The Rose Thief (Achievement Hunter)

1. Minecraft?

For the first time probably ever, Ray felt a strong urge to play Minecraft outside of work that Thursday night. He supposed he was curious as to the repeated pull of the game. Maybe he would play some classic survival on his Xbox, see if it really was something he could get into. He'd mess around a little, see if he could explore a little, find some interesting landscapes or maybe a dungeon. He inserted the disc and waited. He almost gave up when he was alerted that an update was needed. With a sigh, he let it run. He was going to play, he was. He let it run, realizing fairly quickly that this update was going to be a long one. He sent a final text to Michael, placed his phone down beside him, laid his head on the desk, and prepared to nap.

He closed his eyes and drifted off. As such, he did not hear it when his Xbox started making inappropriate whirring noises, and he did not see it when the words on the screen began to turn garbled. The screen shook, the image bending this way and that. Then the screen went black. The blackness appeared to be rotating, swirling into a vortex. Ray dreamed he was falling, falling, and then-

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He fell to the ground with a dull thump, face down. The wind was knocked out of him with the impact, and... was this grass? His hands curled around soft blades, and he lifted his face off the firm dirt. He paused mid-rise, propping himself on his elbows.

Was this a dream? If so, it was possibly the most vivid one he had ever had. He was in the middle of a small clearing; grass pressed outward from in him a radius of at least three feet, forming a ring. After that, thick trees bled into shadows, limiting his range of view. He had barely taken this all in when there was a heavy thumping of footsteps and a clatter of metal rubbing together, and suddenly spears were being shoved into his face. He lurched back onto his ass and started to edge away, but a spear gestured threateningly towards his throat. Dream or not, the spear's head looked sharp. His heart began to race and moved to beat in his throat.

"Don't move, rogue scum!" shouted the man holding the spear way too close. Ray gulped and began to sweat, perspiration pricking his skin. He could barely see the man's face underneath his helmet.

"We should kill him where he stands for his crimes!" said one of the other men eagerly. Every person in front of Ray wore the same thing. A metal helmet, a thickly padded vest, iron gauntlets and greaves, and leather straps holding extra weapons. He counted four men, and could hear more moving behind them.

"H-hey now, don't - don't fucking jump to conclusions," Ray stuttered.

Leaves rusted behind Ray, and something groaned and snapped with a dry, splintering cracking noise. The men in front of him kept their spears trained on Ray, but their gazes snapped up. A couple of them stumbled back fearfully, fumbling nervously for a crossbow. One of them dropped his spear entirely and just stood, stunned like a deer in headlights. Ray slowly, slowly turned his head to look over his shoulder.

Ray saw the eyes of the beast before he saw the rest of it. Purple glinting eyes that glowed with sinister power hovered almost three meters above ground. A low guttural growl followed the eyes, a growl like the rattling of bones that chilled the air and made the world seem darker. A black, oily, skeletal hand with fingers the length of Ray's forearm curled around the trunk of a tree to pull the eyes closer. Where the fingers dug into the bark, the bark turned gray. Ray's eyes were locked on the eyes of the monster, frozen completely in fear. He began to shiver. He felt like he would never be warm again.

Now would be a great time to wake up.

Two arrows whistled through the air, one right after another. They buried themselves into the creature's head, one in each eye. The creature let out a chilling, echoing screech and slumped, its head falling into the sunlight of the clearing. Its face was humanoid and skeletal, its head bald and covered with tight skin as black as pitch. Dark purple liquid leaked out of its wounds.

"Great shot, Your Highness!" said one of the men.

"Step back, guards," said a voice behind the men that still brandished their spears at a defenseless Ray. The voice was more familiar to Ray than anything else around him. A throaty voice clipped with a stupid accent. It couldn't be... The guards shuffled off to either side of Ray, revealing a tall, lean man carrying a dark composite bow stepping out of the trees.

He was dressed finely in a bright green tunic embroidered with glinting gold and black thread. A gold shoulder pad allowed gold beads to cascade around one shoulder, and the other shoulder supported leather straps that held a long skinny quiver. The tunic was high-necked and long-sleeved, but his left forearm was encased in a brown leather arm guard. Black pants fed into tall brown boots with turned-down tops. But what captured Ray's attention the most was the man's face. Long dirty blond hair was left to carelessly do what it wanted, restrained only partially by a silver circlet studded with small emeralds. The green of the stones brought out the green of the man's eyes, which now peered down a rather large nose at Ray.

"Gavin!" Ray gasped. What was his friend doing here? Dressed like an asshole and everything. This dream was getting too crazy.

One of the guards smacked Ray with the broadside of his spear. "Don't address the prince like a commoner, filth!"

"That's racist," Ray said casually, rubbing his arm where the weapon had hit him. The guard brandished his spear again, making Ray recoil. He kind of wanted to wake up now. He still felt cold from the creature and that spear looked as sharp as ever. Gavin held out his free hand to place it on the aggressive guard's shoulder.

"Stand down," Gavin said calmly.

"But my prince, this man is the Rose Thief! We should kill him where he lies!"

Gavin clucked his tongue and shook his head. "There is a process, and we of all people should follow the law. How can I expect my people to follow the law if I do not? We will take him to the captain of the guard, and he will go on trial. We should get back as fast as possible anyway, and tell the king of the Enderman."

"The Rose what?" Ray blurted. "Enderman? I'm not a thief, I - Gavin, what's going on?"

The aggressive guard suddenly spun his spear around and jabbed Ray in the chest with the blunt end. Ray fell back with an "oof," his chest aching with the promise of a bruise. He was beginning to think less and less that this was a dream. It felt far too real, and he should have woken up long ago when the Enderman had shown up. Lord knows he had wanted to. Perhaps he had known that it wasn't a dream from the start, but had refused to believe it.

"I told you not to speak to the prince that way," the guard hissed as two more picked Ray up and tied his hands behind his back with some thin, scratchy rope.

"You've got the wrong man," Ray insisted as they shoved him ahead of them. "I'm not a fucking thief!" He staggered and glanced behind him at the black corpse at the other edge of the clearing. Its scarce flesh was already deteriorating and rotting in the sun.