Ash shrugged. “I kept trying to show you how much we have in common. Animals. Minecraft. And we both like spending time with Jodi. But you never seem to want me around.”
Morgan felt awful. He knew he hadn’t been very welcoming to her. But he’d never meant to make her feel bad.
He felt especially guilty because she’d been trying so hard to make a connection with him. To him it had seemed like she was trying to take his place, to show off, to be better than him at the things he loved. But she’d only wanted to be friends.
“Ash, I’m so sorry I made you feel that way,” he said. “You’re right. We do have a lot in common. And we both want to make sure Baron Sweetcheeks is safe.” He held out his hand. “What do you say? Hamster-hunting partners?”
Ash smiled. She shook his hand. “Partners,” she said. Then the smile disappeared from her face. “But I’ve looked everywhere. Where could he be?”
Putting himself in Ash’s shoes had helped Morgan realize he’d been hurtful to her. Maybe a similar trick would work with the baron.
“We just have to think like a hamster,” he said. “If you were a hamster…where would you want to go if you got loose?” Morgan tapped his chin. “Hamsters love food….”
“I checked the kitchen, including all the cupboards,” said Ash. “And my parents don’t allow food anywhere else in the house.”
“Maybe he got thirsty,” Morgan suggested.
Ash shook her head. “There’s a full bottle of water in his cage. I already looked in the bathroom. I even checked all the basement pipes for any leaks.”
“The baron likes to have fun,” Morgan said. “I built a little jungle gym for him to play in when I bring him home on the weekends.”
“I don’t have a hamster jungle gym,” Ash said. She looked sullen for a moment. Then her eyes lit up. “Wait a minute! I do have something like that! Follow me.”
Morgan followed Ash through her house. All the cushions were on the floor, and the chairs had been tipped over. She’d clearly looked everywhere for Baron Sweetcheeks.
Everywhere but the backyard.
Ash opened the back door. Morgan was once again struck by how cool her tree house was. Of course that was where Baron Sweetcheeks would go! It was a perfect, gigantic playground for an active hamster.
Out of the corner of his eye, Morgan saw a flash of orange-brown fur on the tree house’s upper level.
“There!” he said, pointing. But the hamster was too quick. He lost sight of him.
“No, over there!” said Ash. “He’s at the top of the slide!”
Baron Sweetcheeks slid into view then—literally! The little furball slid headfirst down the slide, his legs outstretched and his eyes wide. Morgan couldn’t tell if the hamster was terrified or having the time of his life. Maybe it was both.
As soon as the hamster was at the bottom, he turned around and climbed up the slide to do it all over again. His tiny nails clicked and clacked the whole way up.
Ash started laughing. At first it was just a little giggle. Then she made a snorting sound.
That set Morgan off. Between Ash’s snorts and the sight of the hamster coming down the slide again—backward, this time—he couldn’t hold in his own laughter. It erupted from him like baking soda and vinegar from an overstuffed volcano.
When their laughter finally calmed down, Morgan wiped tears from his eyes. “Are you free after school on Monday?” he asked her.
“Sure,” said Ash, wiping her own eyes. “Why?”
“Jodi and I want to hang out with you,” he answered. “Po and Harper, too.” He grinned at her. “And if you like Minecraft, you’re going to love what we have to show you.”
Ash was slightly nervous on her way to the computer lab. Morgan had been very secretive about what she would find there. And when she had asked Jodi about it at recess, Jodi had made a face like she might explode.
“I can’t tell you!” Jodi had whispered…loudly. “I mean, I can! It’s not a secret from you anymore. But it’s way cooler if you see it for yourself!”
But what if Morgan had changed his mind? What if he’d decided he didn’t want Ash around, after all?
Ash’s worries disappeared the moment she entered the room. Morgan was there to greet her. And not just Morgan. Jodi, Harper, and Po all looked happy to see her. Even Ms. Minerva gave her a little wave from behind the windows of the office.
“We’re so glad you’re here, Ash,” said Harper.
“Yeah!” said Jodi. “Morgan, do you want to show her the blueprint?”
Morgan took a large sheet of paper from his backpack. It had an outline of a castle on it. He had made a lot of handwritten notes and what looked like directions along the edges.
Morgan stared at the paper for a moment. Then he seemed to make a decision.
He crumpled up the paper.
“You know what?” he said. “Let’s just wing it.”
“Wow!” said Jodi. “Really?”
“Wing it?” Ash echoed. “Wing what? What is the blueprint for?”
Po turned his wheelchair toward her. “We’re a sort of after-school Minecraft club. Our first project together is to build a castle.”
“I thought the best way to do that would be to follow a design,” Morgan said. “I like having instructions to follow. But sometimes I forget that not everyone feels the same way.”
“A building project should be fun,” said Po.
“And challenging,” said Harper. “I’d rather make something new. Something inventive.”
“And I want it to be striking,” said Jodi. “Like a work of art.”
“Okay,” said Ash. She gripped her chin. She nodded, and paced a little. “So you all agree that you want a castle. You just disagree about…everything else.”
Morgan gulped. “Is it hopeless? Should we make four separate castles?”
Ash stopped pacing.
“Just because it’s challenging doesn’t mean it’s hopeless,” she replied. “My scouting troop went through the same thing when we made our tree house.”
“Really?” said Po. “But your tree house turned out totally amazing.”
“And we did that by having a plan, but also by letting each person bring their personality and skills to their task,” said Ash. “Even if that meant the final product would be a little unusual.”
“I can live with unusual,” Morgan said. “We need our castle to keep us safe from hostile mobs.”
“Secure. Inventive. Fun. And striking.” Ash nodded again. “We can do this.” She smiled. “People say there’s no I in team. But here’s a secret: the best teams allow you to stay true to yourself.”
“I like that!” Jodi said. “What if there’s been a silent I in team all along?”
Morgan looked through the office windows, where Ms. Minerva was reading a fantasy novel and drinking a cup of coffee. “Just don’t try it on a spelling test,” he said. “But I’ll try things your way, Ash.”
Harper patted him on the shoulder. “He’s learning,” she said, and everyone laughed.
“So should we get started?” said Ash. “Which monitor should I use?”
“Oh man,” Po said. “I almost forgot. This is the best part!” He shared a smile with the others. Ash wasn’t sure how she should react.
Po took a headset from a peg on the wall. Ash thought it looked strange—high-tech, but also a little bit otherworldly. It seemed to glow even though it wasn’t plugged in to anything.
He handed it to her. “Ready to give this a try?” he said, still smiling.
“I have no idea,” Ash answered.
“Trust us,” said Jodi. “You’re ready.”
“Welcome to Minecraft,” said Po.
“Well, yeah,” Ash said, confused.
“The VR goggles make this
a little different from the Minecraft you’re probably used to,” Morgan explained through a wide grin.
“Way different,” Po said. He waggled his eyebrows and plugged in the headset.
Morgan laughed. “All right, Ash. Time to take your official VR goggles for a spin.”
Ash nodded. She put on the headset.
It was dark for a moment, and then there was a flash of light.
And suddenly Minecraft spread out before her.
And above her.
And over her.
“How?” she cried in awe. “What—what is this?”
Jodi appeared beside her with a pop. It was a weirdly blocky version of Jodi, as if she’d been turned into a Minecraft skin. But it was definitely her.
“Don’t worry¸” she said. “It seems strange at first. But that’s only because it is strange.”
“We’re right here with you,” said Harper.
“Aye¸ my lady¸ ye have naught to fear¸” said a knight in shining armor.
Ash laughed. Despite the helmet hiding his face, she knew it had to be Po.
“Is this cool?” said Morgan. “Or is this cool?”
“It’s incredible¸” said Ash. “It’s beautiful.” She pointed at the two nearby towers. “Although that is one sad-looking castle.”
They all laughed.
“Yeah,” Morgan said. “We’re hoping you can help with that.”
Ash walked up to one of the blocky towers. “I should take a closer look¸” she said. She reached for the door.
“No¸ wait!” Morgan said.
But Morgan’s warning came too late. A flood poured from the door. Ash shrieked in surprise. The water pushed her back several squares.
Once the initial shock had passed, Ash took a wobbly step toward the group. “Is that normal?”
“Nothing’s really normal here¸” Morgan said. “But don’t worry. You’ll get used to it in no time.”
Jodi had been right. With Ash helping them, they finally made real progress on the castle.
And more important, they all had fun doing it.
They spent the first few days making a mineshaft. They were all nervous about it. But Ash insisted they needed more material to work with. She reminded them to be careful.
So they dug. They placed torches every few squares. They set up doors in case they needed to retreat in a hurry. That way, anything scary they encountered wouldn’t be able to follow them back to the surface.
A few times, they heard strange sounds in the depths. Those sounds were proof of hostile mobs underground. Whenever they heard something, they would put up a wall of dirt, turn around, and dig in another direction. They all had swords now, but as Ash put it, why fight if they didn’t have to?
It was a good strategy. It allowed them to bring a lot more building materials up to the surface. And that meant fewer arguments about who got to use what.
Over the following week, Harper went wild with the small amounts of redstone they found. She made a switch for the main entrance, and even a simple trapdoor in case an unwelcome mob ever made it past the moat.
Po found a use for all the flowers they’d gathered. He arranged them all over the castle: around the exterior wall, within the interior courtyard, and even in little flower boxes up on the turrets.
Morgan was in charge of the four main turrets. He made them all identical. But he let Jodi place different stained glass windows in each one.
There was a fifth tower, too. This one was obsidian and rose from the very center of the fortress. And it was all Jodi’s. Whereas the castle turrets were straight, this tower was twisted like a spiral. At its top was a wide platform for stargazing. The platform was surrounded with decorative arches. It was certainly strange, but she thought it was beautiful, too.
As she was putting on the finishing touches, a thought occurred to her. “Did we ever find out what happened to that chest full of obsidian?” she asked.
“I thought Po took it,” Morgan said.
“A base knave I would be to stray so far from the rules of chivalry!” Po said.
“What?” said Jodi.
“He said he didn’t take it,” said Harper.
“That’s weird¸” Jodi said. She wondered if they had finally found one of the glitches Doc had warned them about. She hoped all the obsidian wasn’t glitchy. What if her obsidian tower disappeared one day?
After nearly two weeks of daily progress, Jodi had just one more task to accomplish. This was something she and Ash had been working on in secret.
One day, when the others were in the mineshaft, Ash took Jodi aside and said, “It’s ready.”
They snuck away to a hidden plot of land. It was a sunny patch of ground on the far side of a hill, set right against a lake. The others couldn’t see it from the castle. That made it the perfect spot for a secret garden. Ash and Jodi had planted wheat seeds there a few days before.
Jodi said, “You’re right! The wheat looks ready to harvest.”
But wheat wasn’t the surprise they had in mind.
* * *
Jodi and Ash waited at the top of a hill. They watched from a distance as Morgan and the others emerged from the mineshaft.
“Where have you two been?” Morgan called. “We found some great stuff!”
Jodi turned to Ash. “Are you ready?”
Ash nodded. “Yep.”
They walked down the hill toward the others. They each held out a stalk of wheat.
Two sheep followed close behind them.
“Oh wow!” said Po. “Sheep!”
“They’re following the wheat¸” Harper said. “That’s brilliant! We’ll never have to go looking for wool again.”
“And this way¸ Morgan can have some pets to care for when we’re here¸” Jodi said as she approached them.
Ash handed Morgan the wheat. “We know you like animals.”
Morgan beamed. “This is great. They’re so cute!”
Jodi handed him her wheat, as well. “It’s my way of saying thanks for being a good brother—the kind of brother who listens to his little sister. Sometimes,” she said.
“And I wanted to thank you for being a friend¸” said Ash. “Even if it took you a little while to get there.”
“Thanks¸” said Morgan. “Both of you. I love them. I’m going to call them Beau and Beep.” The sheep bleated. They closed in on Morgan. Their pixelated eyes were fixed on the wheat he held. “Uh. But maybe we should make a fence real quick.”
Morgan loved having sheep at the castle. Beau and Beep were the perfect addition to their home away from home. And he would never have thought of raising sheep. There was no animal pen in the blueprint he had been so determined to follow.
Every time he looked at the animals, he was grateful for his friends and his sister.
He had something for them, as well. One final decoration for the castle.
“Ta-da!” he said as he revealed his gift. It was a wooden pickaxe set in a frame. He’d hung it on the wall.
“Cool pickaxe, noble squire!” said Po.
“I am not your squire,” Morgan grumbled. “And it’s not just any pickaxe. It’s the first pickaxe Harper made. The very first tool any of us made¸ back on our very first day.”
“It’s perfect¸” said Harper.
“So that’s it?” Jodi asked. “Are we really done?”
Ash grinned. “All that’s left is to admire the view from the top of the night tower. I’ll race you!”
They all hurried as fast as they could to the top, laughing the whole way.
And it really was an incredible view. Even better than the view from Ash’s tree house. It made Morgan remember the initials carved into the railing: QAV.
“Your friend Quinn would love it up here¸” he said to Ash
.
“Yeah, she would,” Ash replied. “Maybe one day she’ll see it. But right now¸ I’m just happy to be here with my new friends.”
“We’re happy, too,” said Jodi.
“The happiest,” said Harper.
“Forsooth!” said Po.
Morgan nodded in agreement. But as he looked off into the distance, he saw something that seemed out of place.
“What is that?” he asked.
They all looked where he was pointing. There was a little sliver of shiny black peeking out above the farthest trees.
“I can’t tell from this angle,” Harper said. “We need to get higher.”
They all pulled blocks from their inventories. Granite and cobblestone, andesite and diorite. They piled it all up, one block at a time. It wasn’t pretty, but it helped them get higher and higher, until…
“Oh. Wow,” said Po.
“What does it mean?” asked Jodi.
“I don’t know¸” said Morgan. “But it is weirding me out.”
Morgan knew he didn’t have a spine in avatar form. He knew he couldn’t feel the temperature. Despite knowing these things, he felt a chill run down his spine now.
There in the distance, written in gigantic letters of darkest obsidian, was a warning.
“I have never seen anything like that before,” Ash whispered as they returned from the game. She had removed her headset and placed it back on its peg. They were in the computer lab, and Ms. Minerva was reading a book in her corner office.
“It must have been meant for us, though,” said Harper. “It was a warning.”
“Or a threat,” said Po.
Into the Game! (Minecraft Woodsword Chronicles #1) Page 5