'I'll ride back, tell Josh about the situation.'
'Not by yourself, you're not. What if Herobrine tries to jump you or something?' Lachlan was protesting as Preston entered the room. At the head of the obnoxiously long table, Adam Latsky was seated, drumming his fingers on the hardwood surface whilst glaring at the children who were all having separate discussions.
'It's only an hour and a half on horseback, I'll be - Preston! Glad you could make it.' The Brit smiled, waving his friend over and nudging a chair over as he approached. 'We're just waiting on Brandon and... Nah, just Pete actually. How're you feeling?'

'Honestly? Kinda scared,' The hybrid admitted quietly, wrapping and unwrapping the scarf around his hands, 'But I'm pretty sure we'll get him back. Just got to have faith, right?'. His two friends nodded, with Vik turning to converse with Kenny and Choco while Lachlan put a hand on his friend's arm.
'Hey, are you sure you're okay? You look... I dunno, more dull than usual, just look at yourself!' It was true. His normally bonfire-bright skin was down to the light of a small flame, which was both fascinating and worrying at the same time.
Instead of panicking about this though, Preston just shrugged and continued fiddling with the scarf in his grasp. 'It might just react with how I'm feeling. If it does, then it's startlingly accurate.'

'Big word, well done.'

'Oi, rude.' The two grinned at eachother, and the Australian yawned before resting his head on his arms tiredly 'You alright there, Lachy?'
''Didn't get much sleep, we spent most of the night and this morning trying to figure out the issue with Vik's power.' Noting the confusion on his older friend's face, he groaned and basically lifted his head just to faceplant back onto his makeshift pillow. 'I didn't say anything yesterday?'
'Nope.'
'Right, so basically, we think that old torch-face managed to take away Vik's powers. Hopefully temporarily, otherwise I'm gonna hit him harder than I'm planning to.' Yet again, Preston could see his friend's eyes change colour to a dangerous shade of red.

It would probably be a good idea to bring that up.

...

Yeah, they had time now.
'Hey Lachlan, did you get your eyes checked out in the end?'
'Why d'you ask?'

'They keep going red.' The blond almost flipped the whole table when he heard this, only just being stopped when Preston kicked his leg lightly. 'Dude, chill out!' He hissed, grabbing his wrists to make sure he didn't make any other rash moves.
'Subtlety at it's finest, my Lords.'
'What do you mean?'

'Be more quiet, mate, seriously. It's - Well basically, it's like whenever you get mad at something, they change colour. They go back after a few seconds, but still. You didn't notice?' The dragon hybrid just shook his head, wings curling around his right-hand side almost like a shield.

'Well no, I don't constantly have a mirror in my face! Oh Notch what if I end upturning into the dragon again and hurting somebody? What if I-'
The lava mob put a hand across Lachlan's mouth before he could carry on, nervously glancing at the others in the room and shaking his head. 'Lachlan, I promise you, that won't happen again. Try to calm down...'

~~~

"Okay Rob, just- Just try to calm down. Ignore what he's been saying, it's not true, it's not true, it's-"
Your words wound me, Robert.

'Can you stay out of my head for five minutes?!' The Canadian snapped tearfully, wiping his face with a torn and bloodied hoodie sleeve as he heard his captor laugh. Rob couldn't see him, but he knew that the man was there.
It was apparently by the floating bloodstains that he'd been busy, too.

You see I would, but where's the fun in that? I wanted to see if you'd noticed your little "friend" watching you last night. His ears perked up slightly, and he pushed himself up (pain, ow) so that he could look through the bars.

Was one of his friends here with him?
He's not still here, idiot. My daughter sent him here through a dream - He tried talking to you, actually, but you were too busy screaming like a baby to hear him.
'Not like you were beating the crap out of me or anything, not at all.'
It was highly entertaining, actually. Both of you yelling for eachother, both of you in-

'Who was it.'
Hm?
'Who did you force into watching it?'

Ah yes, the short freak. I believe his name is... Preston?
'You did not.'
Hm, yeah, I did.

'Dude, that's way out of line. The kid already gets nightmares and you showed him that?! You're gonna give him anxiety! He's not even that short either.'
Are you even taking this seriously? The god asked, turning visible and raising an eyebrow at the teenager. In response he just shrugged, wincing and putting a hand up to his shoulder while attempting to stare the man down.

'Yes, but I'm also trying to hold myself back from tearing out your eyes and surgically stitching them to your-'

~~~

'-fireballs. Now, to get to the Nether, we're going to have to build a portal. That should be easy enough, as I have some obsidian in storage, but it's our opponent that's going to be difficult. His realm has mobs - Some similar to ours, some different.' The Werewolf "King" explained. The majority of the plan fit together rather well, so at this moment is was basically a lesson on the Nether and it's inhabitants.

'I think the three main creatures to look out for aren't Orespawns, but they'll be there too. Right, the most common in the area you boys are going to be searching is known as a "blaze". Does anyone here know what that is?'

Three hands went up.

'Okay, Mitchell, what do you know?' The Canadian tensed at the use of his full name, but cleared his throat and nodded.
'Right, from what I know they're a fire-based mob - Almost a ghost. The only parts of it's body you can see are it's head, and... Eight? Ten? Sticks that spin around and keep it upright. They're what's commonly known as blaze rods.'
'Impressive. Anything about their attacks?'

'Hm... Uh, I think they can use their rods as weapons? They can definitely use fireballs though, and they set you on fire for a few seconds, so either dodge them or knock them away.'
'How do you know so much?' Jerome asked curiously, and the brunet just shrugged and twirled his dogtags between his fingers. 'Close encounter when I got lost in there one time. I was... What, seven? Maybe nine? S'not that important, anyway.'

Adam nodded at this, seemingly impressed with the teenager's knowledge, and looked back to the book in his hands. It was supposedly pictures and knowledge of the Nether realm, but there were other things in there too.
...Personal memorabilia.

'Okay. Anyway know about the Wither Skeleton?'
'Yep! It's basically a normal skeleton, but apparently they're the charred bodies of people who've died in there. They have massive stone swords, which have a high chance of giving the person hit with it what's known as the "wither effect". It slowly eats away at both the victim's soul and mind, with an incredibly low survival rate.'
All of the group recognized the shake in Kenny's voice as he spoke, but most thought nothing of it. They continued the meeting, overviewing mobs ranging from the magma cube to the overpowered Nether Soul.

...There was a lot that could kill them.
Just a day in the life, y'all.
'Alright everyone, tomorrow we'll be preparing for the quest. Get a good night's sleep, okay?'

+

'Kenny, we need to talk.'

The blond tensed as he heard Choco call him over. He was tempted to keep going, but ended up walking backwards to meet his friend anyway 'Yeah?'
'It's about the meeting earlier, and your voice.' The chocobo began, putting a wing up to Kenny's mouth before he could speak. 'I know it had nothing to do with your cold, and I know that it's a cover up.'

'I don't know what you're-'
'You eventually stopped talking after you got back, didn't you? It's not some stupid cold.'

He looked down, moving Choco's arm away and stuffing his hands into his hoodie pocket while nudging the ground with his shoe. 'It... Choco, I don't want to lie to you, so I'm gonna leave.'

'Kenny please-'
'I'll see you tomorrow. Don't carry on worrying, please.'

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

CARRY ON ME WAYWARD SON

THERE'LL BE PEACE WHEN YOU admityourfeelingsforchocoimeanwhatnothineheh

Thoughts? Do you guys remember why Kenny knows so much about the Wither's Curse?

See you all in the next chapter, and have a great Morning - Afternoon - Evening - Dawn - Dusk - Midnight - Paranormal Timezone!

Edit; Please stay safe from the hurricane, guys. No matter how pretty the tree is outside, do not pet in while 200+ mph winds are going on. Ily all.