Hello, this is Pastrinator64 with another chapter from Hourglass! Lately I've been reading The Glitch over for some inspiration, and MAN! It sure has been working miracles. I haven't forgotten the good ol' days when I first started Fanfiction and almost fainted from my success. That was back when one of the highest review counts on a MC fanfic was 75. *nostalgic sigh*
It's been a real hard grind trying to get these heroes on the road. I was sorta sick of being stuck in the Palace of 0. That's why it's so much easier to talk from the other characters' point of views.
Anyway, time for the replies!
Replies to Reviews
Aerionsrealm: Hey, buddy! It's been a while, hasn't it? So, what's new?
Nwinds: 1. Ah, okay.
2. I found what you were looking at and fixed it. Thanks! I can always count on you for this kind of thing.
3. Got it! "Bye bye and good day!"
4. Maybe. I'd have to look into it a bit. The mobs I mentioned earlier were old ideas I had when I first started playing—just some stuff I wanted to see in Minecraft.
5. Yup! That's the gist of it. XD
6. (Answered in QAA)
7. Nuking it is a good way to describe my impact, yes. Fourth wall breaking is the best!
8. (Answered in QAA)
More on topic to the story, we're finally getting on with things! The quest is going to begin! *le excitement*
Now, let the story commence!
Chapter 9: Life is Like an Hourglass
After being informed of the possible satanic dangers ahead, the heroes found themselves standing in front of Farixz once more. Not only Farixz, but Serisdo and Thorvon as well. Norman was watching Serisdo closely, trying to read his expression. He'd seen the Spirit make a beeline for the door to that hourglass room not so long ago; he didn't like to admit it, but he was a nosy guy. He needed to know what was going on.
"Heroes: Norman Cobweb, Liz Cobweb, Adrian Grass, Kelsey Ice, and Astrid Silverfishstone, your quest begins in a matter of minutes. You each are well-aware of what lies ahead for you to conquer, so you are in no need of another lecture from me. Although, there is one thing I must give you before I send you on your way."
Farixz held out a wing to Norman, who approached immediately. In a small burst of light, an hourglass appeared there. It looked relatively generic, though its sand was colored a grassy green, clashing with the brown wood of its body. Norman understood. It was Minecraft's colors. Same as its widely-recognized emblem.
Farixz let the small hourglass fall into Norman's outstretched hand. Norman grasped it, the wood feeling cool to the touch.
"I have failed to mention one crucial piece of information. The Arabaloca shall reach the Minecraft Dimension in exactly thirteen days, four hours and nine minutes. This hourglass represents your life's time, you see, so as soon as every grain of sand reaches the bottom, the Glitch will prevail. This occurs the instant your time runs dry, so I caution you to mind your time limit."
Norman nodded in all seriousness, secretly hoping that they even had enough time. They'd really have to push themselves to get where they were going in that short amount of time.
Kelsey and Adrian looked mortified, actually. Their first quest in Minecraftia had taken them weeks to complete. Now they only had, what, eleven days and something-something hours? Astrid was the only one who looked relaxed since she had joined them later in the last journey. She noticed everyone's dismay and looked around her.
"What? Eleven days seems okay to me." she commented.
Norman slid the hourglass into a side pocket of his Blockpack and then returned his gaze to Farixz.
"Is this it, then? You're going to send us back into Minecraftia?"
Farixz nodded, but also smiled. This shocked Norman, what with all the seriousness in his tone from earlier.
"I sense doubt in you, Norman. In fact, I sense doubt in all of you, even if it is the tiniest bit. Remember to count on one another to complete this vital task. Remember that you are not alone. The combined power of many shall always overshadow that of an individual. Keep this in mind as you venture off into the unknown."
Farixz lifted his wings above his head; Serisdo and Thorvon followed suit. Norman, as well as the other four of his companions, was surprised by the blindingly bright flash of silver light that issued from the almighty Spirits In Between. They were forced to close their eyes in order to keep from going blind, and moments later they felt themselves being lifted off the ground.
"Your time...starts...now."
When the lights in the Palace of 0 throne room dissipated, our five favorite protagonists were gone, not a trace of them left. Only Vanessa remained, standing further away from the Spirits so that she wouldn't have been transported as well. The three Spirits lowered their wings and floated directly towards her, startling her a little. The three of them stopped a mere meter from Vanessa, staring down at her.
"Mastermind!"
Almost instantly, a swirling black and white vortex brewed above them, spitting the Mastermind out onto the ground. He used his twisted snake staff to push himself to his feet, walking over to them with a slight bounce. While twirling his staff in hand like a baton, he looked down at his new pupil with joy.
"Ah! Vanessa, it looks like it's time to head out! You and I are going to be spending some quality time together, see. Eeheeheeheehee!"
The Mastermind held out his staff to Vanessa and said,
"Now! Just slide your hand inside one of my pet's mouths and we'll be off!"
The ends of the staff transformed into Clamatis and Ridere's heads, the black and white snakes of sorcery...kind of a mouthful. They both hissed at her, then opened their mouths extremely wide. Vanessa gritted her teeth in disgust.
"You want me to put my hand in one of THOSE things? You're crazy!"
The Mastermind rolled his moon/sun eyes and gave a disappointed sigh.
"Fine, then. Just grab onto their tongues and we'll be off."
"Wait, how do I—"
Without warning, both Ridere and Clamatis launched out their tongues and wrapped them around Vanessa.
"OH, THAT IS SO GROSS!"
Poof! In an instant, Vanessa, the Mastermind and his snakes disappeared into thin air.
Norman could feel himself drifting in between dimensions. It felt like he was being carried by a swaying ocean wave, but dry. When he opened his eyes, the feeling around him disappeared. He landed on something else, something hard and cool, like rock.
"Norman?"
With some effort, Norman propped himself up on his elbows. Liz lay next to him, looking a little dazed from the travel.
"Where'd we land?" she asked him, blinking to clear up her vision.
Norman looked around him. They were in a tunnel near the surface; the way out was a mere twenty blocks away, slightly above them. The stone was a bit lighter-colored than regular stone, plus it let off a very faint but cold aura.
"This is some freaky stone," commented Astrid, who was already up and walking around in the tunnel.
"Ooh...wow, what a headache." murmured Kelsey, squinting at her surroundings due to the sudden ache in the back of her head.
She stood up and straightened, stretching her arms. Adrian did the same; all of sudden, Adrian took a single look at the tunnel around him and his blood ran cold.
"Ohh, no...not a cave!"
"It's a tunnel, Adriot." muttered Astrid, snickering at her own insult.
Adrian's cheeks burned in annoyance and he grimaced at Astrid. Soon, though, his gaze landed at what lay below them; A MASSIVE, INTIMIDATING, PITCH-BLACK CAVE WITH A DEADLY DROP-OFF. Instantly, Adrian gulped and bolted in the other direction, towards the exit above.
"Fergit this place! Ah'm gettin' out!"
Adrian jumped up onto the nearby ledge and exited onto the sweet, sweet surface. Norman quickly followed behind, shouting,
"Adrian, we've got to make a plan first!"
Norman too reached the surface, finding Adrian just a few blocks away, staring out at something in the distance.
"Adrian, why...what are you staring at?"
Adrian lifted a quivering finger and pointed in the direction he stared. Norman turned his head a little and his mouth dropped at the sight of what lied ahead. A few seconds of pure shock later, Norman called out to the others,
"Guys? You need to come up here!"
Liz came up first, followed by Astrid and Kelsey.
"What's so important?" said Astrid cockily.
She walked up to Adrian's side and, with widening eyes, took in the sight with disbelief.
"Holy s***."
Once again, they'd landed themselves in the Aether, but this time everything was scarily different than the previous times they'd visited. The color scheme of everything had been changed. The many plants and assortments of colorful trees covering the floating islands had turned blood-red, dripping with black droplets of plasma. The grass was glowing red, the dirt pitch-black and giving off a dark dust.
Every mountain in sight had been reshaped to match the Glitch's terrifying head, conveying the evil eyes perfectly. Any mobs left on the floating islands were either completely silhouettes, like ghosts of their former living selves, or struggling against the mutations. It looked like all of the once massive floating islands had been broken apart, leaving many smaller islands in their place.
Even the air had changed. It was a very dark night out, though the clouds hovering below them were a dirty black, swirling and churning violently, letting out flashes inside that could've been lightning. A sour wind blew around them, adding further to the horrific and even saddening surroundings.
The entire Aether had been creepypastad by the Glitch.
"Oh Notch. What happened to this place?" muttered Astrid.
"It's the Glitch's territory now." said Liz, sadness in her eyes.
"Well, what now, then?"
Everyone turned around to see that it was Kelsey who'd just spoken up.
"Farixz did send us on a mission, didn't he? How are we supposed to get out of the Aether?"
Morgan leaned up against a tree and gasped for air, her heart heavy from what she'd just remembered. Who was she? Or, rather, what was she? She thought for sure she was human. Last time she checked was...wait a minute. She'd only woken up a few days ago, somewhere in a very thick woods around midnight. She'd survived just barely using her fists to ward off the evil creatures that kept following her; she eventually fell asleep after hiding away inside a tree.
When she woke up, something was rustling underneath her. Her instincts had told her to get up and run from whatever it was, and thank Notch they did, because she narrowly missed behind choked by what she thought had been a possessed vine. Seeing that massive plant monster usually would've been enough to knock her out cold, but for some reason she just started running, finding enough strength to keep going until she reached that stupid jungle.
After that, she was captured by the creepy Venus flytrap thing and taken to its cave just so the thing could violate her. It was her scream that brought the stones from the ceiling down to kill it. Afterwards, all she remembered before passing out again was being stuck down in the cave for a long time before this funny-looking miner found her. Auconi? Yeah. And that pretty cute Australian boy Darcy. If only he didn't talk like a weirdo.
But still! Both of them were turning out to be kind of annoying, both the cutie and the dorky-haired one. She had to get away from them; now she was paranoid about ANYONE touching her. Now all she had in mind was to find that witch lady. If she was the one who...created her, then she would know the answers. That's all she wanted, was answers.
"Hey, Morgan?"
Morgan jumped and whirled around, finding Auconi standing there. He looked suddenly embarrassed and backed up a little.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you."
They stared at each other for a moment, eyes locked together. Morgan noticed something else weird about this boy. Besides his green hair, his eyes were a piercing blue. It was very unique. Wait a minute, was he blushing? He was just about to open his mouth and say something when Darcy came in from behind and tased him in the sides using his fingers.
"HA!"
Auconi yelped an unmanly little yelp and leapt away from Darcy, losing his balance completely and toppling off the walkway into the ocean water. Underneath the water, he screamed in frustration, letting it be covered up by the water in a just a loud gurgle. He broke the surface and gulped in air, hoisting himself back up onto the walkway. Now he was wet, embarrassed, and a couple notches beneath Darcy on the man-o-meter. AND Darcy was laughing at him.
"Smooth as sandpaper, Auconi! Ahahahahaha!"
Auconi was so angry that he charged at Darcy, grabbing onto his shoulders and launching the two of them into the water. Morgan would've thought this was funny, but she had too many things on her mind to be cheered up. Instead, she took this as an opportunity to get away from them. She just had to find answers.
With this in mind, Morgan ran off into the jungle ahead, unnoticed by both Darcy and Auconi. She just hoped that she would not become lost a second time.
"Does anyone happen to have any Glowstone in their packs?"
Everyone took off their Blockpacks and searched inside them. Each was completely empty except for their personal weapons. Astrid lifted her diamond sword out of her Blockpack and kissed it.
"Beautiful as always!"
Kelsey rolled her eyes at Astrid's enthusiasm and looked in her own Blockpack. All of a sudden, she realized she didn't even have a weapon. She thought she remembered having to use a sword once, but her Blockpack had no weapon to provide her with. Now she'd have to get another.
After an unnecessarily thorough check of their packs, everyone knew that Farixz hadn't been generous enough to provide them with the ONE BLOCK THEY NEEDED! Norman was getting kind of frustrated now. He knew the Glitch would detect them in an instant from where they stood. It was probably already residing in the Aether Palace so it could do some more evil plotting.
Adrian, along with everyone else, was pretty stumped on what to do. There really was no easy way out. It wasn't like they could just jump off the island and hopefully fall from the Aether into an Overworld ocean below. He knew well that there were interdimensional boundaries between interdimensional dimensions...that was a weird sentence.
Suddenly, the Glitch spoke to Adrian again, its voice resonating inside his head, thick with mischievousness.
"It's time for your first lesson, my little guinea pig!" whispered the Glitch, making Adrian shiver. "We might as well start off this quest with a bang! Something horrible to dampen everyone's spirits, why not? Especially your leader's! What to do...what to do..."
In the midst of his fear and dread, he felt a nudge from Kelsey next to him. He looked down at her quickly and met her concerned gaze.
"Adrian, are you alright? You look really pale."
He nodded and put on a fake smile.
"Fit as a fiddle, Kelse!"
Kelsey smiled sincerely at his funny southern talk and added,
"That's sounds more like the Adrian I know."
She turned back to face Norman, who was giving some kind of instructions. Adrian tried to listen, but he was still in wait for what the Glitch was going to say next. He was deathly afraid of the response, but it was coming soon...he knew.
"Aha! I've got the perfect idea! Adrian, wouldn't you say that a bomb is the perfect way to start off this quest with a bang? MWAHAHAHAHAHA! BANG! Sorry about that. Anyway, I want you to make sure that Ms. Cobweb finds herself trapped in a volatile situation, okay? And make sure it happens BEFORE you leave the Aether! I've got a front-row seat right here in my castle; I wouldn't miss it for the world."
Adrian's stomach churned at the idea. In thought form, he tried responding to the Glitch.
"How can ah make myself do this?! This just ain't fair, ya snake!"
"Life ain't fair, PARTNER. You don't have long, kid, otherwise I'll have Ben take over instead! Here, I'll even provide the weapon of choice!"
Adrian felt something shift inside his Blockpack and he swallowed hard. The bomb had already landed itself right inside his pack.
"Good luck! Have fun!"
"Hello? Is Adrian there? I'd like to speak with him."
Adrian snapped back to attention and looked straight into Norman's eyes, trying to keep from looking absolutely terrified and ready to wet his pants.
"Sorry, sir."
"Okay, I might've been an adult less than a week ago, but you can call me...Norman. Or partner. Whatever you want."
Despite all the horrible voices in his head, Adrian couldn't help but smile.
"Okay, partner!" he declared, bringing his real happy tone into his words.
"Now then! I think that there's only one way we'll be able to get back to the Overworld, but it certainly won't be a cakewalk. First, we'll have to locate the Aether Palace. Then, somewhere around the castle is the house of black and white wool that the Mastermind had been residing in back when he came up here and blackmailed Notch. THEN, all we have to do is find that Aether portal that you guys used to get into the Aether first. The first part will definitely be the most dangerous, though, so we'll have to be sneaky in order to make sure we're not detected by the Glitch."
Adrian mentally rolled his eyes and thought to himself,
"Well damn, it's too late for that..."
"In order to get to the Aether Palace, we'll have to wander a bit. I know it sounds dumb, but that's what we're probably going to have to do for this entire quest. We have no directions, so...all who have complete and solid block powers, please step forward."
For a moment, no one walked forward. Then Kelsey came forward after getting what he meant. Sure, she HAD a decent block power, but how was she supposed to use it? Astrid stepped forward as well, wrapping and arm around Kelsey and saying,
"Looks like we're the lucky ones, huh?"
Astrid laughed at her own sarcasm. She liked laughing at her own material, she found. Kelsey looked reluctant, though, because it was only a matter of time before everyone knew she was useless in the ways of block powers.
"In order to get across each floating island, we're going to need a walkway. Since we don't have time to forage a whole load of blocks that are probably now filled with deadly viruses, we're going to need someone's block power. The more we have to use, the better; that way, we won't have anyone pass out from exhaustion. Block power usage does take a toll on your energy when in excess, you know."
Astrid shrugged, saying,
"Well, just remember that if anyone breaks one of my blocks, the whole bridge'll come falling down. I'm not a Silverfishwhisperer, so..."
Norman paused for a moment, considering the dangers of trusting Astrid to keep them from all falling to their deaths. Then he turned to Kelsey, whose blood turned cold instantly.
"Kelsey? You have...?"
"Ice. Yeah, I don't think that's any safer. Someone could totally slip off, right?"
Norman took a sharp intake of breath through clenched teeth, not liking their situation. He knew both had their cons, but there was still an obvious choice when it came to their safety.
"Alright, Astrid, I guess it's your time to shine."
Astrid shrugged and walked forward, right up to the edge of the island.
"If you say so!"
Astrid crouched to keep her balance as she started placing monster eggs. They looked like plain stone blocks, only inside they held some not-so-nice creatures that were ready to swarm all at once at the first sign of danger. They were practically Cuccos in bug form.
Following behind Astrid came Norman, then Liz, and everyone else afterwards. They moved slowly so that they wouldn't fall off into the dark lightning clouds below. In the very back, Adrian was paranoid as heck. He had no idea when that Ben virus guy would take over his brain! It could be in an hour or a minute; that's what made it horrible to think about.
Five minutes later, they reached the other slightly smaller island. Norman gazed out into the distance, looking for even a tiny bit of the Aether Palace. He kept walking forward, keeping his gaze facing forward, trying his best to ignore the mountains surrounding them, staring down at them nastily.
Once he reached the edge of the island, he still couldn't see any castles in the distance. He looked over his shoulder at Astrid, who was crossing her arms in wait.
"So, we close, or what? Five minutes of block power usage is making my hands ache." she asked impatiently.
Liz squinted far off into the distance, seeing if she could spot any sign of the palace. Absolutely nothing.
"Everything off in the distance looks like its shrouded in some kind of red mist."
Kelsey shivered; she felt kind of surrounded by the environment. It was a very foreboding feeling.
"This place is so creepy. Let's just keep moving, alright? We don't have much time, remember? Even Farixz said our life is like an hourglass."
Norman sighed and reached back inside his Blockpack, pulling out the peculiar hourglass, staring at the green sand inside. It was very small and the grains of sand fell so slowly that it felt like they had all the time in the world. Well, that was a lie by all accounts. They had almost no time.
Morgan ran through the wild nonstop for about five minutes, and then took a quick break. Catching her breath, she let herself slide down up against a jungle tree, vines cushioning her back a little.
She paused, lowered her eyebrows in sudden thought, and reached behind her, fingering the vines. She stood up and turned around to face the green-stripped tree. She then realized that she had absolutely no clue where she was. AND she'd been in such a hurry that she'd forgotten to snatch some supplies before she left.
"Stupid, stupid, stupid!" she muttered to herself, slapping her forehead.
Morgan looked up at the jungle tree leaves high above her head and muttered to herself a second time.
"Well, might as well know where the hell I am."
She started climbing, using the vines like ropes. She hated to touch what was now her least favorite block, but she really wanted to figure SOMETHING during her dumb journey. She climbed for a full two minutes before finally reaching the top. She broke the last block of leaves with her fist and jumped up onto the top of the tree, now able to look out over a lot of the jungle. She was up in one of the highest trees.
Morgan, despite never really finding much liking in nature, stared in awe at the beauty of the jungle. She could even just barely see a plains biome somewhere off northwest of her. The jungle's trees were much taller where she was, though they became gradually shorter as you went northeast. It was a sight to remember, that was for sure.
"I can't hang around here, though," she thought, "I've got to find that witch lady."
But before she could even start to get back down to the jungle floor, something very strange happened. A thunderstorm started brewing, but only in one spot. Just within her range of sight, dark clouds formed and began to churn, right around where the trees got shorter in the northeast area. A lightning bolt came down suddenly, only it looked slightly different. It was golden.
"Aha!"declared Morgan, a new idea in mind. "That's gotta be a sign!"
Morgan jumped back down into the hole she'd made in the tree, climbing hastily back down the tree's vine wall. Once she hit the ground, she kicked it into high gear and ran as fast as her legs would take her, following the storm far off in the distance. Now she HAD to find out what was going on.
Golden lightning?! Well, it can't be Rexum, obviously, so...who? The witch lady? Maybe?
Anyway, on with QAA!
To the Glitch:Pikachu! THUNDERBOLT!
*zaps the Glitch with 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 volts*
The Glitch: Do your mortal people have no end to your insolence?! All earthly attacks are obsolete against me! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
To the Glitch: You are an idiot for logical reasons of which EVERYONE, save you, should understand.
The Glitch: Sure, sure. Give me an example and then I might humor you. And even if I AM an idiot, I am still an IMMORTAL idiot! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
To Phil: You do have family, right? Have them work alongside ya—one solution when Pastrinator64 likes the 4th wall to a nuclear testing ground. Or bunker buster missile testing.
Phil: I have a wife and children, yes. It's just that, well, my wife is too busy in her business back on Earth, and my son is too lazy to get up out of bed and find himself a decent college. He's also back on Earth. Yeah, I'm sorta alone with my purpose.
To the Blaze: Gives translator, and asks question again.
The Blaze: What, you want me to just give away my limbs so you can make'm into some machine? As if.
To Liz: Don't you need everything you can get to defeat the Glitch? Btw they will not hurt you or any of your friends and they are 20% more powerful than the Glitch and they defy all logic but safe for you. :D
Liz: Yes, but...alright then. I'll give it a try, but I'm not sure I want to show them to Norman quite yet. You shouldn't have put them in his Blockpack! I had to take them out quick before he saw them. He'd think it was a trick by the Glitch or something along those lines.
And now for another Sugar Lords snippet! Enjoy!
In a matter of two more hours, Pastrinator64 and the gang finally made it back to the brown-clouded area above Malloward. Pastrinator64 quickly used his sugar-level x-ray vision to scan the area. All glucose levels showed normal consistencies. Nothing out of the ordinary here.
"Hey, Pasty! There's something out of the ordinary here!"
ILTRTGS was hovering twenty feet from where Pastrinator64 was. He hovered on over to her and took a look at the thing that was in her hands. It really was an out-of-sorts object. It looks like a...brain of some sort. Gross. Pastrinator64 picked it up and examined it, still maintaining a bit of a disgusted expression.
"Yeah, that's really gross. Anyway, what do you think this is?"
"A brain." interjected Pikale.
"Well, no der. I mean, who does it belong to?"
Nwinds, being the genius he was, tried to read the mind in front of them all. When he finished thirty-two and a half seconds later, he raised his head and looked directly at Pastrinator64.
"It looks like this belonged to that monster we fought earlier. It was kind of hard to identify, but there's no doubt now."
Everyone gasped. The thing was about the size of a kid's basketball! Absolutely tiny for a monster of that size.
"Gee, it must've been one stupid alien." commented Enderdude, looking amused.
Nwinds shook his head and explained.
"Actually, this alien intelligence far surpasses what we have. It knows things outside of this world. Literally, I mean. You know, if I studied this a bit harder, we might be able to use it to locate this creature's origin. This would provide us some of the answers we've been looking for, don't you suppose?" he said, looking back at Pastrinator64.
Pastrinator64 paused, thinking it over, but then nodded in agreement.
"You're right! Well, no time to waste! Get studying!"
Really?! Some legit answers?! No way!
Well, that's all for now! I hope you enjoyed chapter number nine, and I'll see you all LATER!
This is Pastrinator64, your fellow writer and reader, signing out!
*throws sugar bomb and disappears behind its cloud of fine white sugar*
...Goodbye for now...
~Pastrinator64 [~]