Dungeon Crawl!

by Nick Eliopulos

  “At least I can see again,” said Jodi. “Well, sort of. It’s awfully dark.”

  “I think I see the ground just below,” said Morgan.

  Morgan was right. The stony floor rose to meet them, and they all touched down gently at the same time. “Excellent job on the potions, Harper,” said Po. “And did I detect just a hint of jasmine?”

  Harper smirked. “If you tasted anything, it was probably the spider eyes.”

  Po made a horrified face.

  “Hmm.” Ash tapped her foot on the ground. “Bedrock,” she said.

  “I’m happy to be back on solid ground,” said Jodi. “But what’s special about bedrock?”

  “It’s even tougher than obsidian,” said Morgan. “In fact, it can’t be mined at all. Otherwise you could make a hole right through the bottom of the world.”

  “So we’re as far down as we can go, and it’s a dead end,” said Harper. “We need to get back up to that vault door, I think.”

  “How do we get past the block Party?” Po asked. He turned to Jodi. “That’s the amazing name I just came up with for our archenemies up there.”

  “Why doesn’t our team have a name?” said Jodi.

  “We’re Team Po,” Po answered.

  Everyone gave him a look.

  He shrugged. “I thought everybody knew that already.”

  “Team Po might have met its match,” Jodi said. “Those mobs anticipated our every move.”

  “What if this is as far as we can get?” Harper asked. “What if we can’t beat them?”

  “We’ll think of something,” Morgan said. “Right, Ash?”

  Ash hesitated just a second too long before she said, “Of course.”

  The next day, Po spent his lunch period in the auditorium. Almost everybody did. There was a lot of work still to be done for the play, and there were only a few more days to do it all.

  Po started by double-checking that the spotlights were ready to go. He had all his lighting cues firmly committed to memory. And if he happened to forget anything, it was all clearly labeled in his script. He would make sure the spotlight always followed whichever actor was speaking. And he knew to use the blue-tinted lights in the underground scenes, to make everything look a little spookier.

  But other people were scrambling to get their own work done. So Po figured he could help.

  Ash was grateful for the offer, and she handed him a big can of paint. “Can you please get this to Jodi’s team?” she asked him. “Tell her that’s the last of the fuchsia!”

  “I don’t know what that word means,” said Po. “But consider it done.”

  On his way backstage to find Jodi, he ran into Morgan.

  “Hey, Po, check it out!” Morgan said. He held up a croissant. It was angular, with pixelated edges. It looked just like a food item from Minecraft. “Mmm….Doesn’t it look good enough to eat?”

  Po’s stomach grumbled, and Morgan laughed.

  “I guess that answers my question,” Morgan said. “But don’t be fooled. This pastry is nothing but cardboard and markers.”

  “It’s impressive,” Po said. “But since when are you on the props team?”

  “We fell a little behind schedule,” Harper admitted. “We have to make three dozen of these croissants, you know!”

  “And thanks to your help the other day, I finally have my lines memorized,” Morgan said. “So I thought I’d pitch in.”

  “Speaking of which…” Po pointed to the paint can in his lap. “I’ve got to make a delivery.”

  He found Jodi without much trouble, but he was surprised to see her with Theo. The Phantasm himself had taken up a brush and offered to pitch in alongside the set team.

  “He’s actually been a big help,” Jodi whispered. “I should be nicer to him.”

  Po strained to lift the heavy can of paint. “You want to be nice? Take this! It’s the last can of focaccia. Or…fusilli? Something like that. And it’s heavy!”

  “Those are foods, and this looks like paint, so I’m not sure what you’re actually handing me right now.” As she took the can from him, she looked all around. “Say, have you seen Doc today?” she asked. “I thought she was going to help….”

  “I’m pretty sure Ms. Minerva banned her,” Po answered, “after she floated the idea of automated curtains.”

  “Ms. Minerva had better be careful!” Jodi said. “Can’t you just imagine Doc taking her revenge? What if she’s the true Phantasm? What terrible vengeance might she pursue?”

  “You’re right,” Po said.

  “I am?”

  “Well, you’re half right,” he said. “I don’t think Doc is going to swoop in here and take revenge on anybody. But we can find something for her to do, can’t we?” He scratched his head. “Just because she’s the science and technology expert doesn’t mean she can only do science and technology stuff.”

  “We could find another role for her,” Jodi agreed. “I’m sure we could.”

  And at that moment, it was as if a redstone switch clicked into place in Po’s head. “Eureka!” he said.

  He saw Ash walking by, and he reached out to grab her. Then he waved Harper and Morgan over.

  Once they were all assembled, Po told his friends, “I’ve noticed something today. Even though everyone has a specific job on the play—a specific role—we don’t stick to just that role. We have to be flexible in order to help each other out.”

  “And as stage manager, I appreciate it more than I can say,” Ash said. Her eyes drifted to a nearby clock. “But do you have a point?”

  “My point is that this is exactly what we’re doing wrong in the dungeon. We— Oh, hey, Theo,” Po said, noticing that the boy had slowly edged up to their circle.

  Theo looked momentarily guilty. He cast his eyes around until they landed on the unopened can of paint at Jodi’s feet. “Ah, there you are!” he said in his Phantasm voice. “Just the very thing to satisfy my traitorous hunger!”

  Po smiled politely, and the others made room for Theo to come into their circle and grab the paint. “I’m, uh, not really going to eat the paint,” he said. “That’s just a line from the play. Well, you all know that already….”

  Theo hesitated, clutching the paint to his chest. He looked like he wanted to say something more, but he gave a Phantasm-y farewell and returned to his half-painted set.

  “He’s really getting into his role,” said Ash. “Good for him!”

  “Anyway,” said Po, “as I was saying: We’ve been too rigid in the dungeon. We’ve stuck to our roles almost too well. And that’s made us totally predictable.”

  “It did seem like the Block Party knew what to expect from us,” said Harper. “They tore through us where we were most vulnerable.”

  “The Evoker King must have set them on us,” Morgan said. “He’s probably been watching us the whole time. He’s desperate to stop us from finding the key to his power. So desperate, he built entirely new mobs from scratch.”

  Ash narrowed her eyes. “I’ve been thinking about that, actually,” she said. “Even though I’d never seen those mobs before, there was something almost familiar about them.”

  Morgan shrugged. “They’re new to me. Although, the spellcaster with a bow reminded me of an illusionist. They use blindness spells, after all.”

  Ash snapped her fingers. “That’s it! The Block Party—they’re just illagers with different skins. The one with the ax is a vindicator. The sailor with a crossbow is a pillager.”

  “What about the dragon?” Morgan asked.

  “It’s just a ravager with a fresh coat of paint!” Ash said, and at the mention of paint, Jodi waved her purple-drenched paintbrush.

  “This is perfect,” said Po. “This means we have a real advantage. We know what to expect from those NPCs, reskinned or
not. But they won’t expect us to mix things up.”

  Morgan grinned. “I’m game.”

  “Me too,” said Jodi.

  “I was tired of throwing potions around anyway,” said Harper.

  “Love it,” said Ash. But her eyes were back on the clock. “Now, Morgan, where are we on those croissants…?”

  Jodi was ready for their rematch.

  They had set their beds up at the bottom of the pit, beneath a low stone ceiling that would hide them from view. They broke through that ceiling now, and Jodi could just barely see the glow of the bridge above.

  High above. Jodi wished they could just cut through a wall, or somehow respawn back onto the bridge.

  But they had a plan. A real plan this time. One that the Block Party wouldn’t see coming. And that plan relied on stealth. They would sneak up on the guardian mobs.

  That meant building their way out of the pit, one block at a time.

  Jodi hopped up and quickly placed a block of stone beneath her feet. She repeated the action, again and again, so that a pillar of stone seemed to sprout right beneath her. It was slow work, and she had to be careful to keep her balance. But she made steady progress—all of them did, each on their own pillar—and they were perfectly silent as they ascended.

  In that way, they were all acting like rogues this time, getting into place for a sneak attack.

  When the glowing bridge was within reach, Jodi waited for Ash’s signal. Ash looked around, making sure everyone was ready. She raised her blocky fist, and they all leapt onto the bridge at the same time.

  Their foes honked in surprise. Their stealthy approach had bought them a few precious seconds.

  “Everyone behind me,” Morgan said, and he stepped to the front again. Just like the Block Party would expect. He still looked like a knight, after all.

  But then he drank an invisibility potion and faded from view.

  “Surprise, suckers!” Jodi cried, and she pulled out a bow and let an arrow fly.

  “Did you like that?” asked Harper. “Have another!” And she shot her own barrage of arrows into the crowd.

  The Block Party had obviously been caught unprepared. The sailor and the zombie were both struck by arrows. They flashed red, a sure sign they’d taken damage.

  “The dragon is mine,” said Po. “I owe it one!”

  Po lobbed a green potion at the creature. The flask shattered on contact, splashing the dragon with poison. While the poison ate away at the creature’s health, Po threw a dark blue potion at the dark knight. It was a splash potion of weakness, and it would make the knight’s attacks far less deadly.

  Before the knight could recover, Morgan stepped from the shadows and slashed her with his sword. “Sneak attack!” he said.

  “And one more for good measure,” said Po. He finished the false knight with a slash from his own sword. Though he still wore his wizard skin, he was now outfitted with a few pieces of diamond armor.

  “The illusioner is down, too,” said Ash. She stood over the fallen form of the dark mage, a shield in one hand and a diamond pickaxe in the other.

  “That’s all of them,” said Po. “We did it!”

  Together they ran the length of the glowing bridge, coming to a stop just before the great door.

  “You really think it’s in there?” said Ash. “The key to the Evoker King’s power?”

  Morgan rubbed his blocky hands together. “I say it’s time to find out.”

  “Okay,” said Jodi. “Go ahead, Morgan. Open the—”

  In an instant, everything changed. The blocks all around them broke into pixels, and the pixels swirled and swelled. A light bloomed in Jodi’s vision, and when she reached up to cover her eyes, she felt…goggles.

  She was back in the computer lab. Back in the real world.

  “Door,” she said.

  “What was that?” Po asked, removing his goggles. “What just happened?!”

  “The power’s completely off,” said Harper. She toggled a power switch. “The computers, they’re all dead.”

  “Oops!” said a voice. “I think that’s my fault.”

  They all turned to see Theo standing there in the middle of the computer lab.

  “I’m sorry, everybody,” he said. “I was trying not to interrupt you, but I tripped on a cable. I think I might have pulled out the main power plug.”

  “We have to go back!” said Morgan. “We were so close!”

  Ash shook her head. She pointed to the window. “It’s already dark out. By the time we boot everything back up, it’ll be too late.”

  “What were you even doing here, Theo?” asked Harper.

  “I was looking for something I left in here earlier,” he said. He cast his eyes about the room. “Ah, there you are!” he said with his phony Phantasm accent. “Just the very thing to satisfy my traitorous hunger!”

  He picked up a piece of paper. From where Jodi was sitting, it looked like just a blank sheet of paper.

  “That’s what you forgot in here?” Jodi asked. “Are you sure?”

  “Farewell!” Theo cried, and he turned on his heel. If he’d been wearing his cape, it would have snapped dramatically behind him.

  But on his way out the door, Theo paused. He looked back over his shoulder and said in his normal voice, “I really am sorry.”

  Then he was gone. To Jodi, the whole thing seemed a little suspicious.

  “I said it before,” said Ash. “But he is really getting into his role.”

  “Maybe,” said Jodi. Or maybe she’d been wrong to give Theo a second chance.

  Po wanted to get back to the Minecraft as soon as possible. They all wanted that. But accidentally or not, Theo had done quite a bit of damage to the computers’ central power strip. Harper promised to go directly to Doc with the problem. But even if Doc was able to fix it immediately, Po feared it would be days before they had time to return to the dungeon.

  He was right about that. The next few days were packed with preparation for The Phantasm of the Cafetorium.

  By the afternoon of the show, Po had helped out with just about every part of the play. He’d finished painting sets with Jodi and making the Phantasm’s cardboard gondola with Harper. (The finished product looked just like a Minecraft boat brought to life!) He’d also made sure that Morgan was ready for his acting debut.

  Ash had started calling Po her “unofficial assistant.” It was a title Po embraced with pride. For one thing, it got him a little closer to the stage. For another, Po learned a lot by floating from one group to another. In the end, his “role” was to not have a role, and that suited him just fine.

  In the last minutes before the curtain would go up, Ash gathered the cast and crew backstage. “I’m amazed at what we’ve accomplished,” she told them. “We’ve built an entire world. And now we’re going to dazzle the rest of the school with the story of the Phantasm.” She smiled. “I’m about to make my final report to Ms. Minerva. I’ll be so happy to tell her we’ve had no glitches, no unexpected complications—no problems at all.”

  “Uh, Ash?” said Jodi as if on cue. “We’ve got a big problem.”

  Ash gripped her clipboard so tightly that her knuckles went white. “What is it?” she asked.

  “It’s this guy,” Jodi answered, pointing at Morgan.

  “What, Morgan?” said Po. “No way! He knows his lines, I’m sure of it.”

  “Oh, he knows his lines,” Jodi said, rolling her eyes. “But he’s lost his voice.”

  Morgan smiled sheepishly and shrugged as he moved his mouth. Only a faint whisper came out. “Sorry….”

  “We’re doomed!” cried a student on the tech crew.

  “It’s the curse of the Phantasm!” cried another.

  “Nobody panic!” said Ash, and she held out her hands to
calm them. “We…definitely have a plan B.” She cast her eyes all around, clearly trying to form a plan B on the spot.

  Her wild eyes landed on Po. “It’s Po!” she said. “Po is our plan B!”

  “Uh, I am?” said Po.

  “You know Morgan’s dialogue,” said Ash.

  “But who will run the lights?” Harper asked.

  “We’re doomed!” said a student.

  Po had a flash of inspiration. “Doc can run the lights,” he said.

  “Doc?” echoed Ash. “Isn’t she banned from backstage?”

  “Yeah, she is,” said Po. “But Doc knows how the equipment works, and she can follow directions. And look…” Po held up his script, marked up with all his notes. “Directions. They’re all written down.”

  “It seems like a good idea to me,” said Jodi.

  “All right.” Ash nodded. “I say yes. Harper, find Doc and bring her here. Jodi, let Ms. Minerva know about the change of plan. Morgan, get some soup! And, Po…?”

  “Yeah?” said Po.

  “Better get into costume,” she said. “Baker Gunther, Monster Hunter, is due on stage in ten minutes!”

  * * *

  Po was surprised to find himself getting nervous while he waited just offstage for his first cue. Acting felt totally different from performing on the basketball court. The fact that it was a new experience made it scary,—but in a good way.

  Po closed his eyes.

  He took three deep breaths.

  He told himself he would be fine, no matter what happened out there.

  And he wheeled out onstage.