“How old is this kid again?”
“Eleven,” Esme said.
“He’s a genius,” Anton said, and he was actually serious and sounded like he was in awe.
“A.J. has way more time on his hands,” Esme said.
“More time than we, who are stuck in hospital beds, do?” I asked.
“Even though he’s younger than us, A.J.’s been at the hospital way longer than any of us,” she said.
“Whoa, that’s harsh.” I couldn’t imagine what it might be like to spend most of your life sick. Dr. Nay had told my parents that I was looking at three months in the hospital and then half a year in rehab. In my mind, I was preparing myself to spend Christmas looking at a beige ceiling. I’d miss the rest of my freshman semester.
I shook my head and surveyed the field of traps we’d have to navigate. “I don’t think even you could make this, Lonnie,” I whispered.
Lonnie shuffled along the back end of the house, staying near us, but then he turned and moved away. I ran to catch up with him and corralled him back to where the rest of us stood.
Esme looked on silently as I managed to get him back and wedge him between the two of us so there was nowhere to go.
“What if Lonnie’s like that forever?” she asked. “What then?”
“He won’t be,” I said with more conviction than I actually felt. And then I added, “I’ll make sure of it.”
“How?” she asked.
“I’m his oldest friend,” I said. “If anybody can bring him back, it’s me.”
“The question is, what are you bringing him back from?”
“He’s my best friend,” I said. “I’ll bring him back from anything.”
She nodded, looking hesitant, and walked away after Anton. He was whistling and muttering under his breath, pointing to parts of A.J.’s defense system as if Esme and I were still paying any attention to him at all. During a longer than normal pause in his running commentary of how awesome all of A.J.’s traps were, Esme offered a noncommittal “Uh-huh,” and Anton started up all over again.
I remembered getting a shovel from one of the mob drops, so I used it to dig up snowballs as we circled back to the front of the house. I would need these for my attack on the nether fortress.
“So,” I said. “How do we get inside?”
“I’m sure I can figure it out,” Anton said. “It’s just going to take some time.”
“We know where not to step,” I said. “Anywhere there’s redstone wiring is going to be a problem.”
Anton chuckled and shook his head. “You really are a noob! Do you think a kid who could make this wouldn’t know to camouflage every trap?”
“Except he didn’t,” I said.
“Except he wants you to think he didn’t,” Anton said.
Esme grunted. “You mean there are decoys.”
“Exactly,” said Anton.
Suddenly she seemed almost as enthralled with A.J.’s traps as Anton was.
“Listen, none of that helps us to get inside,” I said.
“Just wait,” Anton said, exasperated. “I can figure it out. Even with the decoys. Clever little kid.”
I took a turn around the house again. I was sure Anton would eventually figure out how to get into the house, but, in the meantime, it had been daylight for a while and I expected night to rise on the digital tundra soon. I didn’t want to be exposed when the mobs came out. We needed to avoid that at all costs. I didn’t think Lonnie would survive another attack with no way to defend himself. I needed to find a place to stash him, so I decided to do my own recon.
The house rose several floors. About five floors up, there was a glass enclosure that looked like there was plenty of foliage on the inside. A greenhouse, maybe. The bottom floors were windowless—more defenses, I guessed—so the greenhouse might have been the only natural source of light in the house. And based on the way Anton kept going around and around muttering to himself, lying flat on the ground, squatting, and looking at the labyrinth of traps at every angle, it was the only way to get inside.
“Stay here,” I said to Lonnie. I had an idea, but it would require me to go it alone. Lonnie looked at me, and when I moved away, he didn’t follow. I smiled at him, then turned back to the greenhouse.
Although it took me a minute to puzzle out, I was pretty certain I could make out a clear path up to the greenhouse. If I could follow it precisely and not touch any other part of the ground, then I could get right up to the side of the structure and knock out one of the cubes on the first floor and get inside. I took a deep breath, then jumped to a raised, snow-covered block.
Nothing happened, so I jumped to the next area, and again, no traps went off. I laughed and looked back at Lonnie, who was still standing where I’d left him, watching me successfully navigate A.J.’s booby-traps.
“Stop!” Anton yelled as I jumped to the next block. He and Esme started running toward me, and it felt like time slowed down as I landed. I felt rather than heard the click of a hidden pressure plate, and then time sped up.
There wasn’t much time to react.
Esme grabbed Anton, and tugged him away.
I turned and sprinted back the way I came, not bothering to watch where I was stepping anymore, and tackled Lonnie. We fell to the ground and skidded away, but it wasn’t far enough.
A.J.’s traps triggered with spectacular force. A series of flaming arrows flew toward us. Most stuck in the ground, burning in place, but a few of them hit us. The sharp stab of the arrow piercing me was bad enough, but the fire…I started to crawl away, but Lonnie sat where he was, pinned by three arrows that hit his legs and arm. I tried to pull him away, but another volley of arrows rained down. I put my arms over my head and hoped for the best. Then there were a series of explosions, so loud that they left my ears ringing. All four of us crawled away from the blasts just as the ground behind us fell open like a trapdoor and disappeared into a lake of lava.
It was the first time I was really feeling anything inside the game. And it wasn’t good. I realized this could be an effect of being inside for too long. My mind was creating sensations that weren’t really there, but it wasn’t time to leave yet. I couldn’t. Not now.
I continued crawling back into a snowbank that thankfully put out all the fire from the arrows. Esme and Anton were still approaching when a third volley came at us. This looked like flaming balls that fell like black hail, hard and fast. They sank into the ground, sizzling as they melted into the snow, then exploded pixels of dirt. I pulled Lonnie up onto the snowbank with me, and tried to yell at Esme and Anton to get out of the way. My throat felt strained, as if I were screaming at the top of my lungs. Still, neither of them moved. Maybe they couldn’t. I didn’t know. It suddenly occurred to me that their hearing might have been affected by the first set of blasts as well.
I pulled Lonnie to the other side of the small rise, then ducked for cover. A blocky hand grabbed hold of the top of our paltry snow shelter, and I grabbed it and pulled. Esme tumbled over, and then Anton. She was saying something to me, but I couldn’t hear. She looked like she was shouting. Anton’s face was twisted with pain. Only Lonnie appeared relatively calm, despite the bright red wounds that bloomed on his body.
Esme pulled herself to standing a few moments later and looked over the rocks. She turned back to Anton and told him something else. He nodded, and shifted his body to the right, leaning out so he could see the house. He nodded again, and she pulled him to his feet.
I pushed my way up and looked at A.J.’s house. The triggers had all stopped firing, but there was an enormous gray crater where I had been jumping earlier. I pulled Lonnie gently along to survey the damage. The house, amazingly, was totally unharmed even though the crater was huge. The kid was impressive, I had to admit. He probably had a future in demolition.
All four of us
stood over the crater, looking dazed, not moving, until Esme walked up behind me and shoved me into the hole. I fell against a rock. A shard hit my shoulder and sent me spinning down another level, rolling to a stop just before another drop that led to the lava lake. I got to my knees and looked up. Esme screamed at me, but I couldn’t make out anything she was saying, even though—good news—my hearing was already coming back. It was incredible how quickly people healed inside the game. If only it were that way on the outside.
I waited until Esme walked away from the hole to climb out. I wasn’t an idiot.
When I got out, Lonnie was the only one waiting for me at the edge of the crater. Esme and Anton sat against the same snowbank we’d used for cover, talking between themselves. Lonnie’s hand reached over and brushed against my own. I looked into his eyes, searching for signs of the friend I had out in the real world. He tilted his head, the way the real Lonnie sometimes did when he was waiting for me to figure something out. I knew what that thing was. I would have to confront Esme and Anton at some point.
It was better to get it over with.
I moved closer to them, taking Lonnie with me as backup. “I didn’t know that was going to happen,” I said.
Esme looked up, narrowing her eyes. “Why?” she asked.
I had no idea what she meant, so I waited.
She stood up. “Why didn’t you know that was going to happen?” she asked. She stepped closer as she talked so she was right in my face by the end of the question.
I took a big step back. “How could I know?”
She laughed. Anton frowned, and Lonnie looked at me in that same head-tilted way.
“I was figuring it out,” Anton said. “You could have waited.”
There were a lot of good responses to that. I could have said, I know, I’m sorry, or even You’re right, or maybe I’m a giant idiot and I wouldn’t be offended if you abandoned me here. But instead, “You were taking forever” is what came out. “I needed to find a place for Lonnie to be safe.”
Anton got to his feet with a little difficulty and glared at me. Esme stood next to him, as though she was there to support him in case he wanted to lay into me too. She eyed me angrily, but then turned off toward the house.
“What’s the point?” she asked. “It’s not even worth it.” She let Anton lean against her shoulder as they went.
Lonnie looked at me once, then began to follow them as they skirted the edge of the crater. I let out a huff of frustration before I followed them.
Anton carefully examined the wooden door and frame as if he thought it might be explosive too. This time, I waited. I had learned my lesson. Then Lonnie pushed Anton aside, opened the door, and stepped into the house.
I cringed.
Nothing happened.
When I opened my eyes again, Lonnie was standing inside a large room looking back at the rest of us as if we were stupid to think that a kid who’d spent that much time on defenses outside the house would think he still needed another trap at the door.
Anton looked annoyed. But he stepped inside. I followed exactly in Esme’s tracks, not wanting to cause any more trouble than I already had. But as we followed Anton moving carefully around the ground floor rooms, we all relaxed more and more. A.J.’s house was something of a funhouse with a few practical items thrown in.
Exactly like something out of an eleven-year-old’s imagination.
The first room had a large fireplace crackling in one corner and a waterfall streaming in the other. Against one wall was a bookshelf, and a table with a lamp. I picked up one book that said RULES on the spine. Inside it said:
Don’t play with the chickens.
Don’t touch the levers.
Don’t go to the fourth level.
Don’t use the ladder.
I read them out for everyone to hear. Lonnie went up a couple of steps into the next room but Anton stopped him before he got too far inside, saying, “Hold up,” and pushing past him. This next room was smaller than the first and packed with crates lining the floor against one wall. Anton went through each one. They were filled with A.J.’s supplies. There was a bed in the opposite corner and a ladder near the foot of the bed leading to the next level.
“Don’t use the ladder,” I repeated.
Esme put her hand on it anyway, as if she was testing it out. “It seems fine.”
“There must be another way up,” I said. I moved around the room looking for another passageway, but there was only a door at the back to the next room, which had stone floors and a series of levers against two of the walls. Anton studied them carefully.
Esme put a foot on the bottom rung of the ladder, and tested her weight on it. “Still seems fine.”
“Don’t,” Anton whispered fiercely. His eyes cut to both of us. “Neither of you move a muscle.”
“Nor a pixel,” I said, attempting a laugh, but another sharp glare from both Anton and Esme sent me looking around the room as if it was the most fascinating assemblage of digital landscape I’d ever encountered. I turned to Lonnie and asked, “Do you want to sit?”
“You remember sitting, don’t you?” Esme said, mocking.
“Shhh!” Anton sniped. “I’m trying to figure this out.”
“Yes, sitting is very distracting,” I said.
“Getting blown up in this game definitely is distracting,” he said. And when he noticed me rolling my eyes at him, he muttered.
“Do you honestly think he’d set traps inside his own home base when the outside is so well guarded?” I asked.
“Doesn’t matter,” Esme said. “You need to work faster, or I’m going up the ladder.”
“No, you’re not,” I said.
“You will want to get on this ladder too,” she said as she pointed out the window.
Outside, it was getting dark, which wasn’t the worst thing. No, the worst thing was that a horde of zombies had appeared and circled the building and the blast hole, and they all seemed to be looking in at us, getting closer every moment. The noise from when I triggered A.J.’s traps must have alerted them to our location. And there were a lot of them. Dozens. Nope. Hundreds. Line after line of digital mayhem approached.
I looked at Anton and said, “Hurry up!”
“Do something!” I said again. I pushed Lonnie down into the chair and looked from Esme—who still had one foot on the lowest rung of the ladder and two hands firmly on the sides—to Anton, who was now lying on his stomach looking at what appeared to be a small crevice between the floor and the wall.
“It’s a false wall,” he said.
“And?” I asked.
Esme still hadn’t changed position, but she had out her bow and an arrow aimed at the door and the growing darkness outside.
“Well?” I asked again.
“Hold on,” Anton said impatiently.
Esme stepped away from the ladder and positioned herself next to the bookshelf with the arrow still pointed at the door.
“Maybe we should use the ladder,” I suggested. “It’s the only way out of this room.”
“And I’m telling you it isn’t,” Anton said again. “But if you say one more word, I’m not going to tell you what that way out is, and you can deal with all of them alone.”
The horde was pressing in, moaning. A few of the zombies managed to navigate around the craters, but most of them were falling into the holes I’d made at the side and front of the house. But so many more kept coming and falling in that soon the holes would be filled; I imagined the rest of the zombies crossing to the door by crawling over the backs and heads of their fellow ghouls.
“Have you ever seen anything like this?” Esme asked. “Ever?”
“No,” I said. “What do we do?”
“Hold on,” Anton said.
“They’re nearly here,�
� I said.
“Just a minute,” Anton said in a higher, squeakier voice.
“We’re toast,” I said.
Out of the corner of my vision, I saw Esme back up a little and get to one knee. Her bow and arrow were still pointed outside of the room, but whatever she was aiming at seemed to be a whole lot taller now…or higher. Aren’t zombies supposed to be small? I wondered. And what is that whistling sound?
“Anton?” I asked.
“What?” he snapped.
An explosion rocked the outside of the house and blew the front door in. It skidded against the floor toward us and stopped mere inches from Lonnie’s feet, separating him from me.
Zombies poured into the room. I leaped over the door and grabbed Lonnie. But instead of following me blindly as he’d done before, he pulled his hand away and darted toward the door opening that was nearly clogged with green creatures.
They overwhelmed him quickly and surrounded me, too. I took a few swings at them with a diamond sword, but there were way too many.
“Got it!” Anton said. I saw him look up and around, and the smile on his face slid to fear and then frustration. “I was nearly there,” he said sadly.
“Where?” I asked. “Maybe it’s still good,” I said.
Esme fired arrows into the crowd. The zombies required multiple hits to go down, and more and more were coming. I continued slashing with my sword while pushing Lonnie backward, away from danger. I turned to see where Anton and Esme were, but a zombie hit me, sending me sprawling. My body felt leaden as I hit the floor, and I didn’t know if I had the energy to escape the approaching zombie, but then someone dragged me away. With a surprising amount of speed, I was pulled back toward the wall where Anton had been working, and then somehow through the wall to the other side. I could still hear the zombies moaning and moving through the space, but for some reason they didn’t follow. I looked up to thank either Esme or Anton for saving me, since—let’s face it—they owed me no favors, and found myself looking at Lonnie. It could’ve been a trick of the light, but it almost looked like he smiled at me, as if he recognized me. Warmth flooded my chest.
The Crash: An Official Minecraft Novel Page 11
