The fight begins
Herobrine roamed through his castle, completely relaxed and free of worry.
Why should he?
Everything here was peaceful and quiet, both inside and outside the castle.
It was just as it should be.
Herobrine smiled at this thought before opening a door and entering the library, where he immediately spotted Nuka sitting at the bottom of one of the shelves, reading a book with fascination.
As he always did.
Herobrine was so happy when he saw him.
His home would not be complete without him.
Behind him, he caught sight of Roxana standing at a table, busy brewing potions.
Her auburn hair shimmered in the soft Glowstone light and she looked stunningly beautiful as always.
Herobrine's heart flared up in joy when he spotted her.
Oh, how he had missed her!
He immediately quickened his pace when he was suddenly grabbed by the arm.
Surprised, he looked back at Nuka, who was suddenly standing behind him, looking exceptionally sad and serious.
"Where are you going?" he asked
Why was he behaving so strangely? He only wanted to see Roxana.
"I..." he began, but before he could speak any further the boy gripped him tighter and looked at him insistently.
"You have to wake up!" he interrupted him and suddenly his voice was much more panicked and seemed to swing back and forth in tone and speed, as if two completely different people were suddenly speaking to him!
,,You hear me?! Wake up! Please! You...you can't die yet! Brian! Wake up! Brian? Brian!"
Herobrine froze when he heard him shout.
What had Nuka just called him?
But before he could say anything else, his friend and the world around him dissolved and Herobrine fell into the depths accompanied only by the voice still desperately calling his old name before he rode out of sleep.
Immediately the pain shot up inside him and Herobrine began to regret that he had woken up.
It felt like his guts were on fire and Herobrine swallowed hard as he realized how quickly his body had deteriorated in the few hours he had been unconscious.
His face was screwed up and he tried to ignore the metallic taste of blood in his mouth that had emerged and become more and more pungent since he had been trapped here.
There was no denying anymore that he was dying.
A fact that horrified him deeply and was something he would rather not experience in a conscious state. It made him wonder all the more who had dared to tear him from his sleep.
With this thought, he forced himself to open his eyes a little and look around, blinking weakly, expecting to see Null standing in front of him again. But in the limited field of vision he had of the throne room, there was no one to be seen except his shadows, standing motionless around the room, like statues.
"Brian...?"
Herobrine froze when he heard the soft voice and his mood sank even lower when he realized who had caused him to wake up.
Herobrine groaned in annoyance before turning his head slightly and staring at Notch, who was chained between two pillars next to him and looking at him with high concern.
He also looked like a heap of misery too, but Herobrine didn't care much about that.
Instead, he just glared at him angrily.
Why? Of all the people in the world, why did he have to spend his last hours with him?
"Thank heavens you're still alive," he whispered a moment later, relieved that he hadn't noticed his resentment, "You passed out so quickly after Null finished to...to beat you up and you were unconscious so long...that...I was afraid he'd finished you off...for...for good..."
Herobrine grimaced as he thought about it.
After Nuka had agreed to the deal and disappeared, he had snapped and said some not-so-nice things to Null, which had resulted in the latter getting angry at him and beating him up really badly.
But Herobrine didn't regret snapping at him like that.
After all, he had treated Nuka like dirt, took advantage of his momentary emotional overload and desperation and forced him to make stupid promises that he wouldn't keep in the first place!
Herobrine closed his eyes and sighed as he thought of Nuka's laughing face...
He looked so happy in his dream...
Would he ever see him again?
"Why did you wake me up...?" he finally growled, whereupon Notch just stared at him in confusion.
"I... I was worried..." he finally stammered, whereupon Herobrine snorted contemptuously.
"Why?" he asked disapprovingly, which earned him a shocked look from Notch.
"Because I give a damn about you..." he whispered, which turned Herobrine's anger into a flaming volcanic eruption of rage.
"LIAR!" He shouted so loudly that the sound echoed off the walls of the castle. It forced him to burst into a violent cough, which brought him a new wave of pain, but that didn't shut him up.
"You don't care about me. You never..." he continued a moment later, panting heavily, unable to suppress a slight tinge of sadness in his voice, but he didn't show it.
On the contrary, it only made him angrier but he was too weak to fly off the handle again, whereupon Notch just sighing sadly.
"Oh Brian..." he finally whispered sadly, more to himself than to him, "If only that were true...But I...I can understand why you think that...after...after everything you've been through..."
Herobrine snorted contemptuously as he heard that.
That was more than an understatement!
,,You... you didn't deserve that…", Notch continued ,,I know that now... and I'm so, so sorry that I didn't believe you back then..."
Herobrine raised his eyebrows in surprise when he heard that.
He hadn't expected that Notch would ever admit his mistake but his surprise quickly disappeared and turned to anger as Notch continued to talk:
"So...don't you think that now as we're probably spending our last hours together, you could let go of your hatred and... And we could talk things out?"
"Maybe... maybe we could even manage to get along again..." Notch continued with a hopeful look at Herobrine, who couldn't help but laugh out loud at these words.
"Get along?" he repeated mockingly before turning to Notch and glaring at him with a hateful look.
"Do you really think that just because we're on the brink of death, I'm going to forgive you and forget everything I've been through, thanks to you, just because you finally realize you made a mistake?"
He snorted.
"That doesn't change anything! It just means that you now know that the centuries of torture worse I had to endure, was not justified at all!"
Notch froze when he heard that and Herobrine realized with a shock that he had said too much.
"Torture?" Notch repeated in shock as Herobrine quickly averted his eyes, angry with himself for getting carried away and almost revealing a part of his life to Notch that he wouldn't even tell Nuka about, "What... what do you mean?"
"Nothing..." Herobrine growled curtly, knowing that Notch would not be satisfied but before he could ask, Herobrine heard a teleporting noise, causing him to look up and freeze when he spotted Null, who had suddenly appeared in the middle of the throne room.
His tension only increased when he saw how annoyed and angry he looked but before Hero could see more, Null suddenly stumbled and fell to his knees, starting to cough violently while clutching the staff tightly with one hand.
His whole body was shaking and Herobrine could see a dark substance dripping from his mouth, making it clear that he was indeed not well at all.
But why? Herobrine asked himself in confusion Why is he so messed up? He has the power of all the gods in his hand to give him strength and energy.
Except... except this amount of power could be too much... even for someone like him.
"Well, look at that, you two are still alive," Null continued pointedly at this moment. He had straightened up again and quickly wiped away the black blood as he noticed them "What a surprise but it seems like weeds don't die as quickly as expected."
At these words, his face darkened and Herobrine glared at him angrily. However, before he could counter Notch began to speak.
"Well if... if you're so annoyed with us, why haven't you... disappeared already?" he asked weakly, causing Null's eyes to flash up with anger!
"Don't you dare mock me!" he hissed sharply, before raising a hand and cutting off Notch's air, while Herobrine stared at the two of them in confusion, not knowing what to make of this conversation.
Disappear? He thought as Notch gasped and struggled to get his breath back. But where to? And why does he need our powers for that?
"I'm going to leave this world behind me soon!" hissed Null, who still had Notch in his stranglehold, "Understood?!"
Notch could only nod, whereupon Null let go of him and he slumped down, gasping. Herobrine didn't care so instead he turned back to Null, who had turned away, looking awfully exhausted.
"Is that why you took away our powers?" he asked Null indignantly, who didn't turn to face him, "Because you think you can leave this world?!"
He snorted contemptuously.
"I've rarely heard anything so stupid!"
"Of course you would say that," replied Null scornfully before slowly turning to Herobrine, "But that's no surprise, since you were never the brightest candle..."
But Herobrine only snorted when he heard that.
"Oh please," he replied dismissively, "Don't act so high and mighty. Even a child could see that this idea is stupid and won't work, if it was ever possible in the first place."
"And I'm pretty sure that you know that by now," he went on without further ado, "otherwise you would have left long ago."
Null's eyes narrowed when he heard that and Herobrine felt a certain amount of satisfaction when he realized that he wasn't so wrong in his assumption.
"And yet you carry on, driving this world and meanwhile your own body to ruin, even though you don't even know if you'll succeed, let alone what comes after, right?"
"That's none of your business!" hissed Null sharply, but Herobrine wasn't impressed.
"Yes, it does!" he protested instead, "because you're going to sacrifice my whole world for this shit!"
But to his surprise, Null only laughed coldly.
"A world?" he repeated with an amused shake of his head, before his face turned dark again and he turned back to Herobrine, "No, this is nothing more than a prison. And even if I don't know what will happen if I escape it, it will definitely be better than this!"
"You don't know how much time i wasted to get to this point!" he hissed quietly "How many centuries I have wasted scheming around and pulling the strings in the background to get here!"
,,And even if I still can't escape this world after all this, then I would rather go down with this world than stay in it!" he ended, while Herobrine just stared at him, shocked!
He had expected Null not to care much about the world, but that he would throw away his own life instead of preserving it surprised him.
But why? Why did he hate this world so much that he would rather die than stay here?
"I see," he finally muttered, "so that means that all the things you've ever done for me, all the things you've told me, are just lies to get my powers?"
But to his surprise, Null just grinned.
"No," he finally replied, "Most of them were, but not all of them."
Herobrine gave him a dark glare.
Of course he would get an answer like that.
But before he could say anything in response, he heard another soft teleporting noise at the entrance to the throne room, whereupon he turned his gaze and froze when he spotted Nuka there.
And not only that, on the back of the pale, visibly frightened boy laid none other than Steve.
(Change of view)
Nuka stood at the entrance to the throne room and he could feel his knees trembling.
Whether from Steve's weight or his fear, however, he did not know yet.
He could only hope that others had snuck into the common entrance behind the throne room and were ready to attack Null as soon as he had thrown a water bottle that he had gotten from Alex at Null.
Who would go with him to the throne room had been quite a debate but in the end it was decided that all of them expect Alex would accompany him.
Unusual, one would think, considering Jason and Alex were much better at swordplay but Roxana had her wand and could use water magic, not to mention she could supply Notch and Herobrine with her healing powers while the others restrained Null.
I just hope the whole thing works, Nuka thought desperately, while glancing nervously at Null, who had now also noticed his presence.
"Look how he's back!" he exclaimed happily, "And look who he's brought with him!"
With these words, he raised his hand and before Nuka knew what was happening, Steve was lifted from his back, floating through the air towards Null. He grabbed him by the throat and examined him with a devious grin.
"Finally, one less thing for me to worry about," he continued gleefully, while looking at Steve, who was desperately gasping for air, but was still unable to move.
"Looks like you can do something right after all," he continued, addressing Nuka, before throwing Steve away carelessly, which caused the ex-god to fly
across the hall, crash into one of the pillars and fall to the ground. Steve was motionless now.
Nuka swallowed hard as he looked over at him.
He could only hope that Null hadn't killed him off but he couldn't dare to check.
Instead he just grabbed into his jacket and held the bottle tight to remember his mission as Null turned to face him again.
Oh how much he would love to throw this thing right in his so-called father's face right here and now but he had to wait until the shadows had disappeared, otherwise their victory would be very short-lived.
As if his thoughts had summoned it, there was suddenly a sound of a dull, far explosion outside, whereupon Null groaned and went to his knees, grabbing his head in pain, while the shadows around him started to wake up from their statue like state. They turned towards the sound before slowly disappearing into thin air, presumably to reappear near the location of the explosion.
Just as they had planned.
I hope Alex will be alright, Nuka thought nervously as he continued to stare at Null, who was now standing up again and laughing softly.
"Looks like your friends are trying to get the humans out of the city," he continued shortly afterwards to Notch and Herobrine, who were both still chained up and looking more than horrible, "But they won't get far. My shadows will finish them off."
"Well, you can go if you want," he continued, addressing Nuka, who was still standing in the entrance of the throne room far away from his father "You have fulfilled your task and I don't need you anymore."
This statement surprised Nuka, as he thought Null would just kill him after he finished his task but sadly he couldn't take this offer.
"But what about Hero?" he dared to ask instead, whereupon Null laughed softly again.
"Oh, you stupid little guy..." he answered a moment later with a frighteningly large and mocking grin, which covered almost his entire face, "Did you really think I would let him go?"
He laughed.
,,Be grateful that I decided to let you go at all."
Nuka lowered his eyes in shame when he heard that.
He hadn't really believed that Null would keep up his bargain but there had still been a small glimmer of hope.
A small hope that his father wasn't a complete asshole after all.
"I see" he replied quietly before lifting his head and, for the first time, staring right into Null's shining white eyes. His expression was determined. "but before I leave, I have to do something!"
And before his opponent knew what was happening, Nuka pulled the bottle out, teleported and threw it full force into his face!
