks turn pink in embarrassment as she mumbled a weak apology. The alley had widened into an area that was better lit than the actual alley itself, before tapering again into another alley a little ways down.

"That's... weird," and Petra put her hands on her hips as she surveyed the alleyway, "he said to meet him at the dark, creepy alley close to the gates, but he's not here."

It was hard to see Petra in the darkness, but Evie was about ninety percent sure that Petra was being dead serious about this.

"Maybe he's late," Petra finished, putting her hands on her hips.

"Are you sure that this is the dark... creepy alley that he meant?" Jesse asked, hesitantly.

The redhead shifted a bit, making a thoughtful sort of humming sound. "I... was. Okay, new plan," and she turned around to give the other two a decisive look. "You two stay here just in case this is the spot he meant, and I'll look around. I guess I could've heard him wrong." Petra paused, eyes narrowing in slight worry. "Then again, I've never gotten a meet-up spot wrong before."

Jesse gave Petra a thumbs' up and a weak smile, giving Evie next to her a slightly nervous grin. "Sure. We'll hold down the fort. Right, Evie?" And Jesse immediately shot Evie a look- the sort of look that said that as long as Evie was there, she'd be able to stay in this dark, creepy alley.

Which was... kind of flattering, but Evie thought maybe the trust that Jesse was apparently placing in her was a bit misplaced.

"Sure. Cool. Yeah." Evie blushed a little at the three different answers she'd just provided. Petra was nice enough to not point out that only one answer was required, or the fact that Evie was now pinker than the inside of a watermelon.

"Thanks, guys." The redhead was already starting to walk away. "I'll be back before you know it. If he shows up while he's gone, just stall for me."

"Stall for you. Okay, sure," Evie said, slightly weakly, as Petra disappeared out of the alley. "Can do."

She almost wanted to call the redhead back and point out that Petra had said that all she had to do was stand there and be quiet. She was pretty sure this wasn't in her job description, but...

... well, it was a little odd. She'd barely met Petra, and yet she already felt rather eager to please the redhead.

Well, but that was probably just Evie trying to be the amicable person she usually was, so maybe it wasn't that weird.

"Ahem."

Jesse let out an alarmed yell and leaped back, straight into Evie. Evie, who was not expecting the sudden movement, flinched herself, staggered backwards, and managed to full-out slam her spine and the back of her head into a brick wall.

It took a great amount of mental concentration to keep herself from swearing loudly.

"And just who might you two be?" A man with long black hair that hung to his shoulders and a beard, pale skin that was almost sallow, and narrowed dark blue eyes stepped into the light, which threw slightly dramatic shadows over his face.

Jesse cleared her throat after a minute, straightening up and sending him a glare to match his. "The name's Jesse," she said, almost coldly. "What's it to you?"

Evie gave a feeble wave, still more focused on her throbbing head than the whole situation unfolding in front of them.

"I'm supposed to meet with Petra, not whatever you two are supposed to be," the man nearly snarled, eyes narrowing even further.

"A... human being?" Evie meekly asked.

To her credit, Jesse's glare turned into a slightly odd expression- something that was between a grin and a scowl- at the tentatively asked question as she snorted, although the man's expression didn't change. Then again, Evie had asked the question extremely quietly, so maybe he hadn't heard the comment.

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't just walk out of here right now," the man threatened the two of them.

Jesse's expression recomposed itself into a more defensive expression, as she crossed her arms. "We're with Petra."

"My deal is with her, not her partner," the man snapped.

"She'll be here. But... we can get started without her."

Evie's head immediately snapped around to stare at Jesse with a completely befuddled expression. We can?

"Do you have the skull?"

Immediately, Jesse's confrontational manner dropped, the slightly-shorter girl stepping back almost automatically with a deer-caught-in-headlights expression on her face. "Well- Uh-"

Despite the fact that Evie's role in the whole matter was to stay quiet, judging by the slightly panicked expression on Jesse's face, if Jesse kept doing all the talking, this guy might actually follow up on his threat and walk out of the alleyway, and despite how shady Evie thought this was, she was pretty sure Petra wouldn't be too happy if they messed up the deal.

So, being the extremely eloquent person that she was (that was sarcasm, by the way. Really, really heavy sarcasm), Evie decided to speak up.

"Uh, no, we don't have the skull. I mean, we do. I mean-" Evie mentally slapped herself in the face. This was going so well already, wasn't it? "Well, we don't-" She hastily gestured at herself and Jesse, just in case her point wasn't clear- "but Petra does. She'll be here soon. In a minute. Yeah."

The man stayed silent for a moment, staring at Evie silently as if he was trying to decipher her hastily-blurted words, before shrugging slightly. "Well, as long as she's coming... I suppose it won't kill me to wait a little longer."

The three of them proceeded to lapse into an uncomfortable silence that lasted for at least a minute. And sixty seconds doesn't seem like a long time, so let me assure you- when you've got a slightly-creepy guy staring at you with hard eyes expectantly with someone you don't know all that well standing there next to you, believe me- it's a long time.

"Ivor!"

The man immediately turned a bit, his expression softening into a more pleased one. "Ah. There she is."

Evie mentally breathed the biggest sigh of relief ever as Petra came strolling back into the alley, sounding casual. "Sorry for being late. But good things are worth waiting for." Her expression became more serious, almost business-like, a moment later. "I've got what you asked for-"

"If," Jesse spoke up, suddenly galvanized by Petra's reappearance, "you have what you promised us."

It was a bit difficult to put what was going through Evie's mind in words in the common English language, but it was something like this:

What Jesse no gah.

(Although 'gah' is not a word in the English language.)


A/N: Oh boy. Jesse, what are you doing? xD

Evie is clearly having a small panic attack with Ivor's appearance and having to speak. Really was not in her job description. xD

Responses to reviews will start being posted next chapter! (If I get any, haha.)

x.X. A.L. X.x