//------------------------------// // Don't Mine At Night // Story: The Multiverse in a Nutshell // by Pennington Inkwell //------------------------------// Sunset took a deep breath, giving their wooden box one last look. Even if it was only a few days, it did a good job keeping us safe. Guess that's something to be proud of building. "You ready? We've got a long hike ahead of us!" Sunset nodded, turning back to Missy with a smile. She adjusted her iron helmet and double-checked her sword. She could see dark pixels beginning to appear in its surface like chips in the metal, but she was confident that it would be more than enough to protect them. "Ready as I'll ever be!" Missy began to march into the trees, already looking determined. "Hope Penn's got room for two more beds in his base!" Sunset chuckled as she hurried to catch up, nearly missing the oddity out of the corner of her eye: several free-standing pillars of logs. "Hey, Missy... did you take all the leaves off of those trees over there? Missy drew up short, staring in the direction Sunset was pointing. After a few seconds, she shrugged. "Wasn't me, Sunset! Why would anybody do that, the logs are the valuable part!" Sunset blinked. "Well, there's no way that's natural... Do you think someone else is here?" Missy shrugged. "Well, if they were, they would have seen our cabin for sure! Why wouldn't they come by and say hi? Come on, we're wasting daylight!" Unless they weren't interested in being friends... Sunset nodded, stepping up to walk side-by-side with Missy. Still, something about the unnatural formation made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. It makes no sense... "I just hope Penn's okay. If there's other people here, we don't know if they're friendly..." ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Penn wiped the sweat from his brow, panting heavily for breath. It had taken longer than he wanted to admit, in fact it had nearly killed him multiple times trying to find all the precious metal, but he'd finally done it. He'd been forced to sacrifice it before, for his own safety. The composite parts had been melted down and merged with the scraps of hellish ore he'd managed to retrieve from the Nether. But now they had been re-made. The obsidian throne had stood empty for too long. He jumped up onto the black block, hopping in place as he set the golden blocks beneath him in a pillar. "ONE... TWO... THREE... FOOOOOUR!" He cried with glee, leaping from the top and spinning around to admire his work. The ultimate status symbol had been returned to its rightful place. The Tower of Pimps was back. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Careful, Sunset..." Sunset tightened her grip on her sword, keeping aware of Missy's presence behind her. The creature she was facing seemed equally wary, pacing in time with her as they circled one another. Its green, leafy body rustled softly with each movement. She narrowed her eyes, each one watching the other for a sign of attack. "You say this thing will explode if I let it get close?" she whispered. "Y-yeah..." "Okay, then. Gonna have to kill it before it does." Sunset let out a long sigh, settling into her ready position. The creeper seemed to notice the change, beginning to rush in towards her. Sunset responded in kind, lunging forward sword-first. She made a pair of jabs into its narrow torso before spinning around on the ball of her foot, using the extra momentum to slash at the joint where the head met the body. She stepped back, raising her sword back up to the ready position just as Weiss had taught her. She smiled as she watched the creeper's head slowly slide off of its body and fall to the ground. A moment later, the entire body dissolved into a puff of smoke, leaving behind only a small pile of gunpowder. She sheathed her sword in its usual place on her back and turned back to Missy. "WOOHOO! Go, Sunset!" she cheered, hopping up and down as she punched at the air. Sunset's eyes widened as she saw what Missy obviously hadn't: a small army of the creatures assembling behind her, all clearly upset at the death of their comrade. Each of them was already advancing on Missy, their hollow eyes Sunset grabbed the front of Missy's leather armor, throwing the little girl over her shoulder before sprinting in the opposite direction. "OWOWOWOW IRON, SUNSET! WHAT ARE YOU- HOLY HAMON!" "Sorry, Missy!" Sunset shifted her grip, holding Missy over her head with both hands as she ran into the forest. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Hey, Ron! Hey, Billy!" Penn grinned pointed a pair of finger-guns as he passed by. He strode confidently down the bridge between towers of the nether fortress, ducking his head slightly to avoid one of the barriers he'd installed to trap lanky wither skeletons. He felt a small twinge of satisfaction as his golden helmet (Which he had lovingly dubbed "The Golden Helmet of Mambrino") scraped against the cobblestone. "How's it going, Wilbur?" "Babe, how're the kids?" "Ayy, Beelzehog, looking good!" "Porky Pig, as I live and breathe! Haven't seen you since last week's ghast attack!" He stepped up, gently elbowing the piglin. It gave a soft grunt in return, sniffing curiously at him. Penn raised his hands in mock surrender. "You got me! I brought along some gold for you! You got anything for trade?" The pig-like creature seemed to shuffle around in its inventory for a moment before presenting a glassy blueish-green disk. Penn retrieved every one of his spare gold ingots from his pocket. "I'll take your entire stock!" A few moments later, he was examining his newly acquired prizes and the piglin was enjoying the fresh deposit to its life savings. Over his shoulder, Penn heard the telltale screech of the most hated monster in the nether. He didn't panic, reflexively rolling to the side as a fireball flew just over him, missing by inches. Instead, it slammed into "Porky Pig's" chest, throwing it up into the air and off the side of the fortress. Penn could only watch as the trader plunged into the lake of lava below, its squeal echoing fruitlessly off of the walls over the cavern. Another pair of the creatures walked up alongside him, eyeing him suspiciously. Penn chuckled nervously to himself as he reached for his bow to deal with the flying menace. "I'm sure he'll be fine... right?" ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Ow ow OW OW!" Missy yanked her arm away from Sunset, scrambling as best she could to put distance between them in the dirt hole they were currently hiding in. Her wings fluttered angrily, nearly extinguishing their single torch. "Cut it OUT!" Sunset took a deep breath, trying to remind herself Missy was simply a child. I was the same way when I got hurt at her age... "If we don't do something, it could get infected. I just want to take a look at it..." Missy gave her yet another dirty look before pulling her arm away from her side, revealing what looked like a large red rash across her stomach and side. Her dress looked like it had been burned away by fire, and her skin was a raw-looking shade of red. Both of them sucked in air through their teeth. It looks like a chemical burn... "I'm sorry, I should have been more careful..." Sunset whispered. "Yeah, you should... I TOLD you iron isn't good for me!" she muttered, gingerly wrapping her wing around the injury. "'Missy, look out!' or even just 'Behind you!' would have been plenty..." "I panicked." Sunset reached into her pocket, passing Missy a piece of cooked mutton. "Eating helps us heal here, right?" Missy nodded, halfheartedly nibbling on the meat for a few seconds. The two of them sat in silence for a time. Finally, Sunset sighed and stood up, just barely able to fit in their two-block-tall hole. Missy's eyes widened as she started pulling off her armor one piece at a time. "Sunset, what are you doing?" "Too much risk." Sunset muttered, shuffling out of her iron leggings. Finally, she carefully kicked off her iron boots, tossing the whole set in the corner farthest from Missy. "When you told me it could hurt you, I shouldn't have kept it. Period." "Sunset, you can't just run around with no armor!" Sunset ignored her, finally coming to her sword. She stared at it for a moment before sliding the sheath off of her shoulder and down to her waist. She slid it back into its place, now off of her back if she needed to pick Missy up and run again. If Missy's on the receiving end of my sword, we've got bigger issues than it being made of iron. "I'm sure we'll run into some cows tomorrow on our way to the mountains. I'll make some leather stuff, like you've got." She gave Missy her best smile, refusing to show any fear in the face of her near-complete lack of protection. After wearing it for days, it felt like being naked not to have the bulky, heavy armor inhibiting her movements. "We can match!" She turned back to the pile of iron armor, trying to figure out what to do with the hazardous waste. She finally resorted to kneeling down and punching at the ground, digging out a deeper hole in the corner where she could bury it. As she punched through the block, however, she was greeted with an unexpected surprise: empty space. She stepped back slightly, blinking at the sudden development before turning back to Missy. "Hey... Check it out, there's a tunnel down here!" "What?" Sunset pushed herself to the side to let Missy sidle up next to her to stare. "You wanna check it out?" Missy whispered. "Not like we've got anything better to do until morning..." Sunset shrugged before hopping down into the hole feet-first. It was a short drop, no more than three blocks, and she easily caught Missy a couple seconds later and set her carefully on the ground. The two of them were standing in a two-by-two block stone tunnel with a dirt roof and gravel floor. Aside from the uniform shape and even level of the ground, the other major difference Sunset noticed from prior caves they'd explored was the presence of perfectly spaced torches, leaving it perfectly lit. "This is definitely man-made." "Yup." Missy looked up and down the corridor. "And if my memory serves me correctly, it's also going the same direction we were walking. Looks like a free, safe shortcut to me!" "And this doesn't seem a little suspicious?" Sunset asked, raising an eyebrow. "I mean, first those weird stripped trees, then big hordes of creepers showing up out of nowhere, now this?" Missy shrugged, beginning to strut down the corridor. "Let's not look a gift unicorn in the mouth!" "Okay, let me explain to you WHY that's offensive..." Sunset muttered, beginning to reluctantly follow. After a few steps, however, Sunset felt a chill run up her spine, one that made every nerve in her body tingle with anxiety. Her hand was already on her hilt as she spun around, trying to catch a glimpse of the source. She didn't spot any kind of threat behind them in the hallway, but she DID recognize the feeling. She'd been trying to deny it for a while, now, but ignoring it was likely going to be the death of them. Ever since the day she had saved Penn from the laser bolt on the dalek ship, Sunset had been getting premonitions. A sense of dread, a reflex to something that had yet to happen, always in the nick of time to save herself or someone she cared about. It hadn't ALWAYS been there, they had a fair number of close calls that had caught her off-guard completely, but every time it HAD manifested, listening to it had saved them from total disaster. She was feeling that premonition again. Right here. Right now. They weren't alone, and something here wasn't what it seemed. She didn't sheathe her sword again, keeping it gripped tight in her hand. "I have a bad feeling about this..." ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "I have a good feeling about this!" Penn grinned, looking over his newest creation with pride. Usually, he needed step-by-step tutorials for building with redstone, but he'd managed to pick up a few things about Minecraft's equivalent to electricity over his years of playing the game, and even memorized a few key designs watching MumboJumbo and TangoTek. He followed a long wire of red dust to a safe distance, stopping beside a lever affixed to the wall. "PULL THE LEVER, PENN!" he cheered. For a moment, he paused, feeling a lonesome pang as he realized that there was nobody around to get the reference and laugh with him. Still, he needed to focus. There was no way Sunset, Missy, and Isis were going to leave him stranded here. He just needed to stay alive for as long as possible and focus on finding another portal back, if one even existed. He gave the lever a yank, watching the entire build hum to life. There was a gentle ticking as items passed through hoppers and chests. Soft crackling of blaze powder burning accompanied the gurgling and splashing of water boiling. He held his breath, trying to keep up his faith that his creation wouldn't devolve into a mess of awkward puddles and muddy blaze power again. He felt a surge of excitement as the ticking moved to the hoppers leaving the main device, and he followed the sound at a safe distance, all the way up to the tunnel leading into his base. He'd managed to secure almost every side of his base in multiple layers of protection, even the window he'd made for his beacon had been given a lava dispenser just in case someone tried using it as a way in. The biggest weakness in his defenses had been his front entrance... Until now. The movement of the items through the hoppers triggered the comparators, which sent signals to trigger rows of dispensers, all of which erupted into a hailstorm of criss-crossing arrows and bottles containing noxious potions shattering onto the stairs. It was an array that would spell instant death for any creature that tried to pass through it, be they living or undead. He hopped up and down with glee, running over and mining up one of the hoppers carrying the potions to their ultimate end. Without the fresh items traveling through the system, the dispensers soon shut themselves off, and his front entrance was once again safe to pass through. Behind him, his automatic brewery continued chugging away, having plenty of ingredients left to keep producing potions. "Hah... Let's see spooky old 'Brine get through THAT next time he wants to mess with me!" He polished his blocky hand against his chestplate, blowing the dust off his non-existent fingernails. He turned back to examine his new creation for any faults, only to run face-first into a pillar of glowstone blocks topped with a redstone torch. His eyes widened and he grabbed his sword, spinning around to search for any other signs of the intruder, but none remained. As far as he could tell, he was still alone... But that glowstone pillar said otherwise. "Come ON! Come out here!" He switched weapons, changing over to his crossbow and cocking one of his specially prepared arrows. His goading went unanswered, completely ignored. The silence was mocking him, throwing his own challenge back in his face with empty echoes. After several seconds on-guard he sighed and lowered his weapon again. "Okay, fine, you smug specter... You win THIS time. I'm gonna go change the settings to 'potions of regeneration' and see how many of them I can chug before I throw up. I wanna know if healing potions can make you sick." ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Hey... shouldn't it be day by now?" Sunset asked. "We should head back up to the surface." "What? Why?" Missy gestured to the hallway they'd been traveling down for the past few hours. "This is going our way, and there's no way for monsters to sneak up on us in here!" Sunset glanced over her shoulder again, the feeling of dread having carved out a nest in the bottom of her stomach long ago. No matter how long they traveled in perfect safety, she couldn't make it leave. "Call it claustrophobia..." "You're afraid of Santa Claus?" "No, it's the fear of tight spaces-" Sunset looked back to see Missy snickering behind her hand. "Oh. Ha ha, very funny. Let's all mess with Sunset..." "Oh come on, I haven't whined about the whole iron thing for an entire hour, I deserve to do some ribbing!" Sunset rolled her eyes. "Fine, I guess I had that coming and then some... But seriously, let's get out of here." "Fine... Just gimmie a boost!" Sunset nodded, holding her hands together for Missy to step on and lifting her up to punch a hole in the ceiling. After a few seconds, the digging stopped. "Hey, Sunset?" "Yeah?" "Was the roof... always obsidian?" Sunset blinked, her head snapping upwards to look above them. True to Missy's word, just past the dirt above them was a layer of the near-unbreakable black rock. "O-okay... I still have that iron pick we made in case we found more diamonds!" Sunset shifted Missy's weight to her shoulder as she reached down into her pocket to retrieve the tool. "No use. You need diamond to break obsidian, I know that much..." Missy muttered, hopping off of Sunset's shoulder and back to the ground. "What are we gonna do?" That unease was starting to gnaw at Sunset again, as if it was rubbing in that she should have listened and gotten out while they still could. "Okay... well, we can still mine around it! We're only a few blocks deep, right? It can't go on forever!" She turned to the wall, tearing through the rock with her pickaxe easily. She felt the bottom fall out of her stomach as the stone gave way to more of the pitch-black rock. "Suunnnseeeeet...." Missy's voice was trembling as Sunset turned around, seeing that she had excavated the other side and revealed the same thing. "I'm getting scared..." Both of them looked down at the gravel floor, then at each other. "You don't think..." "Missy, I don't know WHAT to think, any more..." Sunset whispered. She raised her pick once, twice, three times... only to be stopped by a distant sound. It sounded like an avalanche of pebbles and dirt, and her first heart-stopping thought was a cave-in. Her eyes widened as she stared in the direction of the noise, the way they had come from, and saw a growing red glow advancing on them in the distance. The gravel was falling away in a single long wave, revealing only empty space and fiery death below. "The... THE FLOOR IS LAVA!" Missy screamed. "RUN FOR IT!" ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Hmm..." Penn stroked his chin, thinking over his decision. This was a crucial moment. It could very well determine what would fill his every waking moment from this point onward. Every day he would be faced with the consequences, unable to escape them. "Glowstone chandeliers, or hidden lighting under carpets? Isis, what do YOU think?" He glanced over at the blocky, motionless drone he'd brought with him when he'd set up his base. He'd tried to repair it, but redstone just wasn't compatible. Still, he could imagine what Isis would say. "I KNOW carpet would mean mobs couldn't spawn here, but I want it to look nice!" he gestured to the hallway leading to his library and enchanting room. "I've been using obsidian and polished diorite to make checkered tiles and I really liked it, but... It's gotten kind of old, too." He reached into his pocket, grabbing a stack of wool carpet. "I could go with red and cyan accents to match the enchanting table... But why miss out on the chance to make chandeliers? They'd be PERFECT!" He looked back at Isis, who still didn't move and said nothing. "Both? Both. Both is good." He nodded to himself as he settled his mind. "Glowstone chandeliers and KEEP the tile under the carpet in case I change my mind! Great idea, Isis!" ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sunset and Missy were both collapsed, completely exhausted from outrunning the falling gravel. Missy had started to fall behind at about the three-quarters mark and Sunset had thrown her onto her back piggy-back style without a second thought, but even Missy's negligible weight had felt like a backpack full of lead after running so far. Sunset had almost heard an angelic choir singing when she saw the stairway leading up to the surface at the end of the tunnel. She had felt the ground giving out underneath her as the two of them burst up onto the surface, barely managing to leap to safety before they were plunged into a bath of molten rock. Now the two of them were collapsed on the ground where they had landed, Sunset laying on her stomach and Missy laying in an identical position on top of her. We're lucky to be alive... "Missy?" "Y-yeah?" "Next time... we see... a shortcut... let's not." "Agreed..."