It was that blue foam sword on his desk. It lay there across his very important papers. It seemed to call to him. Try as he might, Principal Whiner couldn’t take his eyes off that sword. Without realizing it, Whiner’s hand moved to the hilt and gripped it.
Immediately, a feeling of warmth ran up his arm, through his chest and down to his feet. Whiner checked over his shoulders in case there was anyone watching in his tiny office. Silly, he knew, but he had to be sure.
The warmth from the sword coursed through his whole body. A smile spread across his normally stone-like face. He wanted to laugh out loud, something he never did at school. He held the sword above his head and swung it through the air. He imagined enemies crawling up from the carpet. Swing! Splat! More coming behind him. Turn, swing, splat!
Principal Whiner, a man who prided himself on crushing the joys of children, skipped around his office, swinging that strange blue sword at imaginary enemies.
With each swing, the energy from the blue sword grew stronger. It charged through him. There was something about this strange sword. It held him as much as he was holding it. Principal Whiner still hated children and he still hated Minecraft, but he knew one thing for sure.
He was never letting go of this sword again.
* * *
Detention moved slower than a zombie through soul sand. Ant and Hamid stared at the clock for the entire hour of their punishment. They were meant to be doing homework, but all Hamid could think about was his Minecraft buddies logging into his server looking for him and Ant. After school was prime Minecraft time. Parents weren’t home from work, so homework and chores could wait.
And now that was gone. For a whole month, Hamid and Ant were stuck in Mr. Mackowitz’s science classroom with the other poor kids who had ticked off Whiner.
When the hour was finally up, Ant and Hamid charged for the door. They burst through it like a pair of creepers on a late-night noob hunt. Mr. Mack was right behind them. The old science teacher hurried down the corridor and out the school doors like his underwear was packed with taco spice.
Jaina stood outside the classroom holding the remaining three foam swords they got from the strange villager.
“Catch.” She tossed a foam sword to Hamid and another to Ant. “Good thing you guys didn’t bring these to class or Whiner would have them, too.”
Jaina’s after-school homework club finished around the same time as their detention. The rest of the school was deserted. Everyone had gone home, except maybe Mr. K, the caretaker. He was probably on the third floor unblocking the toilets.
Ant swung his foam sword through the air in one smooth motion. Hamid’s sword bounced off his hands and crashed to the ground. He picked it up in time to swing it around and stop the attack from his best friend.
“Nice block!” Ant said. “I’ll get you next time, you vile creeper!”
His words echoed down the empty corridor.
“Thanks for waiting for us, Jaina.” Hamid batted away Ant’s sword, signalling the game was over, or at least on pause. When Ant was around, games and silliness were never over.
“No worries,” Jaina said.
“So, did your search turn up anything?” Ant swung his sword at a new invisible enemy.
“Nothing,” Jaina said. “Not a single mention in any of the local newspapers or Minecraft blogs or forums.”
“I don’t get it,” Hamid said. “A dude dressed up as a villager collapses in the middle of the biggest Minecraft convention in town and then just vanishes. And no else saw it but us. That is just too weird.”
“Even Mr. Rodinaldo didn’t see anything!”
“That’s because he was talking to Sheena Raine,” Ant said. He attacked a defenseless locker with his sword. Each swing sent the little combination locks swinging. “Who cares anyway?”
Hamid stopped mid-step. “I care! That guy vanished right in front of my eyes. Yours, too. You might have the memory of a goldfish, Ant, but things like that kind of get stuck in my brain. Once my brain grabs onto a problem, it can’t let go.”
But Ant wasn’t listening. He slow-marched toward Hamid and Jaina, his arms held out straight.
“Braaaiiinns …”
“Ack! Back, zombie!” Jaina whacked Ant with her sword.
Ant ignored the blow and lurched forward.
“Braainns! Must eat brains.” He leaned in and pretended to munch Jaina’s shoulder.
Jaina laughed and pushed her friend away.
Hamid sighed. “Would you two be serious? Something very weird happened yesterday at Mini-Minecon. And no one saw it but us. Don’t you think that’s a little odd?”
Ant stayed in zombie mode. And now Jaina had her arms out in front of her.
“Tasty brains,” she moaned in her best zombie voice.
Hamid knew it was no use. When Jaina and Ant started playing the zombie game, there was no stopping them. Well, maybe there was one way to stop them.
“Back, zombie scum!” Hamid yelled. He doubled-whacked Jaina and Ant with his own foam sword and ran down the hall.
“Get back here!” Ant chased his friend down the empty corridor. Jaina was right on his heels.
“Not fair!” Hamid shouted over his shoulder. “Zombies can’t run!”
“These zombies can!” Jaina waved her foam diamond sword in the air like a warrior queen.
Hamid rounded the corner, sliding on the freshly mopped floor. He took another sharp right and scrambled into the library, making sure not to let the door slam shut behind him.
The lights were off. The librarian was long gone. It was just Hamid and the shelves of books, stretching into the darkness. He crouch-ran to the picture book section and hid behind the giant stuffed library dragon sitting on the Story Time carpet.
Hamid could see the whole library all the way to the computer lab in the back. Jaina and Ant ran past the windows lining the graphic novel section.
“Suckers,” he whispered.
His friends would end up at the main office near the front doors and have no idea where he went. They would have to backtrack to find him. And when they thought to look in the dark library, he would be waiting for them.
Hamid crouched low. His whole body tingled with anticipation. He gripped his foam sword tightly. He would show them how Hamid the Hammer dealt with zombies.
Something clattered in the darkness near the computers at the back of the library. It sounded like a ball rolling down bamboo. He had heard that noise before but couldn’t place it.
“Ant?” Hamid called into the darkness. “Jaina? Is that you?”
The noise came again. This time it was closer.
Hamid stepped out from behind the library dragon. His grip on the sword tightened and threatened to smush the foam flat.
“Joke’s over, guys.” How did Jaina and Ant get into the library? There was only one door and he was watching it the whole time. “This isn’t funny.”
Hamid moved through the darkness to the back of the library. He kept his steps slow and his sword raised. It was only foam, but it was better than nothing.
Bamboo clattered again, this time from behind him. Hamid spun around. Cold dread oozed from the shadows near the door, like someone suddenly turned on the air conditioning.
Blood-red eyes stared out from the darkness.
Hamid tried to run. His brain screamed. His legs quivered. But his feet remained still. Fear rooted him to the ground.
The eyes moved out from the shadows to reveal a grinning face made of bone. With each step, the skeleton clattered like bamboo knocking together. It tilted its square head to one side and reached out a long, fleshless arm.
“Give them to me,” the skeleton hissed. “The four must be mine!”
Somewhere in Hamid’s terrified mind, a connection was made. He suddenly knew where he had heard the noise before. This creature standing in front of him, in the middle of the Story Time carpet was real, but it wasn’t from reality.
It was from Minecraft.
Chapter 3
Hamid raced for the library door. The skeleton was faster.
With one great leap, it flew across the Story Time carpet and blocked the door. It landed with a clatter Hamid had heard a million times during his dungeon delves at home. And home was where this thing in front of him belonged. Home on his computer. In his server. A cartoon of pixels and programming, not a fully formed monster standing in front of the librarian’s book return cart. There was no doubt about it. From the square skull and blocky rib cage, this was a Minecraft skeleton. And it was in his school library. If this was one of Ant’s jokes, that guy was banned from their server for all eternity.
The skeleton reached out its bony hand again.
“Give it to me. The four must be made one!”
Hamid had no words. All he had was fear. This skeleton, which looked very real to him, was going to turn him into a pile of floating inventory items.
Hamid’s heart was a rock in the pit of his stomach. There was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. He raised his foam sword before him. Foam versus bone. No competition there, but it was all he had.
The library doors swung open. Jaina’s voice cut through the dark.
“Hamid! You in here?”
He’d never been so glad to see his friends. Jaina stood in the doorway, Ant at her side.
“Watch out for —!”
“Me!” The skeleton stood to its full height, towering over the three friends.
Jaina fell back, her eyes as big as ender pearls. Ant stood in shocked silence. For once.
Hamid saw his chance for escape.
“Run!” he shouted as he charged past the skeleton and through the doors.
Ant and Jaina were right behind him. Unfortunately, so was Mr. Big and Bony.
“Give them to me!” the skeleton wailed. The rattle of bones echoed along the lockers lining the hallway.
“Where did you find your friend?” Ant asked when he had caught up with Hamid. Ant had always been a faster runner. And more sarcastic.
“He found me!” Hamid said.
“He better unfind us, quick!” Jaina said.
The three friends rounded another corner, bringing them near the front of the school. Hamid slid to a stop outside Ms. Thalwick’s music room.
“In here!” he said.
“What are we going to do? Teach it how to play the ukulele?” Ant said.
“He’s right,” Jaina said. “We’ll be trapped in there.”
Ant jumped up and down on the spot, like he always did when he got frustrated with a boring math lesson. “We have to do something!”
The music door exploded in a shower of paint and wood chips. A thick arrow shaft stuck out from the middle door. At the far end of the hallway, the skeleton pulled back on its bow, another arrow notched and ready to fly.
“This way!” Jaina said. She ran down the hall before Ant or Hamid could argue.
Another arrow thudded into the door between the boys, missing them by a hair.
“Wait for us!” Ant shouted and took off after Jaina. Hamid was only a step behind.
The front doors to the school appeared at the end of the corridor. They were close to escaping. Only a few more steps and he would be outside and free to run all the way home and hide under his bed and never play Minecraft again.
But Jaina didn’t run outside. She pushed open the door to the Main Office and disappeared inside.
“She’s got the right idea,” Ant said. He ran down the hallway to catch up to her. “It’s raining.”
“Thanks for the weather report,” Hamid snapped. “I’m more worried about becoming a skeleton pincushion than getting my hair wet.”
An arrow thunked into the floor beside him, cracking the tiles like a broken mirror. Mr. K was not going to be happy about that.
“Dude, have you ever played Minecraft before?” Ant opened the door to the office. “The sun is behind the clouds. We run outside in the rain and Bony the Wonder Archer will just chase us. At least there’s a door and a phone in here!”
Ant pulled Hamid into the office and slammed the door shut. His friend had a point. The time for dealing with things on their own was long gone. It was time to call for back-up. The police, the fire department, the parent council, anyone.
The room was empty. Mrs. Vernon, the school office assistant, had gone for the day. Jaina stood at her desk. She mashed the buttons on the phone like it was a game of whack-a-mole.
“How do you get an outside line on this thing?”
Another arrow smashed through the window on the office door. The missile flew across the office and thunked into Mrs. Vernon’s phone. Sparks erupted from the number pad. A thin trail of black smoke wafted into the air, announcing the machine’s demise.
The skeleton appeared at the doorway, glaring at them through the broken glass. Its red eyes burned deep into Hamid’s own bones. It raised its bow, arrow notched and ready to fly.
There was nowhere to run.
Hamid dug his feet into the ground and raised his foam sword in front of him. Ant stood beside him, his sword raised.
“This is it, old buddy,” he said. “We’ll go down like heroes.”
Jaina joined them.
“Yeah, if anyone believes us.” She held up her foam sword to face the skeleton. “Come and get us, you old bag of bones!”
Principal Whiner’s door swung open. He stormed out of his office, face red with rage. In his hand he held the foam diamond sword he had taken from Ant only a few hours earlier.
“What is the meaning of this?” he said. “What are you brats doing in my offi —”
His words froze in his throat. Maybe it was the broken window and shattered glass sprayed across the floor. Maybe it was the sight of three children, clearly up to no good long after they should be at home. It could have even been the sight of a blocky skeleton the size of an NBA basketball player outside the office door. Each of these things would be enough to send any principal into early retirement.
The skeleton’s red eyes flamed brighter at the sight of Principal Whiner. It dropped its bow and pointed a long bony finger at them.
“The Four!” the skeleton hissed. “Together as they should be.”
Hamid’s foam sword was suddenly very warm, like he had just pulled it out of a fire. Blue light burst from each of the blades.
The light quickly filled the office. Hamid couldn’t see the skeleton anymore. Then he couldn’t see his friends anymore. In the time it takes to sneeze, the whole world turned a bright, diamond blue.
And then it all went black.
* * *
A pig snorted in Hamid’s brain. A sheep bleated near his toes. His head felt like it was stuffed with two-month-old homework. Flashes of pixelated diamonds bounced across his brain. He rolled over on his side and reached for his blanket. Today was totally a stay-in-bed kind of day. This was all Ant’s fault. Maybe it was too much pizza last night or too long helping his friend build his latest Minecraft masterpiece. Either way, Ant was to blame and Hamid was staying in bed.
His hand fumbled around in search of his blanket. It landed on something warm and fuzzy.
“Baaaa.”
Hamid cracked open one eye to see two eyes staring back at him.
He bolted straight up, his eyes wide open and struggling to focus.
Sunshine and green. That’s all Hamid saw. And a sheep nuzzling at his shirt.
He jumped to his feet. He wasn’t dreaming.
“Get out of here!” Hamid said, shaking his fist at the sheep.
The startled sheep trotted away. It stared back at him like a puppy left in the rain.
Hamid stopped mid-shake. His hand wasn’t there. His arm just ended in a flat square. It was like it had been sliced off in an accident.
“Don’t scare them away. We’ll need their wool later to make beds.”
Ant walked out of a patch of trees not far away.
At least, it sort of looked like Ant. He was handless, too, just like Hamid. His who
le body looked like it was made of cereal boxes. Even his head, which was one large cube with Ant’s dumb grin plastered on the front.
Ant wriggled his body like his underwear was creeping up on him. From somewhere in his chest, a brown cube appeared and thunked on the ground.
Along the side of the cube hung saws, hammers and a few tools Hamid didn’t recognize. But he did recognize the box.
“A crafting table,” he said.
Ant’s dumb grin doubled in size.
“Yep. And we better get busy with it.” He turned his cube-head to the hills in the distance. “The sun’s getting low. It’ll be night soon. And you know what happens at night.”
Hamid’s brain felt broken. But strangely, it all made perfect sense. He turned to face his best friend and saw only a blocky character from a world he knew all too well.
“You mean …” he couldn’t say it out loud. It couldn’t be true.
“That’s right,” Ant said. “We’re inside Minecraft.”
Chapter 4
Jaina dropped the last block into place. It landed with a squelch that both satisfied her and made her worry. Dirt. Not the best building material, but it would have to do.
She hopped down from the makeshift dirt-block staircase and turned to face her first build.
A dirt house. Well, more like a shelter than a house. No windows, no door and not even a bed inside. The sun was almost behind the hills. This simple hut was way better than hiding in a hole all night.
Jaina knew what happened at night. She didn’t know how she got here or why she was suddenly a blocky version of herself, but she did know what happens in Minecraft when the sun disappears.
A low moan came from the edges of the growing darkness, as if in answer to her own thoughts.
“Better get a move on,” she said to herself. Her shelter was built, but Jaina still had much to do. In the distance stood a small group of trees. “Time to get punching.”
Descent Into Overworld: An Unofficial Minecraft Adventure Page 2
