Patrick hesitated, then did as commanded. A couple of sticks, more cobblestone, and some wool. Ebin was next, with a couple of his ender pearls, some blaze powder, torches, and a pickaxe.
Carmine kicked at the stuff on the ground, then glared at the two. “Where is it?”
“There,” Patrick said, pointing at the pickaxe. He figured he’d try again.
“Not buying it,” Carmine said. “So where is the BLADE OF THE SEA?!”
This time, Carmine was serious and punched Ebin, knocking him to the ground. He held out his sword, so that the tip bit into Ebin’s neck. “Tell me now, or your buddy here gets it.”
Patrick bit his lip, debating.
“Patrick, buddy?” Ebin looked at him with terrified eyes. “Pal?”
He barely knew him, but still…He couldn’t just let this guy get killed, he wasn’t like these pirates after all.
“Fine,” he said. “The Blade isn’t—”
A girlish-battle cry sounded and someone leaped out of the tall grass, wielding a sword and shouting, “Get back! Get back!”
“Woof! Woof!” a wolf barked, following close behind her, then jumped and knocked the sword out of Carmine’s hands.
“Follow me!” the girl said.
Patrick snatched up some of Ebin’s dropped gear, which he would give back to him when this was over, including one of the Ender Pearls.
Ebin grabbed the blaze powder and the rest of the Ender Pearls, and they ran.
“Who are you?” Patrick said, stumbling after her, checking over his shoulder to see the three pirates were in pursuit. “You didn’t have to do that, we were just fine.”
“The name’s Trish,” she said, “and it sounded like you were about to give away the location of the Blade of the Sea.”
He came to a halt. “Whoa, what do you want with that?”
She stumbled a few steps, then stopped too and stared back at him, flabbergasted. “You do realize they’re chasing us right?”
He glanced over his shoulder and saw Ebin and the wolf, Sharp, go running by. “Good point,” he said as he followed her, breaking off into a sprint again and soon passing Ebin. “But answer the question.”
“Nothing, okay! I just want to make sure those jerks don’t get it.”
He considered her, then nodded.
“Okay, I’ll—AHH!” He found himself rolling down a hill. He’d tripped! He rolled and rolled, landing with a thud at the bottom.
Far above, Carmine yelled “After him!” and a moment later Patrick heard the man and woman screaming as they too came rolling down the hill. He searched around for somewhere to hide. The only option appeared to be a small lagoon with a cave opening next to it. He didn’t always like what he found in caves, what with spiders and weird traps and all, but he figured it was daylight after all, so as long as he stayed close to the opening and looked out for pressure plates, he should be all right.
He dove over, punched out a couple blocks of sand, and blocked up the entrance to the cave.
A loud “Oomph” told him the two pirates had landed outside.
“Where’d he go?” the female said, and a few minutes later the other one sounded like he was crying. “Will you get up and help me look!”
“I banged my funny bone, okay?” the guy said. “It hurts.”
“Oh my gosh, I’d rather have a pig for a companion than you. Seriously!”
Patrick couldn’t help but laugh, but then held his hand over his mouth.
“You hear something over there?” the guy’s voice said.
Oh come on! Patrick wanted to punch himself for being such an idiot. Did the guy have super hearing or something?
“This way,” the female said. “Over here, it looks like someone put up these blocks recently.”
Patrick felt his chest heaving. If he had a sword, that would be one thing. At this point, he’d even have settled for a shovel. But two armed pirates against his fists? He wasn’t ready to take that bet.
The cave was dark aside from the shafts of light shining farther back. There must have been a hole in the roof somewhere back there.
He looked down. It was a long drop, but there were blocks staggered along the way. He could either dig a new hole and keep barricading himself until they eventually found him, or he could attempt an escape.
Here goes nothing, he thought, and then jumped for it. The fall was scary, but he landed on the first block down. Okay, just a couple more. He ran and leaped for the next one, but missed! He reached out and grabbed hold, swinging, then fell!
Chapter 12: The Cave
The stone was cold against his face. Patrick groaned, moving his hand to see if he could—it hurt, but it moved. Opening his eyes, he took a sharp breath—he had landed on a small platform and was lucky to not have rolled off and fallen to the bottom.
Voices sounded, and close.
Right, the pirates! Patrick shook his head, clearing it to remember what had happened. The girl, the pirates, and now he was alone with these two about to catch him. What were they saying? He had to stop the world from spinning before he could make sense of their words.
“He can’t have gone far,” the female was saying.
“Just make the jump!” the other one said.
“I’ll do it, just let me be.” Her voice was trembling.
Patrick realized that meant one had made it to the first block, the other was still above. They were separated, and this might be his chance!
He sat up, searching his pockets. Empty…The wall next to him was dirt, though. If he could punch it out, grab it, and throw before the one above noticed, he might have a shot.
“Ready...?” the guy said above. “On the count of three.”
Okay, it was go time.
Patrick leaped to his feet, punched out the block, and spun—
“One-Two—”
The block of dirt hit the guy on the side of the head, as above the girl said “Three!” and jumped.
Several thuds sounded—the first from the female pirate landing against the other one, the second was from the guy falling off, hitting his leg on the way down, and the landing below. A moment later the female was screaming, holding onto the ledge above, feet dangling over the side.
Then she saw Patrick.
“You!” she said, apparently forgetting how terrified she was long enough to glare at him.
“See,” he said, “this is a more fun way to meet, don’t you think?”
She just glared, then slowly the terror took back over as her hands began to lose their grip and she whimpered.
She was about ten feet away, so he couldn’t reach out and help her, and when the guy’s voice sounded from the darkness below, Patrick knew it wasn’t so far of a fall that you couldn’t survive.
There was no way up, so Patrick figured he better go down.
“It was great chatting, but I gotta run.”
He scooted over the side and dangled his legs, so the drop wasn’t so far, then let go. The fall seemed to last too long to be safe, but when he hit the bottom he landed on something soft and rolled. He couldn’t believe it, but he was okay.
When he turned back, he saw the male pirate.
“You’re having a bad day,” Patrick said. “So I’ll forgive you for not saying anything as I take off.”
He laughed as he ran off through the cave. But then he froze at a fork in the cave, suddenly not feeling so much like laughing. One way likely led farther down into the mine, the other led up to some other way out…but for now, they both seemed to just be flat paths in different directions.
“Okay,” he said to himself, pacing, glancing back. Those two were sure to follow shortly, so he couldn’t stand here debating. He held up his hands, then decided—left handed, so left it was.
He certainly wished he’d brought a torch or two. He had been lucky there were holes above to let light in, but it got darker as he went farther into the cave. Then he saw something—a flickering light.
Each step was more d
ifficult than the last, but he pushed himself on in spite of the fear gripping him.
Then the sound came that he’d dreaded—the groan of a zombie, just behind him! He ran now, breaking for the light. Another groan, then another. How many were there?
The light he saw had only been its glow from around the corner. As he reached the far wall he skidded to a stop, amazed to see that someone had set up a little room down here. He took it in, totally caught off guard. There was a bed in one corner, several chests on the far wall, and a crafting table.
Something brushed against his shoulder and he pulled back just in time—one of the zombies almost had him! He kicked so it fell back against two more, and then he sprinted for the chests. He had to hope the owner of this room wouldn’t mind him borrowing a sword, and even more, he had to hope there was a sword to borrow.
He pulled open the chest and—
KA-BOOM!
The trap threw him backward, and he landed with a soft thud on the bed. Something clicked and he stood in time to see the zombie had stepped on a pressure plate. It paused, as if aware of what was coming. Suddenly the ceiling slammed down on top of the zombie, leaving behind nothing but left over rotten flesh. Yuck.
Two more followed, stumbling across the rotten flesh.
Patrick quickly scanned the room to see more pressure plates—more areas a trap could be. The explosions had caused a small hole in the wall, but there didn’t seem to be anything but darkness back there and…Wait a minute, was that a barely visible hole next to the other chest? He knew what he had to do.
He snatched a torch, only then putting two and two together and seeing it was a redstone torch. With one leap he reached the hole and put the torch in.
The wall slid aside, revealing a stairway up. At its top, he could see the light of day! He licked his lips, remembering how hungry he was, and glanced back at the chests. Was it worth it? The floor around the chests didn’t seem to have any pressure plates that could set off any more explosions, but still…He decided to go for it. Carefully, he stuck his foot out, kicked open the chest, and pulled his foot back.
No explosion.
The zombies were approaching, too close. He leaned over and almost laughed with delight—a stone sword and a golden apple. Pocketing the apple, he hefted the sword just in time to swing it and knock back the first zombie. He noticed a second pressure plate and slashed the second zombie at the right angle to send it onto the pressure plate, and cringed as the floor opened up to drop the zombie in a pit of lava. The floor closed back up. As the first zombie charged, it met the pointy end of his sword and collapsed into more rotten flesh.
Not wanting to wait and see if more would show, Patrick took a bite of the apple and headed up the stairs.
A shape appeared above him, dark, silhouetted against the sky above.
The sound of an arrow being strung in a bow, and then a girl’s voice said, “Drop your weapon and come out…slowly.”
Chapter 13: Reunion
The last thing Patrick wanted right now was to have defeated the zombies only to be shot with an arrow and make this his final resting place.
But he wasn’t about to sit here and explain himself while he waited to see if those pirates showed up.
With a roar, he charged up the stairs, arms up to block his face, and knocked the attacker on her butt, but not before an arrow landed with a twang in his right thigh.
It hurt, but he held back the scream, struggling to leap across the uneven ground.
“Hey, wait!” she yelled.
He recognized the voice and tried to come to a stop, to turn around and see if it was who he thought, but the hill gave way to a small decline, and he fell. He rolled to the bottom, where the arrow cracked and came free from his leg in a burst of pain.
“Ahhh!” he shouted. He wanted to get up and go back to see who that was. But then he saw something moving fast. He couldn’t just sit here and get killed, so he ran, hobbling as best he could. The shape appeared again, this time from behind a tree, moving fast. With a thud, they collided.
Patrick stumbled back, hit his head against a tree, and then slid to his butt.
When he looked up, he saw it was the girl who’d saved him earlier—Trish! Her wolf leaped into the clearing, prepared for action, but then sat and wagged his tail. Patrick smiled, but Trish glared at him.
“Are Mac and Chiece still after you?” she asked.
“Is what after me?”
“The bandits who followed you over the cliff.”
“I took care of them,” he said. “One’s hanging from a ledge, the other’s hurt a bit, I’d imagine. There was someone else, though, not sure who—”
“That would be me,” she said. “I mean, back there. You scared me.”
“That was you?” he said, standing. “You shot me!”
“What’d you expect me to do?” Trish said. “It wasn’t like I could tell who you were, and you were running at me, screaming.”
He glared at her, not sure how she could even start to think that making excuses for shooting him was going to win him over.
She stared at him longer than he felt comfortable with, then said, “So what are you? A pirate?”
He wanted to walk away right there. “No! I mean, I’m just a guy who got dragged into this mess. What happened to that Carmine guy?”
“We took care of him.” She cocked a thumb toward the edge of the cliff.
Patrick whistled. “I’m impressed.”
“Don’t act so surprised.” She patted Sharp on the head. “Thanks to me and Sharp here, the Blade of the Sea is safe.”
Patrick raised his eyebrows. “You think just because Carmine is gone, the Blade of the Sea is safe?”
“Yeah, I’d say that makes sense…No?”
“First of all, we don’t even know Carmine’s dead. He could have fallen into the water and survived just fine. But even if he is out of the picture, there are worse people who want the Blade. Much worse people.”
Trish frowned. “So we’ll hide it. You have it, right? That’s why Carmine was after you.”
Patrick shook his head. “I don’t know why they thought I had it, but they were wrong.”
“Okay…so let’s think about this. The Blade has to be here on the island. It could be hidden. We just have to search until we have it.”
Patrick wasn’t sure about this girl, so he pretended to be considering something very smart, hoping she would leave the matter alone.
“What?” she asked.
Gosh, she was persistent. He sighed, then said, “Okay, listen. The Blade of the Sea isn’t a sword. It’s not an object at all. It’s a person.”
Her eyes went wide. “What?! Is it you?”
“No! It’s…it’s someone else. I know who it is, but I’m not sure where he is. It’s going to be a major challenge to track this guy down. He doesn’t like people to know where he is. He sort of follows his own rules.”
“Hmm, a major challenge,” Trish said. “What would you say to having a little help?”
Patrick raised an eyebrow. “You?”
“And Sharp. We did just defeat our archenemy, so we’re sort of in the market for a new challenge. “
She had a point, and with his wounded leg, he could use the help. “Okay.”
“Don’t say no yet! I can craft. And I’m good with puzzles. And Sharp eats zombies for breakfast. Like, literally. It’s pretty gross.”
“Are you listening? I said okay.”
A wide smile broke out on Trish’s face, a bit too wide—it gave Patrick second thoughts, but it was too late for that.
“Our first challenge is figuring out how to get off this island,” he said. “Then we just have to search the whole world for one person.”
“Piece of cake.”
Patrick doubted it would be anything like a piece of cake, with sugary delicious frosting and moist deliciousness inside. Yum. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was until now. Hungry…and sick of fighting pirates. It was time th
ey got out of there.
“So,” he said, “you ready for the next challenge?”
She turned to him and her smile widened, which he was surprised to see was possible. She looked like she was about to say yes, but got teary eyed and nodded instead.
“Okay,” he said, trying to pretend he hadn’t noticed.
He motioned for her to go first and tipped his imaginary hat, like a gentleman, then followed.
Only they hadn’t gone three steps when the wolf snarled, backing up toward them.
The tension in Patrick’s sword hand throbbed, but he stood at the ready. From behind a tree came Gwen, bow and arrow ready.
“There you are!” she said, eyes narrowed in annoyance. “You broke into my hideout, and apparently left two pirates behind!”
“Oh, that…It wasn’t on purpose.”
Gwen looked him over, then said, “Humph. And who’s this one?”
“This one is Trish, actually,” Trish said. “And yes, I saved his life.”
“She helped me out a bit,” he said. “I don’t know if I’d say she saved my life.”
Trish looked at him with wide eyes, her chin tilted as if waiting for him to come clean.
“Fine, she might have rescued me from some pirates.”
“Yeah, okay,” Gwen said, lowering her bow and arrow but glaring at Patrick. “I don’t care. What I do care about is that you led a ship from the pirate federation to one of my hideouts, then I retreat to find you in another one of my hideouts. All I’m here to do is give you a warning. Stay away.”
“Wait, if the hideout’s lost, what’re they firing on?”
“Take a look for yourself,” Gwen said, nodding toward a hill nearby.
Patrick and Trish walked to the top of the hill, the wolf in tow, and saw a ship sailing off, the larger ship of Selna shooting after it.
“That Bonecrusher fellow managed to make it back to his ship and make a break for it,” Gwen said. “Just like I advise you two to do. Either way, I’m going to my third hiding spot, and if I find either of you following me, this arrow will be the last meal you ever taste.”
Blade of the Sea Book 2: A Children's Survival Unofficial Minecraft Book Page 5