by Mark Mulle
Chapter Six
The Mountain of Skeletons rose high up in front of them. The tip of it touched the sky, the clouds rolling over it in a slow fog. There was a thick heat in the air, too, that was different from the heat of the desert. It was heavy and thick, and Notch could feel his armor heating up. There was a pathway cut out on one side of the mountain. People used to climb the mountain to get to villages on the other side for trade. But once the skeletons had begun to use the mountain as their home base, people had stopped using the pathways.
"The lava meets the land up near the top. There is supposed to be a lava spring there. Back before the skeletons marked this mountain as their own, people would go there often to get obsidian," Pauline said.
"Great," James mumbled, "More climbing."
"More of a hike," Notch pointed out.
James shrugged as if to say ‘what's the difference?’ They began to walk up the pathway. It was steep and Notch could feel the heat beneath his feet. He wondered if this was what the Nether was like. He supposed it was good practice.
It took an hour of climbing before they spotted their first skeleton. It was in a cave along the way and it was hiding in the shadows. James fired off an arrow and took care of it before it noticed them.
"We should be on our guard. When the moon rises, the skeletons will be out of here in force." Pauline whispered.
Notch agreed. He wanted to find shelter soon for the night so that they could get the obsidian tomorrow and then get off of the mountain in time. If the rumors were true, the skeletons were here in force. An hour before the sun set, they stopped in front of a cave. James and Pauline took care of the three skeletons that were inside of it and they got to work on their shelter.
James drew first watch. Notch curled up in bed and was asleep in moments. But the peace didn't last. He found himself lost in a nightmare, like the ones that he’d first had when he had let Herobrine free. He was running at full speed with Herobrine floating just behind him, mumbling something that he couldn't hear. Notch could hear Pauline calling for help somewhere in the distance and James fighting off a hoard of Ender Men off to one side. But still Notch ran - he kept running - if he could just -
"Notch!"
He opened his eyes and saw James peering over him, his eyes wide.
"Sorry. Sorry," Notch mumbled, sitting up in bed, "Did I wake you?"
"No," James pointed to the mouth of the cave, where sunlight was shining through their barricade, "It's morning."
"You didn't get me for watch."
"Pauline covered it instead." James said.
"She didn't need to do that."
"Not a big deal," James said, "I figured we should get going. We can make it to the lava spring today."
"Sounds good." Notch replied.
Soon after, the group set out again. The sun was high in the air but there was a fog slowly rolling in around them, from being up so high. James and Notch found it a bit hard to breathe, but Pauline was fine, as usual when it came to anything such as climbing, hiking, or being up too high for a normal person to be comfortable. Luckily, the skeletons stayed in their caves.
By the time they made it to the lava spring, Notch felt as if they were running low on daylight already. He wished he had sent Pauline up instead of bringing everyone. She probably could have climbed up the mountain three times in the amount of time it had taken them to get up there once. Soon, the lava spring was in front of them with more obsidian at the edges than Notch had ever seen.
"Let's get to work. We need ten blocks. Make sure not to fall into the lava." Notch said, looking at James at the last part.
"Hey, I'm clumsy but not stupid." He retorted.
They worked in silence, but mining the obsidian took longer than Notch had planned on. He felt frustrated. Everything he had been trying to do in a timely manner on the mountain was falling quickly behind schedule, and it wasn't as if he could blame Herobrine for it either. Maybe it was being up so high that made it hard to breathe, or the fact that Notch couldn't shake the sight of the fires in the horizon. He felt as if he had a giant clock counting down over his head.
Notch heard the first skeleton before he saw it. His head snapped up but James was already firing an arrow off, taking it down swiftly.
"We're out of time." Notch said, hearing more in the darkness.
"I'll cover you guys," James said, "But you two need to hurry up."
Pauline didn't reply - she just swung her pickaxe faster. Notch tried to focus on the task as well. They only needed three more and then they could get somewhere for shelter. James fired two more arrows, but it was clear that the Mountain of Skeletons was well named. They kept coming.
"I'm going to run out of arrows, guys." James said, firing another one.
Notch stopped swinging, "Pauline, it's up to you. I'll help James. Don't lose focus."
She nodded as Notch moved out of the light of the torches, pulling out his sword. There were more skeletons than he had ever seen before. They were coming in a steady pour down the side of the mountain. They were firing arrows now, and Notch positioned his shield so James could hide behind it and fire accordingly. Notch tried to hide behind it as well, and when needed would leap out and take a spider down. A skeleton's arrow bounced off of his armor and he winced, crouching back down.
"How we doing, Pauline?" He shouted.
"I'm on the final one!" She yelled back.
The skeletons were only coming from one side of the mountain, which was the only blessing they had at this point. James went to grab another arrow, but paled.
"I'm out," he said, "and I don't exactly have time to craft more."
"Pauline!" Notch shouted, "Are you done?"
No reply. Notch turned around and saw she was fending off a skeleton that had somehow gotten past them in the dark. In the torchlight, he could see her trying to fight it off with her pickaxe. James saw it, too, and before Notch could say anything, he was running towards her without any weapon at all. He charged directly at the skeleton, knocking it down to the ground swiftly. Notch ran over as Pauline shoved the final block into her inventory.
"We have to go!" Notch shouted.
The three of them turned to run, and then they saw the first signs of lava.