Wow this is a little overdue. What has it been? A week I think. Man, school sucks I have had homework like you guys wouldn't believe. It all comes from the same f***ing teacher too!

Anyways, congratulations to CheetahLover12345 for her winning OC, Amanda. Good job Cheetah!

Now onto the chapter.

Chapter 2

Turtlelove POV

When I wake up, I'm sweating, shaking, and sobbing. The nightmares have hit every night for the past week. How many times have I watched Kitsune die? How many times have I wanted to know why I couldn't save her? How many times have I wanted to know where she is now? I like to think she's with Notch in the Ather, but I've liked to think a lot of lies lately.

I roll over in bed, trying to compose myself, when I feel some of the most intense misery I've ever felt. I get out of bed and go to my door. When I open it I find a quietly sobbing Kit laying in front of my door.

"Kit what happened?" I'm worried for her. In the time that I've known her, I know she's not one to cry in front of anyone, or alone for that case.

She's still crying when she says, "It's the village! It's been destroyed." She chokes up then continues. "Everyone is dead..."

I didn't think she could get closer to the ground than she already was, but she sinks down further, landing on her stomach. Burying her head in her hands she continues to cry. I sit down next to her, rubbing her back and saying soothing words until she stops. She's still on the ground, but since the sobbing had stopped, I figured I would try to get a little more information from her. How would I help her otherwise?

I spoke gently, "Do you know what happened, or how it was destroyed?"

"I was out after curfew when I wasn't supposed to be because I was hungry and I had found an apple tree not far from town earlier. When I came back with my apple I was just about to walk into town when I saw them. Three people, dressed in long, black robes so you couldn't see their faces, came into town riding really big, black wolves. They looked like they had just been to Hell and back. I watched them as they slowly rode into town, and stopped in the center. That's when they did something I couldn't believe.

They all turned to face outward, creating a triangle, and joined hands. Then a small, glowing ball of light started to form in the center of them. It got bigger, and bigger, and bigger until it was high above their heads in a huge, fiery blaze. Then they let go of each others hands and it blew up. Fire went everywhere at once. Houses were destroyed almost instantly. Anyone that got out of their house in time just got killed by either one of the men, or their dogs which they had gotten off of when the ball exploded. They didn't seem to be burned though. They were just fine slaughtering every last person in my village. They never saw me hiding in the trees. When everyone was dead they just got back on their dogs and left like nothing in the world had just happened.

That's when I came out of the trees and saw everyone I knew, laying in a helpless heap. Stacy, Hannah, my own parents! Every last one gone because a couple of assholes rode in on their giant dogs and played with fire."

I sit next to her, taking in what I had heard. Everyone was dead? Even Hannah? The thought made me sick. Everything that this child had seen, all could easily be someone's worst nightmare. For her, the nightmare was reality. Then I realized something about those people I should have thought of the moment she talked about them. They had been in all black, had the ability to control fire, and were riding huge, black wolves. There's only one place they could have come from.

"Kit, did they leave behind a black fog when they left?"

She thinks for a second. "Actually, they did. The entire village was in this dark fog. It reminded me of ash sort of, but ash isn't that dark."

I was right. They came from the Dark Dimension.

"Kit," I said. "Take me to the village."

/~Time Skip~\

"Oh god."

That's the only way to sum up what I see. The entire village is gone. Completely gone. Where so many houses were, there are now huge, still smoking craters. Bodies of all the people that had once lived here-Stacy, Hannah, and others I didn't even recognize-lay dead in their own individual pools of blood. Then there's the smell. The smell of burned flesh, blood, death, and decay all intertwined to make such a horrible smell that I have to fight to keep my breakfast down.

I find Kit bent over a lady who looks to be in her later forties. She wears a simple, brown sundress, sandals, and has black hair and green eyes; the spitting image of an older Kit.

Kit sobs next to her. I can tell she's talking but it's muffled by her hands and sobs. All I can make of what she's saying is one word. "Mommy..."

Now I'm really in danger of crying. I don't know what Kit has witnessed but just seeing what's leftover makes me want to scream, or cry, or puke. So I can only imagine the pain she must be going through seeing as how she knows exactly how it happened.

That's when I look over toward the woods. Just within the trees is, from what I can tell, a wolfgirl hybrid. She reminds me of a bacca in build but that's where the similarities end. She has red fur covering her body. She also has the arms, ears, tail, and face of a wolf. She's standing there just within the trees, watching us but that's not why I'm scared out of my mind.

It would be hard to miss the arrow aimed at my heart.

Kitsune POV

I wake to the same incredible pain that I have woken up to for the past week. I've gotten fairly used to feeling like crap, but I'm surprised to be tied to a chair outside of my cell and in a different room. This one has light coming from a few small lamps stuck in the ceiling, and a window. A window! I almost have a fit when I see the real sunlight. Sunlight that I haven't seen in what feels like forever. I almost forget that I have been tied to a chair because I try to get up and walk to it. All I accomplish from this, is making my many bruises and cuts burn; bringing me back to reality.

Then the king of this realm walks in and I have to fight to keep from screaming every fowl name I know at the man. This man that took everything from me. This man that tried to KILL me. He stands before me, white eyes and all: Herobrine.

He comes close to me, so close that he could have only needed to move forward an inch and he would be kissing me.

"Where is she?" He asks quietly. I swear he spits on puppies and kills babies in his free time. In answer I spit in his face, which earns me a punch from, yours truly, Mr. Strong.

He's not amused. He stands back a little this time but asks the same question. "Where is she?"

I don't know to who he's referring to, so I shake my head in mock confusion. "Where's who, Herobrine?" I almost laugh at his face then. He's so easily angered, but I know better than to laugh. They'll beat me if I so much as breathe out of line.

"Turtlelove." He spits it like it's a threat. When he continues, he speaks each word slowly, purposely pronouncing each letter in turn. "Where. Is. She?"

"Who?" I almost coo. He asked Mr. Strong to leave and I knew I had crossed a line.

"You know damn well who you little bitch." I wince. He's yelling now with barely contained anger. He's been after Turtle since I got here. For what reason, I don't know but it must mean a lot to him if he's willing to put up with me.

I look him in the eyes as I reply. "You can break every bone in my body. You can threaten me, beat me, starve me, and yell in my face until I die, but you will never break me, and I'll never tell you where she is."

Herobrine was about to fire something back at me, but before he could he was interrupted by one of his goons opening the door to tell him something.

"What do you want?" He said to the goon.

The goon replied. "Sir, our knights have destroyed the village where she was spotted, but no one found her, or her remains."

I go into a complete fit snarling and growling at the two of them wishing they would die. There's only one person they call her, and they just destroyed an entire village, probably killing lots of people, just to find Turtle! I start thrashing in the chair, wild with rage. I'll kill them all. No one touches Turtle. No one.

Herobrine interrupts my rage with the only sliver of hope I've had in a while. "I told you, I don't want her dead! If she's wounded, fine, but dead and I'll kill all of you. Go!"

"Y-Yes, s-sir. Sorry s-sir." The goon quickly shuts the door and runs. Probably to tell the others that their blood lust will have to wait.

Herobrine eyes me with his white, soulless eyes. He smiles a smile that would make flowers wither and says, "You don't have to tell me where she is if you don't want to. I'll find her on my own." With that lovely thought, he leaves. Then Mr. Strong comes in and does something I don't expect, he still knocks me out, but before he does he mutters a small apology. The only sign of sympathy anyone has shown me in a week. No wonder he's never a leading contender in my daily beatings.

Turtlelove POV

I slowly try to get Kit off of her dead mother, keeping my eyes on the hybrid girl in front of me.

"Kit." I said softly. That's all I got a chance to say though because that's when she lets the arrow fly.

It all seems to happen in slow motion. I grab Kit and shove both our bodies into the ground, using my body to cover hers. The arrow goes over our heads and hits the chest of someone I didn't know had been behind me. He fell to the ground in a heap, and the girl came out of the woods.

"Glad you had the common sense to move." She said. "Any slower and that would have been you." She gestures to the body on the ground. "Reckon he was trying to murder you two. I'm just glad I got here on time."

I stare at her. Then look down at the crumpled body of the man who would have killed me had this girl not been here. He wears all black, and when I see the insignia on his knife I almost scream aloud. He came from the Dark Dimension. Just like the beast that killed Kitsune, the riders that destroyed this village, and now to add to the list, the guy that tried to kill me.

"T-Thanks." I stammer out.

The girl chuckles in a lighthearted, joking way, and replies, "I'm just kidding. I wouldn't have killed you. The worst thing that could have happened would have been you getting a small cut in your ear."

I glance back at the man and realize she's right. He was almost a full foot taller than me, and he had still been a couple of feet away from me when she shot him.

"Hi." She said. "I'm Amanda."

She extends her hand which I accept. "Turtlelove," I said and let my hand drop. "and this is Kit." Kit waves a hello at Amanda who waves back. I'm wondering as to why she's here because this village is history, and I'm pretty sure no one would want to be here. The place is a ghost town, but yet, here she is ready to save my life.

Kit, I can tell, trusts her completely because she has been talking to her for the past few minutes while I have been lost in my thoughts. Now they both get up, because they have been sitting, and Kit hugs her. After a moments hesitation, Amanda hugs her back.

I ask Amanda because I'm curious, "So why were you here? I mean, it's not like this is a popular area or anything."

"Well," Amanda says. "if you must know, I'm here because I heard those Notch forsaken demons had just come to this dimension," she gestures to her bow with a smile. "so I thought that I would pay them a visit. Apparently you guys beat me to it though."

She looks around like she's admiring the decorations in a house rather than a destroyed village. "Looks to me like a run for their money though. Those suckers must have put up quite the fight."

It was obvious she didn't know what had actually happened by the look on her face, so I looked to Kit to see if she wanted to tell her. Kit gave a small nod, and I spoke. "That's not exactly what happened here."

Amanda looks genuinely confused. "Well then what did happen?"

So we told her. We told her how the town had a fire, about how Kit had gone out after dark when everyone was in bed, about how when she came back and hid in the trees. We told her about the men on wolves, the big ball of fire, the giant explosion that destroyed everything, even that the dead woman next to us was Kit's mother. Amanda was quiet during the story, taking in everything we said. I even told about the suspisoin I had that they were trying to kill me. She only asked the occasional question like, "Could you really not see any of the men's faces?" or "Are you completely sure they were from that dimension?" When we finished the story, Kit was crying softly again. Amanda didn't say anything for a while, just stood there and watched me hold Kit until she stopped sobbing.

When Amanda spoke after what seemed like forever she said, "So what are you going to do?"

I think for a minute before I speak because I hadn't thought much about that yet. Eventually I said, "Well for starters, I'm moving. I won't take any chances staying here."

"I'm coming with you." Kit stated. "You won't go without me."

"Never." I said. "I would never leave you."

I hug her and Amanda speaks up. "I'll come with you." She said. "You never know when you'll need me to save your lives again." We all smile and it was decided.

We all were going together, to get as far from this place as possible. We went back to my little home to take it down. I wanted to keep the stuff from the house, but Amanda said we should travel light and we wouldn't need any of the stuff in there anyways. I still kept the painting of my mom and of Kitsune though because even though I know they're dead, I want to remember them forever.

/~Time Skip~\

We have been following Amanda through the woods for a while now. Kit asked me after we left my house, or the land it had been on rather, why the 'new girl' was a big, red wolf, and I told her that was just the way she was born. That she was born part wolf just like I was born part turtle, and Kitsune was part, well, kitsune. Then I remembered she didn't know who Kitsune was so that was the beginning of an extremely depressing conversation explaining who my dead best friend was.

Kit understood after a while though that it still bothered me so she let it drop. For a twelve year old girl, she knows a whole lot more than she lets on. I remember when I met her she was this small, innocent girl, she still is, but she has grown from that. She has learned the cruelty of the world at young age, and learned a lot.

Amanda stopped in a clearing and turned to us. "Considering how much you guys have been through, and I just asked you to walk all day through the woods, we can stop here for the night." With that she walked away to set up our small camp. I'm glad she's letting us stop because Kit started sweating quite a bit a while ago. Now she's swaying on her feet like she could fall over at the slightest touch. I scoop her up and carry her over to her own make-shift bed and lay her down. She goes to sleep almost immediately. As I sit on my own bed, I start to think about Kitsune and wonder, once again, where she is now. She's in the Ather. I tell myself. She's in the Ather with Notch and you won't see her again, so you should stop thinking about it. The voice in my head reasons with me, besides, you have Kit to take care of now. I lay down in my bed and go to sleep still wondering whether she's truly with Notch or not.

Herobrine POV

I'm so close. Every time, I'm so close. He'd been pondering this for hours now. How does she do it? How can she keep escaping me so quickly? He couldn't figure out why that turtle was so hard to catch. How was she not caught while in the village? He had sent his best men. The only ones that could destroy an entire village with a single ball of fire, besides himself of course.

"Lord, Herobrine," One of his men had returned from the two he had sent to the village after destroying it.

"Did you find her?" He asked his scout. Normally, he would have sent someone stronger than his scouts but considering she would probably notice someone bigger, he had decided on these two.

"S-she escaped, sir. Thomas is dead."

His men had failed once again. Not surprising. What was surprising though, was the fact that Thomas was dead. He was one of the best scouts he had! His next question was only one word long, but it was enough to send chills down the other scouts spine. "How?"

The scout answered slowly, "S-sir, Thomas almost had her sir, but a w-wolfgirl hybrid s-shot him, sir."

Herobrine shook his head slowly. There was always something. The giant couldn't get her because he was scared off, the fire demons that destroyed the town couldn't find her, and now, the best scouts he had tried to get her, and one of them ended up dead.

The other scout spoke again, "S-sir, I did see them though. They were heading towards Heaven's Glen sir."

Now this, this was an accomplishment. Normally, his men would come back to tell him they had failed and wouldn't know which way she had gone. So he would have to go to the trouble of tracking her down time and time again. But now, he had gotten somewhere. His scout had an exact location he could use to his advantage.

"Go. Take whomever you need. I want her found, and kept alive. Go!" He bellowed his instructions to the scout who hurried away to get his team together.

Soon, he would have her. No matter what happened, he had to get her eventually. Her gift was essential if he ever wanted to be immortal. She didn't know it yet, but she had the power to heal without her silly little potions. She had no idea what her power to read feelings meant yet, but everyday he didn't have her was another day that she could figure out what she had. Another day without her, and she could discover that power, and destroy him.

Turtlelove POV

I wake up what feels like moments after I feel asleep, and look around. I know I'm dreaming because if I wasn't I would be in the forest. Not in a jail cell. As I look I see that there aren't any windows, or lights, or anything really. It's just an empty cage. Then I see a huddled figure in the corner and I almost don't recognize her, but who could mistake that tail for anyone but Kitsune's? I start crying because I know I won't see her again when I wake up.

She speaks softly, her voice scratchy as if she hasn't spoken in ages. "Don't cry. We only have a little time before I have to go so pay attention." I nod in understanding and she continues. "You have to stay away from them. They're coming for you, and they want to capture you like me. You can't let them. They'll take you to Herobrine." She spits the name like a curse.

"Who? Who's coming?" I almost beg.

She coughs before continuing. "His men. Do you remember the one that tried to get you from behind the other day? When you were saved by Amanda?" I wonder how she knows this since she's never met Amanda, but I let it pass and nod. I do remember that day. "Well he wasn't alone. His friend came back to the Dark Dimension and told Herobrine where you guys are." She starts to get frantic. Yelling out everything. "You must not let them find you! They're coming to take you! You have to run, get away, and never come back!"

The image starts to fade and I know I'm waking up. I scream, and jump toward Kitsune to grab her, hug her, something. I don't make it though because as soon as I jump, I start falling as if there was never a floor on that cell, but that can't be because Kitsune is still huddled up in the corner. Before I wake though, I get a last glance of her cell, where a man walks in, pulls her up, and begins to beat her. I begin screaming and crying uncontrollably, wishing it could have been me instead of her. I go into a fit of pure rage and sadness as I continue my fall back to the forest.

When I wake up, I'm kicking, screaming, and crying my head off.

I still have my eyes closed, but the image of the man is burned into my eyelids. "Don't touch her!" I scream. "Stopitstopitstopitstopit!" Amanda is trying desperately to hold me down when I finally open my eyes and come to my senses. Kit is still on her bed, sitting up and staring at me wide-eyed. She looks as though I have truly frightened her. I slowly stop fighting Amanda, and quit screaming, but I'm still crying a little when she lets me go.

"Dude, you must have had one hell of a nightmare." Amanda says. "You started screaming like the world was ending! I woke up expecting a fight, but instead I find you, eyes shut tight, screaming at no one in particular to," She makes air quotes. " 'Stop touching her!' Kit almost ran into me trying to get away from your bed, so I had to get up and try to hold you down. What the hell has you all freaked out?"

I stare at the ground for a while. I don't want to tell her about my dream. It was to personal. Plus, I know now that Kitsune isn't dead, Herobrine is hunting me, and I basically have to run for my life the way Kitsune told me. "It was nothing." I said to Amanda. She gives me a look and I tell her that I had had a nightmare where I watched Kitsune die again. She doesn't look like she believes me, but she lets it go.

I know one thing though. One thing that I will promise to myself and to Herobrine. I will find the portal to the Dark Dimension, and I will save Kitsune from that man, and I will destroy Herobrine. Even if I don't live to see the end.