PART 1

MAIN STORYLINE

Cali slid into her desk chair and turned her computer on. She sighed. She was glad that the school year had finally ended. Her middle school class had a big party. She just stayed out in the hallway. She didn’t like parties. They were too noisy. Nobody really liked her anyway. When her computer finished turning on, she logged on to her settings and started up Minecraft. She loved the game. It was all she played in her spare time. She clicked on the “Multiplayer” button, and clicked, “Add server.” She typed in the IP address, and clicked, “Done.” She pressed the “Join server” button, and her screen started loading. She always wondered why it took so long for her computer to load. She had a very beefy setup, and two or three terabytes of storage. It should’ve gone faster.
When the server finally loaded, Cali was shocked at what she saw. The server spawn was a worn torn battlefield. There were creeper explosion holes, and fires dotted around the default landscape. Cali heard a shuffling noise behind her. She spun her avatar around, and gasped. Three users were standing there. But they weren’t any normal users. The first was a girl, with a skin of pure color. Her long blue hair went down to her waist. The second was a monkey in a Superman costume, a red cape billowing behind him. The last character was a man, with brown hair, blue shirt, and green pants. And above the players were the words, “Monet113, Monkeypants271, and Gameknight999.” She said out loud, “How in the…” In game, she typed, “Holy Herobrine, are you who I think you are?!” The reply came from Monkeypants almost immediately.
“Yes, yes we are. I assume you’ve read the Gameknight999 books then?”
“Yeah, they’re really cool! At least I think so.”
“Thanks, I’m glad you think so.” He went silent for a moment. Then, Gameknight said after a pause,
“I’m sorry.” Cali was about to ask why, when her computer screen started to glow an angry yellow. It buzzed, and then enveloped her in a blaze of light and pain. It felt like she was on fire, yet frozen at the same time. She could’ve sworn she heard the mooing of cows, the oinking of pigs, and the clucking of chickens…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

PixelWarrior877 felt strange. She was lying face down on the ground. That was probably why. She got up, and almost screamed. The ground around her was grass. The trees surrounding were blocky. She felt her face, and it was square. She was… inside of… Minecraft! “How in the world…?” Pixel thought. She turned around, looking at her surroundings, and saw Monet, Monkeypants, and Gameknight all standing where they had been before. But this time, their skins looked much more vivid. Pixel could see Monet’s hair gently flowing in the westward-bound wind. Monkeypants’ cape did the same. Gameknight’s diamond armor glistened in the sunlight. Pixel looked down at herself, and saw her abnormal skin had merged with her body. She had white, spiky, hair that reached down to her ankles. A black hoodie covered her body, with dark commando boots on her feet. A black headband encircled her head, complete with black no-fingered gloves. She looked at the group, then back at herself, then at the group again. “What happened?” Pixel asked timidly. Gameknight looked at her, and gave an intense gaze.
“You were transported… into Minecraft.”
“How?” Pixel asked. “That’s impossible… isn’t it?”
“Well, no. We’re all in Minecraft.”
“What? How in the world did we get… oh… those books, the Gameknight999 series… it wasn’t just fiction was it?” Gameknight shook his head. “So, it actually happened? All those battles with Erebus, Malacoda, Xa-Tul… even Herobrine… they’re all true…” Monkeypants nodded. Pixel was shocked. “Um… Woah… Hold on…” She sat down heavily on the ground, her hair flowing around her like a ballerina’s tutu. She curled into a ball in the presence of the User-that-is-not-a-user. She ran her square fingers through her hair. She was inside of Minecraft, the game she loved, the only game she bothered to play, where people wouldn’t judge her for what she looked like. And she was there with three heroes… no, legends… She got back up. “Why did I get sucked into here? I’m no one special. I mean, if what your saying is true, then, I shouldn’t have been affected by the digitalizer’s ray, right?” Monkeypants nodded.
“Yes, but there was a malfunction. Some other users got pulled into the game too. We’ve been going around, trying to find them. We’re trying to figure out how to get them… all of us… out of here. Don’t get me wrong, Minecraft is awesome and all, it’s just…” Gameknight finished for him.
“We’ve accidentally pulled innocent kids into this place, and now it’s our job to get you out.” Pixel understood, knowing he was referencing one of the books… Pixel didn’t remember which one. She said,
“Okay, so… where are the others?” Monet spoke for the first time.
“Follow us. There at a camp we set up.” She pulled out a splash potion of swiftness, and poured it over the group. Pixel’s vision got warped, as if someone had suddenly turned the FOV to Quake Pro. Monet quickly sprinted off westwards, towards the setting sun. The rest of the people followed.
They ran for quite some time, until the moon was high in the sky. Along the way, they saw monsters, shooting past them as they headed for camp. Pixel had studied them as they sprinted past. Everything was in high def, of course. But that just made the monsters look even scarier. When Pixel was just a normal user, she would go out during the night and pwn googlies no problem. But now, she knew the truth. The mobs in Minecraft were alive, just like the books said. And now, she was stuck there, along with who knows how many other people. With no way out. She wondered if Shawny was monitoring Gameknight, Monkeypants, and Monet’s movements. She hoped so, because they needed a way out too. “Unless he got stuck here too. And in that case, we’re screwed.” Pixel thought. She looked up from the grassy ground underneath her feet, and saw that Monet had disappeared over a hill in front of them. She followed, and saw a magnificent site. It was actually a site; there was a campground with half a dozen or more people walking in and out of tent-like structures, talking by a fireplace, or just sitting looking at the stars. Gameknight, Monkeypants, and Monet led her into the makeshift village, through the two block high stone fences that surrounded the area. She glanced around, and saw all the new people staring at her. They had skins of all kinds. One was a rainbow cat, one was a girl with multicolored hair and a black jacket, and yet another had long, magenta hair with a headset, complete with gray cat ears and tail. Pixel stared at different people, and then fixed her eyes on one. She couldn’t believe it. “What are the chances…”  Pixel thought, “That he would be here…”

PART 2

PROLOGUE

Dykema clicked the play button, and smiled. The buildup started. It got louder and louder. And then, the beat dropped. Dykema threw her hands into the air, and danced around her room. The dubstep was just too awesome to stay still. She did a mini break dance move on the floor, but she cut it short, for fear of hitting one of the many sharp objects in her room. Her parents, or at least her mom, had objected to letting her have so many weapons in her room, but they didn’t really do anything about it. Dykema thought she probably scared them. She looked around her room at the different sights. She had a couple knives laying on her white painted desk. Pink and green curtains hung from the windows where butterfly decals were attached to. On her ceiling,  different posters of planets and space objects were plastered to the paint. On her blue walls, pictures of certain superheroes, Minecraft characters, and Cybertronians hung, some almost falling off the wall. Dykema sighed. She was going to have to retape those later. But first…  She did a flying leap towards her desk chair, and slid in without incident. Her extremely long dark brown hair whipped around in protest. She flipped it out of her face and clicked the Minecraft icon on her already turned-on computer. From outside her room, a voice yelled, “Turn it down Dykema!” She shouted back,
“Oh, shut up Jay!” Her little brother could be so annoying sometimes. She waited for the screen to load. “Hurry up, you dumb thing.” Dykema mumbled. She twisted a piece of her hair between her fingers. She had never cut it. Since she was only in 7th grade, it wasn’t as long as she wanted it to be, but she would just have to deal with thigh length for now. Her game finally loaded, and she clicked the “Multiplayer” option. She hadn’t got a chance to play on a new server she recently acquired the IP address for. She entered it, and said, “Oh man. That lag though.” When the game finally caught up, Dykema saw that the whole landscape was covered with holes from TNT and/or creepers. She turned her mouse, and her character swiveled it’s head. All around her was just destruction. She liked explosions, (who didn’t?) but she didn’t see the reason for anything to be destroyed. From the looks of things, nothing needed to be destroyed. In the chat, she saw someone had written an,
“Ahem.” Dykema turned this way and that, looking for the source. Then she found them. There were three figures. One with long, blue hair, one with the skin of a monkey in a Superman costume, ridiculously forever smiling, and the final one in a blue shirt, green pants, and full diamond armor. Dykema was confused at first, but then recognized the figures. She typed,
“Oh my gosh r u who I think u r?!?!?” The reply from GAMEKNIGHT999 came almost instantaneously.
“Yeah we are.”
“What r u guys doing on this server? I thought u were working on Gameknight’s server, cuz of 1.10 & all.”
“Yeah, we were. But… Something else came up.”
“Like what?”
“We’re actually in the game right now. Like, actually in.”
“Like in the books?” Gameknight nodded.
“Ok, what?! That’s just fiction tho. How can u actually be in the game?” Gameknight’s didn’t respond. He just stood there like he had gone AFK. Dykema thought he must be receiving a private message through “/msg (insert gamertag here).” Gameknight said,
“Get ready.”
“For what?” Dykema asked. Before Gameknight answered, Dykema’s screen started to glow a bright yellow. It buzzed like a nest of hornets. Dykema said to herself, “What the…” before she was engulfed in the light, everything slowly fading to black.

TehUnnamedGamer spat out a mouthful of grass. She was lying down with her eyes closed. She never remembered going to sleep. The thought scared her. She opened her eyes, and let out a yelp. She was lying on grassy ground, trees in the distance. But everything was… Square. “No… This isn’t… shouldn’t… be possible…” She got up. She felt herself. She was blocky. Yep. She was in Minecraft. “Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat…?” She thought. Beside her, Gameknight and his two companions were standing. She now recognized the others as Monet113 and Monkeypants271. She stared at them, their skins much more vivid than before. Gamer looked down at herself. She had practically become her skin. She had long, magenta hair with a cyan streak down the left side. She had a black and white headset on her head. She was wearing a pastel purple and mint green crop top, with the same color of shorts. Black and yellow greenish armbands covered most of her arms, with the same colors on her extremely tall boots. She saw that she had gray cat ears and tail, just like on her original skin. Gamer wiggled her tail, then after a pause, said to Gameknight, “What… The heck… Happened?!” Gameknight replied,
“You were sucked into the game, just like us.” Suddenly, a column of yellow light erupted next to Gamer. Before she had a chance to react, a rainbow cat was lying on the ground, similar to the way Gamer had been lying. She said with disbelief, “Jay?!” Her eleven year old brother responded to his name, and was up in an instant.
“Hey… What’s going on? Are we in Minecraft? Cuz it looks like we’re in… Minecraft.” He inspected himself. “Woah! I’m a cat!” Gamer looked at the gamertag above his head, RainbowCat618. He looked at his big sister. “Um… You’re half cat, you know.” Gamer sighed.
“Yeah, I noticed.” Her brother hadn’t changed one bit. She turned to Gameknight and his family. RainbowCat noticed the others standing with them, and said,
“Who are you three?” Gamer leaned closer and said to Gameknight,
“He hasn’t read the books.” He nodded, understanding. Gamer, with Gameknight’s help, filled RainbowCat in on the brief history of what had happened in Minecraft. RainbowCat had a hard time comprehending it, which was understandable. If you hadn’t read all the books 8 million times like Gamer had, it was a bit confusing. When they were done, Gamer asked, “So, what happened, exactly? Why are we here if the digitalizer just affects those who are hit with the beam?” Monet spoke up.
“There was a malfunction. Some of the beam traveled across the Internet, affecting other people playing on the same server.” Gameknight said,
“The digitalizer makes a whirring sound whenever it sucks another player in, and Shawny messages me back in the physical world whenever that happens.” Gamer inquired,
“Have you tried getting out yet?” Monkeypants replied,
“Yes. No luck. The digitalizer seemed to have no trouble bringing people into the game, but doesn’t want to take them back out. Shawny is doing the best he can, but sadly we still don’t know why this is happening.” Gameknight looked at the sky, and saw it was just past it’s zenith, and starting it’s descent towards the west horizon.
“Come on.” He said. “We traveled really far away from our camp. We’ve gotta go back now or we won’t make it back before dark.” He turned to his sister. “Monet, got any swiftness potions left?” She replied,
“Nope. But I’ve got a lot back at camp.” He said,
“Okay, you can restock there. Come on, let’s move.” Gameknight took off, both family groups following.

They kept running and running until Gamer couldn’t even tell how long it had been. They had stopped multiple times for food breaks (even noobs know that your hunger bar depletes faster when you sprint). They finally reached the camp. It wasn’t very large, but you could tell there were people living in it. Smoke rose from a lit fire inside the two block high cobblestone walled village-like place. (<Phew, that’s a lotta words!>) Gameknight led them inside the walls. Makeshift tent things were set up, and people were mingling around the campsite. Gamer marveled at the place, until she noticed a certain figure sitting by the fire. “Vicky?!” She yelled to her. The girl in question turned to see her best friend and her best friend’s brother standing with Gameknight and his family.
“Dykema?! Jay?” She said, and ran over to hug them. Thy hugged her back. “You two are here too?”
“Yeah. And we… Probably shouldn’t use our real names here. Just in case.” Vicky said,
“Yeah, right. Call me Pinky then.” Gamer looked at her friend. Her gamertag above her head said, “PinkyRaven.” She wore a black hoodie with a green heart on the back. She had creamy white hair with long rainbow bangs swept to the side of her face. Gamer said to Pinky,
“I’m assuming you wanna read those books now?”
“Yeah.” It had been a running joke between the two. Gamer had been trying to convince Pinky to read some Gameknight999 books before the whole malfunction happened.

Monkeypants  made a two block high stack of dirt and stood on it. “Hey, everybody!” They all stopped talking to each other and looked at the User-that-is-not-a-user. “Two more people have joined us tonight. Introduce yourselves.” Gamer spoke for herself and her brother. She said loudly,
“I am TehUnnamedGamer, and this is my brother RainbowCat618.” They all  acknowledged them with nods or grunts. Monkeypants smiled, and said,
“Okay. It’s getting late, so we all better get to bed. Gameknight, Monet, and I will look for more people tomorrow.” Everyone picked a tent and entered it. RainbowCat went over with some of the boys and Gamer went into a tent with Pinky. She already had a bed set up, and Gamer picked a random one to sleep in. She took her headset off and pulled her fingers through her obnoxiously long hair. Pinky did the same, though her’s was shoulder length. Gamer said,
“This is so crazy. I mean, we’re actually inside a game. How insane is that?!” Pinky replied,
“Yeah, pretty insane. And I had no idea who those three were before this whole thing happened.”
“You mean the Feynmans? Yeah, they’re pretty cool.”
“So that’s their last name?”
“Yeah. At least I think so. They might have used a fake one in the books, I dunno.” Pinky pulled the red sheet on her bed over herself.
“Whatever, we could always ask them or something. Well, anyways, goodnight!” Gamer settled down in her bed as well.
“Goodnight!” She said.  They both fell silent. Gamer closed her bright green eyes, even though she knew there was no way in heck that she would be able to sleep. But, still, she was really tired from all that running she had done earlier in the day. Eventually, after what seemed like many hours of trying, she fell asleep.

PART 3

Gamer awoke before she opened her eyes. She thought about what she had experienced in Minecraft. “Wow. What a weird dream.” She thought. She opened her eyes, and saw Pinky’s blocky, smiling face staring at her from an uncomfortably close distance. “Woah!” Gamer yelled,  falling from her bed. She got up quickly, and looked around the room. She was still in Minecraft. “Don’t do that, Pinky!” Gamer said, then laughed. “It was kinda funny, I guess.” Gamer thought. She rubbed the back of her square head. “Man, for a second, I thought this was all a dream.” She said out loud. Pinky became a bit more serious.
“Yeah, me too actually. Come on, we’re gonna be late for breakfast!” Gamer quickly slipped her headset on and followed Pinky out the door and to the main courtyard area. Most of the others were already up, sitting around the morning fire, eating, drinking, and laughing together. It almost seemed… Normal, until she realized they were all here against their will. At the whim of a broken machine. For the first time, Gamer thought about how long she might be there, inside Minecraft. With no way out. “Let’s worry about that later.” Gamer decided. She walked up to her brother RainbowCat, sitting and chatting with another boy, who sounded like he was about the same age as him. He had a pretty generic skin on, one that Gamer had seen recolored many times before. Half of his black hoodie and pants was decorated red for fire, and the other half blue for ice. A creeper insignia was on the back, split in half by the colors. The skin went even so far as to make one of the boy’s eyes lava red, and the other a cold blue. She interrupted the conversation by saying,
“Hey bro, you know where all the food’s hiding? I’m starving.” Her brother gave her a scowl that quickly turned to a smile.
“Good morning to you to, Gamer. There’s some melons and pieces of bread in that chest over there.” He motioned to a chest that was near the edge of the camp.
“Thanks bro.” Gamer replied. She went over and grabbed some melon slices and a piece of bread, then headed back over to where everyone else was. Pinky had already grabbed some food from another chest and was sitting near RainbowCat. Gamer sat next her and tried to make conversation as she munched on her juicy melon. “So… Weather’s pretty nice today.” Pinky replied,
“Yeah. Considering that there’s really only three options for the weather to be: stormy, rainy, or clear.” Gamer said,
“Yeah, I guess.” She noticed that neither Gameknight nor his family was present. “Hey, what happened to Gameknight and his fam?” Pinky took a bite of her apple, then answered,
“Oh, they left already. Looking for more people, I’m assuming. And maybe more food too. They’ll be back soon. They always are before dark.” Gamer asked,
“So, how long have you been here to know that?” Pinky answered,
“Well, in Minecraft time, it’s gotta be about… Um… About a week.” Gamer, surprised, exclaimed,
“A week?! How long were you playing Minecraft for in the real world?”
“About two hours and twenty minutes.”
“How do you know that?”
“Every Minecraft day is twenty minutes in the real world. So therefore, I did the math, and that’s what I got.”
“You always were better at math then me.” Gamer and Pinky smiled together.
“So, I’ve technically only been here twenty minutes in the physical world. Wow. Trippy.” There was a pause. “So, what do we do while we wait for them to come back?”
“Well, we’ve been having archery contests, and stuff, and… just, talking, I guess. There’s a lot of interesting people here actually. I believe the guy your brother is talking to is from England, actually, and… Ooh! The people over there with the similar skins are twins. Heh, I’m a poet and I didn’t even know it. And… I don’t really know about anyone else.” Gamer said,
“Cool!” Insert awkward silence here. “Um…” Pinky laughed.
“Oh man, uh…” Gamer laughed too.
“Let’s go see if there’s a lake or pool somewhere around here to swim in or something.”
“Hey! Actually, I saw some buckets of water in one of the tents. We could make our own!”
“Good idea! Let’s do it!” Pinky led Gamer into a tent and they both grabbed two buckets of water. They went back out and found a nice patch of grass to make the pool. Gamer dug a two by two hole in the ground first with her fists.  Pinky asked,
“What’s that for?” Gamer responded,
“Infinite water source.”
“Oh yeah!” Pinky said. They poured their buckets of water into the hole, filling it. The water looked so real, so lifelike… Gamer pulled her hand through it, swishing it around. It felt like water in the physical world. Pinky stared at Gamer. “I know. So weird, right?” She said, snapping Gamer out of her trance.
“Oh, yeah.” She quickly got up off her knees (she didn’t even realize she was kneeling) and scooped some water into her iron bucket. The water made lines for a split second, then went back to being uniform. She had used this interesting Minecraft mechanic many times before. Pinky found a couple stone shovels lying somewhere, and they both started digging. Others, including RainbowCat, saw what they were doing and started to help. Soon, everyone at the camp had pitched in. There were at least half a dozen users at the camp, so the massive pool got done in no time. They put the finishing touches on it, then filled it in with water. When they were done, they all admired their work by swimming in it. The two twins, TheGurlWhoLuvzGuns and TheGuyWhoLuvzGuns, did a pencil dive off the side at the same time. RainbowCat and his new friend, _313m3nt_, (which Gamer assumed spelled, “Element”) were splashing each other and laughing. More people were just hanging around and dangling their feet in the water.
Suddenly, Gameknight, Monet, Monkeypants, and another person came charging in the front gate. They stopped, panting, then Gameknight began boarding up all the entrances. (To be fair, there were only two; the main one and an emergency exit.) Gamer was about to ask what they were running away from, when she saw who was with them. He was a Caucasian man, with black and dark brown robes, and a cloak with the Mojang logo on the back. On his head he wore a crown of leaves. Floating above his head, in the all-too-familiar black translucent rectangle, was the name, “jeb_”. Gamer gasped. It was Jens Bergensten, Minecraft’s co-creator and lead creative designer. He helped Notch design the vanilla game. And he was in Minecraft. With Gamer. Everyone else saw who it was, they were surprised too. RainbowCat leaned over to Gamer and whispered into her ear, “Who’s that?” Gamer gave him a look of disapproval, then ran over to Gameknight, everyone else following. She asked him,
“Why are you boarding up all the entrances? Is that actually Jeb?” Jeb overhead the conversation, and said with a Swedish accent,
“Yes, I am actually Jeb.” Gamer flipped out.
“Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygoshohmygoshohmygoshohmygoshohmygoshohmgosh…” Pinky walked up and tugged a strand of her magenta hair. She snapped out of her trance. Gameknight said to Gamer,
“There’s a hoard of about twenty zombies coming this way.” Gamer replied,
“They must sense Jeb or something. He practically created all of this. With Notch, of course, but still. They must… know… somehow.” Jeb spoke up.
“Maybe. I’m still having trouble comprehending all of this. I am in the game I helped create…” He looked all around. At the landscape, the sky, and the users surrounding him. One of the people in the back of the group yelled to Gameknight,
“So, Mr. User-that-is-not-a-user, what’s your plan for getting us out of this mess?” Gameknight whipped around at the sound.
“I recognize that voice…” He pushed his way through the crowd to find an NPC with brilliant red hair standing inconspicuously, a playful smile on her face. One user took a guess as to her identity.
“Hunter?” He asked. Gameknight walked up to her and smiled. He looked like he wanted to give her a hug, but was embarrassed to do so. Gameknight said to her,
“Hey Hunter! Where’ve you been?”
“Oh, I was hunting around here somewhere and I saw you running here. Hey, ya know those zombies are still coming right? Now’s not the time for catching up.” She whipped her bow out from seemingly nowhere, notched an arrow, and took up position near the top of the wall. Gameknight turned to everyone in the camp, including his family and Jeb.
“Everyone, we’re gonna have to fight.” Whispers of terror radiated through the camp. They could hear the sorrowful moans coming from behind the hill. Everyone knew that, if not stopped, zombies would destroy every living thing on the server that wasn’t a googlie. Monkeypants saw that some, actually most, of the users didn’t want to go up against the swarm. He said,
“If anyone doesn’t want to fight, they can go into the tents and hide.” At least half of the people standing there bolted for their beds, including RainbowCat. Gamer rolled her eyes and shook her head as she watched her brother run off. Four people remained. Gamer, Pinky, and the Twins, TheGurlWhoLuvzGuns and TheGuyWhoLuvzGuns. They both nodded to each other at the exact same time. They asked where the bows and arrows were, then grabbed some and scurried up next to Hunter. From their gamertags, Gamer got the feeling they knew what they were doing when it came to flying projectiles, and not just with bullets. Gameknight, Monet, Monkeypants, Jeb, Gamer, and Pinky were left staring at each other. Gamer said,
“Jeb, you might wanna join the others. I don’t think anyone could live with themselves if anything happened to the co-creator of Minecraft.” Jeb refused the offer.
“No way am I letting you fight all by yourselves. It’s probably my fault the zombies found this place anyway. I’m not going anywhere.” Gameknight nodded.
“I understand. Come on, we’ve gotta make you three some weapons.” They followed Gameknight to the nearest crafting table, and he made them all one stone sword each. Gamer sliced through the air with it. It was almost just like her machete she owned back at home. Except, of course, more pixelated. She knew a few moves with it. Pinky picked hers up with great care, looking a bit uneasy. She didn’t like blades, knives in particular. Good thing they were on an unmodded server. Gameknight pulled out his signature diamond blade with one hand. He then put an iron one in the other. Monkeypants bore an iron sword as well. Monet pulled out the bow she received from Stitcher. Gamer remembered at least that much from the Gameknight999 books. Unless her brain was being mean to her again and feeding her false information. (<Translation: the author does not know if Stitcher gave Monet the bow or not, and is too lazy to get off her butt and go look on her shelf in the actual book.>) Monet went up and joined Hunter and the Twins. Gamer nodded. They definitely had the archery angle of the defense covered. She glanced over to Pinky. She had set the sword down and was worriedly looking over the wall at the approaching mobs. She walked up to her and gingerly placed her hand on Pinky’s shoulder. She jumped, startled, but relaxed when she saw who it was. Gamer handed the sword to her, and she took it reluctantly. Gamer questioned,
“You ready?” Pinky raised the sword and inspected the smooth, stone surface.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.” She answered. Gameknight approached the duo.
“Let’s go, they’re almost here.” Gamer and Pinky nodded, and all the armed warriors went out the gates to meet the zombie hoard. They recognized the User-that-is-not-a-user at once, but were surprised when they saw that the other users didn’t have server threads. Most of them didn’t give it a second thought and charged straight for the warriors. Gameknight ran forward courageously. “FOR MINECRAFT!” The familiar battle cry rang from his lips. Monet, Monkeypants, Jeb, and Gamer followed suit. Pinky was more reluctant, but did the same. Gamer saw that Gameknight had became a whirlwind of destruction, spinning from one zombie to another. He tore health from all he came in contact with. It seemed to Gamer that Gameknight so much as looked at a zombie and it would explode with pain. Gamer was less ferocious, but equally as devastating. She carved through many a zombie. The archers shot arrow after arrow. Rarely did a projectile miss its target. In what seemed like no time at all, there were only a handful of zombies left. They  knew they were outnumbered, but kept fighting all the same. The users closed in on them, until there was only two left. One of them ran away. TheGuyWhoLuvzGuns tried to shoot him, but he was too far away. He disappeared over a hill, and Gamer knew there would be no way for anyone to catch him. The zombie sprinted with incredible speed. They focused on the other zombie. The users surrounded him. He fell to the ground, HP dangerously low. Gamer put her sword against his throat, and yelled at him,
“Who made you come here?” The zombie growled something inaudible. “Out loud, you scum bag.” The zombie moaned,
“He will destroy all Users-that-are-not-users. He always gets what he wants… Whenever he wants it…” The zombie made a last ditch effort. He extended a clawed hand and reached for Gamer. He never hit his mark. She sliced his throat, destroying the last of his health, making him disappear with a pop. All that was left was zombie flesh and XP. The XP points flowed into Gamer, and she looked at Gameknight. Along with everyone else. They all seemed to expect that he would know who sent them. Jeb said,
“Do you know who sent these zombies?” Gameknight ruled out possibilities.
“Well, it’s not Herobrine. He’s long gone.”
“Entity303?” Gamer suggested.
“He probably wouldn’t waste his time telling the zombies to search. He’d just whip up a command and spawn the zombies right on top of us.”
“Xa-Tul?” Monet asked.
“That doesn’t sound like him.”
“Who, then?” Gameknight answered gravely,
“I don’t know, and I don’t like it.”

PART 4

MAIN STORYLINE

Pixel stared at the figure, shocked that such an important person got caught up in all this. “Jeb?!” She asked, flabbergasted. The girl with the magenta hair said,
“Yeah, it’s Jeb. Get over it.” Everyone was about to go back to their business when Monkeypants stood on a dirt block and called everyone over.
“We have another new person joining us tonight. Tell us your name.” Monkeypants said. His mouth was perpetually turned into a smile, making his skin seem all the more ridiculous and friendly. Pixel shyly spoke,
“Um, hi, everyone… I’m PixelWarrior877… Um… Yeah…” Everyone acknowledged her introduction in their own way, then started to drift away from the gathering place. One of the users saw Pixel just standing all alone, and came up to her.
“Hi, I’m Ashley.” Pixel looked up above her head, and saw her gamertag said, ‘AshleyTheCupcakeOverlord.’ She had pixie-cut, dirty blonde hair, a fuzzy, cupcake hat on her head. She had the same pattern on her white long sleeved shirt and shorts. Pixel nodded nervously. She wasn’t used to people actually taking the time to talk to her.
“Uh… Hi.” Ashley invited,
“Hey, you wanna stay in my tent? I’ve gotta lotta vacancies.”
“Um… Sure!” Pixel readily agreed. As she and Ashley walked to her tent, Pixel thought, “Man, I could get used to this.” Ashley led her inside, and Pixel plopped down on a bed. She took a glance outside at the sky. It was almost daytime already. She would have to go to bed quickly if she wanted any sleep at all. Ashley took her cupcake hat off and slipping into bed. Pixel slid her hood off and pulled her black headband from her head. She quickly braided her ankle length hair, and tied it with the headband. She would make it more elaborate later. She put her hood back on, and tucked her shimmering white hair into her jumpsuit so it wasn’t visible. She copied Ashley and pulled the red sheet on the bed over herself.
“Goodnight!” Ashley called. Pixel returned the word, then closed her light pink eyes.

That night she had a nightmare. All the users in the camp were standing in a threatening circle around Pixel in the Void. They were yelling insults of all kinds. “You’re not welcome here! Go live with the other creeps!” One shouted.
“You’re so ugly!” Another screamed. This went on for what seemed like forever. Gameknight999, her personal hero, pushed through the crowd and scowled at Pixel.
“You’re a disgrace to humans.” He spat out. “Get outta here, mutation.” He took his diamond sword, and with one swing, brought it down upon her neck.

“NO!” Pixel screamed as she sat up in her bed, terrified. She looked all around for threats. There were none. Just Ashley looking worriedly at Pixel from beside her bed.
“Are you okay?” She asked with concern. Pixel took a deep breath, and steadied her breathing.
“Yeah. Just a bad dream.” She replied in her naturally soft voice. Ashley didn’t seem convinced that she was alright, but respected Pixel’s privacy and backed off. She stood, and helped Pixel up. The sun was just rising above the horizon as it began it’s ascent into the heavens. They stepped out into the fresh morning air. The beautiful beginning of the day was tainted because of the terrible thing Pixel had experienced during the night. The image of Gameknight frowning down in disappointment was forever burned into her mind, putting a scar on the otherwise great start to her first full day in Minecraft. She followed Ashley to a lit fire where everyone else was. People were still making their was out of their tents. It reminded Pixel of a summer camp she once went to… Camp Shamineau or something. She shrugged the thought off, and stayed right at Ashley’s heels. She led Pixel to a chest full of all different kinds of food. She grabbed an apple and a glass bottle of water, and joined the others near the fire. It was a cool morning, so most people were glad for the fire. Pixel vaguely noticed a large pool near the edge of camp. The information automatically stored in her brain, and she sat down on one of the stairs that were placed. It was common in Minecraft for chairs to be replaced with stair blocks, because there were no proper chairs in vanilla Minecraft. She munched on her apple in silence, thinking hard. The nightmare replayed over and over in her mind, chipping away at her self-confidence each rerun. Ashley had sat down next to Pixel but she didn’t notice. Ashley must have saw the fear in Pixel’s eyes, because she put a hand on her shoulder. Pixel jumped, startled.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Ashley inquired. “You’re really jumpy.” Pixel, not wanting to divulge any information, just said,
“Yeah, I told you I’m fine.” She took a big gulp of water, but had trouble swallowing. Ashley gave her a sympathetic look which Pixel didn’t notice, and looked around. Ashley focused her eyes on a certain Sister-of-the-User-that-is-not-a-user. She rose and went over to go talk to her, moving out of Pixel’s earshot. She glanced over at them, and saw them glance at her. Pixel quickly averted her eyes, and stood up. She swiftly walked away from the campfire, and all the way to the other side of camp. She sat on the ground, her back against the stone wall. She tried to finish her breakfast before Monet arrived, but Gameknight’s sister moved with amazing speed. She found Pixel in no time. Monet sat next to her. They stared at the ground for a minute,  uneasy, neither girl saying a word. Finally, Monet broke the deafening silence.
“Ashley’s worried about you.” She said simply. Pixel said nothing; she just stared at the ground some more. “Is there something you wanna discuss?” She asked gently. Pixel just shook her head timidly. Monet, knowing there was nothing she could to to make the stubborn user talk, just stood up and left. Pixel stared at her leave. As soon as she left sight, blocky tears started to slip down her cheeks. She pulled her hood down as far it would go so it covered her face. She curled into a ball on the ground. And wept. She didn’t know exactly why, but she knew one of the reasons was because she didn’t want anyone to hate her. Especially Gameknight. She had been ridiculed all her life because she was being herself. She didn’t want to be hated by her heroes too. She couldn’t handle that.
All of a sudden, a banging rang out form the edge of camp. It sounded like a sword was banging against a piece of armor. “SKELETONS! SKELETONS!” A voice rang out, piercing through the vail that shrouded the veil that surrounded Pixel. She stood up, and even though extremely reluctant, she headed for the sounds.

PART 5

When Pixel reached the center of camp, she saw that some people had a sword in hand. Pixel thought that more people would have been armed. She walked stealthily into the clearing but said nothing. She found a spare stone sword on the ground, and quietly slipped into her inventory. Pixel looked for Ashley or Monet, and only found one of the two. Monet was looking over the wall with a villager that could be only the celebrated NPC known as Hunter. Her flaming red curls gave her away in an instant. Two more users stood on the wall, their gamertags bearing the names ‘TheGurlWhoLuvzGuns’ and ‘TheGuyWhoLuvzGuns.’ They had similar skins. Gurl had shoulder length brown hair and brown eyes. Guy had the same, just as a boy. They both had camo jumpsuits on. Pixel assumed they come from a military family or something close. They both had bows, arrows already notched and ready to fire, as did Hunter and Monet. The girl with the magenta hair, her gamertag identifying her as ‘TehUnnamedGamer’ had a stone sword in hand, looking gravely at Gameknight, who was standing with his father and two others. One was Jeb, and the other was a girl with creamy white hair, similar to Pixel’s, but was way shorter. She had long, faded rainbow bangs swept to the side of her face. Her gamertag read, ‘PinkyRaven.’ She was holding a stone sword as well, but looked more reluctant to use it than Gamer. Gamer, on the other hand,  looked like she knew exactly what she was doing. She swung it through the air a couple times as if to make sure it worked. Gameknight and his small army were discussing how they could proceed. Pixel quietly walked up to the group and listened in. “We can’t just go charging in like they’re zombies. Their bows will pick us off one by one. We need a different approach. Any ideas?” Silence. “Okay then…” Gamer spoke up.
“What if we… Ya know… All got bows? I’m a pretty good shot, or so I’m told, but I prefer swords. Easier to use. Just slice and dice.”
“I dunno. Seems kinda risky.” Gameknight replied. Jeb said,
“Wait, does anyone have fire charges?” Everyone shook their heads. “Okay, never mind then.” Pixel had an idea, but she thought it was so bad that no one would like it. She almost spoke up, but decided against it. She wanted Gameknight to like her. No one else did. At school, she was always bullied, and no one ever did anything about it. She didn’t tell her parents because she knew there was nothing they could do. At least, in her mind. So she kept it to herself, even when in her mind the bullies were already long dead by the hands of PixelWarrior877. She continuously brought them back to life with Dark Energon (< It’s a Transformers thing. If you got the reference, kudos to you, fellow geek! >) just to kill them again with a Star Saber or a Decepticon Hunter. (<  More Transformers references… I’m a fan girl, okay? Don’t you dare judge me… Stop it! I know your judging me right now… LOL >) At least, that’s how it played out in Pixel’s mind. That was how she kept from snapping. Hunter yelled down to Gameknight and the group,
“Hey, whatever you’re planning, plan faster. They’re almost to the gate.” Hunter opened fire, causing all the other archers to shoot as well. Pixel heard the clinking of bones, the sound of the skellies getting hurt. She slowly slipped the sword out of her inventory and held it in a ready position. Gamer exclaimed, “Aw whatever, screw the plan.” She recklessly charged out of the camp, and started hacking at the zombies. Gameknight tried to stop her, but couldn’t. She swung left, then right, trying to catch the skeleton she was fighting off guard. Three more around her started shot at her, causing her to flash red. She immediately received backup from the archers, furiously firing arrow after arrow in an attempt to pick off as many zombies as they could. Pinky moved in, and put her back against Gamer’s in a defensive stance, chopping at skeletons where she could. Gamer was in full-out offensive mode,  shredding through a lot of the zombies herself. But then, all Nether broke loose.
Endermen ‘ported in from out of nowhere, one of them appearing purposely right in front of an arrow. The top half of it’s head seemed to detach from it’s lower jaw, letting loose a blood chilling screech that made Pixel cover her ears. All the rest of it’s shadowy companions copied it’s gesture, getting riled up. Gamer looked around at the ring of pissed off endermen, and cursed, “Oh floppers.” (< Slugterra swear word anyone? FYI, there’s plenty more fictional references where that came from. >) The dark terrors moved closer, wanting nothing more than to destroy the two users. Gameknight and the remaining warriors engaged, adding to the duo. Gameknight, Monkeypants, and Jeb helped, but there were just too many mobs and not enough Users-that-are-not-users. Pixel looked for the other users that weren’t present during the ‘planning’ stage. (< I use the word ‘planning’ very lightly. >) Pixel found them hiding under their beds in the tents. She rolled her eyes at the extreme cowardice of the other users. She went up to Ashley, who was whimpering under her bed.
“Ashley, what are you doing?” She whispered.
“I… I don’t like violence… It’s… Scary.” Pixel thought,
“Then why do you play a game filled with violence?” She went back outside, and steeled herself. She gripped her sword with determination, and with a great breath, she screamed, “FOR MINECRAFT!!!” She charged into the nearest enderman, surprised by the ferocity of her own attack. The enderman was startled as well. Before it even knew what was happening, it’s HP dropped to zero, popping out of existence. Pixel was surprised that a stone sword could do that much damage to such a tough creature in that small amount of time. She hardly had time to think about it; another enderman came running at her, arms outstretched and ready to bring the hurt. Pixel dived right under it, sliding through it’s legs and attacking it’s back. The enderman turned around, but Pixel was already gone. She had sprinted to the other side of it before it even turned. She kept hacking at it. It’s flashed red again and again, until finally it died. She moved on to the skeletons, even though there weren’t many left, thanks to Gamer. She deflected the arrows with her sword just like she had seen the Jedi deflect lasers in Star Wars. The skeletons were dead in almost no time. Pixel stood in the pile of bones and enderpearls, breathing hard. All the users, including those brave enough to step out of their tents, stared at Pixel with wide eyes. Pixel looked at the destruction around her, the closest items moving into her inventory on imaginary legs. Gamer walked up to Pixel. Without warning, she enveloped the girl into a massive bear hug. Pixel was unprepared for such a maneuver, and just stood there, still in shock from her recent victory over one of the hardest Overworld mobs. Monkeypants said to Pixel,
“Wow… That was… Incredible, Pixel. Thank you for saving us.” Hunter and the archers arrived from the camp. Hunter sauntered up to Pixel and slapped her on the back.
“Even I have to admit, that was pretty good kid.” Pixel was still stunned. Gamer finally released her from her iron grip, and Pixel looked at her hands. She held her stone sword, but in an abnormal manner. She held it upside down; the blade being on the underside of her hand instead of above it. She hadn’t even realized she held it like that. Gameknight slowly walked up to her.
“Pixel, thank you. You saved the lives of everyone here.” Pixel didn’t hear. She was still looking down at her hands, contemplating that she killed at least ten mobs by herself… she actually killed something… She suddenly realized that this wasn’t a game… This was real life… And Pixel had just became a murderer. She finally noticed Gameknight, staring at her with a look of gratitude. Pixel looked at him with regret. She dropped the sword, her hands shaking. Gameknight asked, “Pixel? Are you okay?” Pixel barely heard him. She looked at Gameknight, then Gamer, then the XP surrounding her. She suddenly took off towards a nearby forest, carving a path in the fallen items. She dropped them as she ran sprinting into the trees and disappearing into the foliage. Pinky ran after her, but lost track of her some twenty blocks in. She came back out and shook her head. Gameknight had a grave expression, as did most of the users. Ashley sheepishly approached Gameknight and asked,
“What happened? Where’d Pixel go?” Hunter intervened,
“She took off for some reason after she saved them from all those mobs. Have no idea why. She’s a hero.” Gameknight said,
“She’s probably never killed a thing in her life. We have no idea how old she is.” Hunter said with a smile,
“Well, from the looks of those moves, I would think that’s she’s been training for a pretty long time.” Gameknight looked off in the direction in which Pixel disappeared.
“Maybe…”