I led Jesse, Lukas, and Petra back through the autumn trees to the hut. I'm sure Maya and Gill wouldn't mind them. Especially Maya, who had a crush on Lukas since the day he let her in the Ocelots.
I wasn't sure why the three of them were covered in water and blood and their rancid smell, but I tried to ignore that. What I was really trying to ignore was my heart trying to explode out of my chest at the sight of Petra. I think I already embarrassed myself when I smiled like a complete idiot when I saw her. Hopefully, she didn't notice...
"Um, Aiden?" asked Jesse. I snapped out of my "Petra trance" and looked back at her.
"Yes?" I replied.
"Is this it?" she asked. I turned around and found that I was walking past the hut.
"Um, yeah," I said as I nervously ran my fingers through my hair and paced back over to the door.
Shake it off, man, shake it off. You can do this.
I cleared my throat as I stepped inside, where I found Maya and Gill doing something.
"Oh, hey, Aiden, Jesse, Petra, Lukas," said Maya as she smiled and tried her best to brush her fingers through her shoulder-length auburn hair and adjust her shirt- staring directly at Lukas making him feel super uncomfortable.
"Hey, Maya," said Jesse cheerily, not taking notice of creepy stalker love-sick Maya.
"Oh, look what the cat dragged in," said Gill starkly as he stepped forward facing the Order, "It's the loser squad who thought they could steal all of your credit, right Aiden? Well, they're no match for the... BLAZE RO-"
"GILL!" I angrily interrupted, "We're not doing that anymore, remember?"
Gill's eyes widened as he remembered that painful day at Sky City when we realized the hard way that we, the "Blaze Rods," were a bunch of idiotic freak-shows.
I desperately needed to change the subject.
"So, what do you think?" I asked.
Petra examined the room, then said, "Cool place."
"Really?" I asked, my voice squeaking a little at the "ee" part. Dangit, voice! Why haven't I outgrown that yet? Gill has, and I'm a year older than him! Girls seriously have it easy...
"Are you okay, Aiden?" asked Petra, when I suddenly realized that I was blushing like a complete imbecile.
"Um, yeah, totally fine," I stammered as I blushed harder. Mostly over the fact that I was blushing- in front of Petra.
"Man, Aiden!" began Gill, "You're beat red! You must be wayy in lo--"
I slapped my hand over his mouth. My face was about as red as Petra's hair at this point. Argh! Why that analogy?? Although, at the same time... mentioning her hair... No! Snap out of it, you fool!
"Uh, Aiden," began Maya, "Can I talk to you for a sec? Like, over there?" She pointed behind her.
"Yeah," I said softly as I followed her into a corner.
Maya looked around to make sure nobody was listening.
"I know you love her," she said with a smirk.
"Who's 'her?'" I asked, seeing how long I could go without having to admit to liking Petra.
"Petra, genius!" Maya quietly exclaimed. (Yeah, I know. That's an oxymoron, but I think you know what I mean)
I looked back at Petra, who was saying something to the group, then back at Maya.
"Yeah," I said, "a lot."
"Well," Maya said briskly, "No need to fret, my hopeless romantic of a friend!"
I rolled my eyes
"They call me 'Dr. Maya Matchmaker,' and I'm here to help you with your completely deflated relationship with--"
"Hey, guys," said Petra, who somehow snuck up on us. My heart rate picked up again.
"Hey... Petra," I said awkwardly. Awkwardly enough to make Maya do a face-palm. Am I really that dorky?
"Whatcha talking about?" Petra asked.
"Umm..." I began.
Think, Aiden, think!
"We were... coming up with survival plans," I said.
Nice save, Aiden!
"Really? What are they?" Petra asked.
Consider yourself dead, Aiden!
"Umm..." I stammered.
"STOP!" Maya shouted, "I wanna talk about cheese!"
Petra was... stunned into silence.
"Um," she began, "I'm just gonna go... over there," she pointed behind her and gawkily stepped away. Who would have thought Petra even knew how to walk gawkily?! I blushed really hard again and hid my face in my hand. Maya beamed with pride and said,
"Crisis averted, my friend! I mean, seriously, you should be thanking me! I totally saved you back there!"
Seriously, Maya?! WHY DO YOU HATE ME! I felt like finding a hole and just dying in it at that moment as a series of unpleasant words echoed through my brain.
Maya's POV
"WHOA!" I heard someone cry.
"That sounded like Jesse!" I exclaimed. Aiden and I along with everyone else ran over to Jesse who was standing in the doorway of the second room of the hut- which was completely filled with walkers!
"Swords out, guys, we can take this!" she exclaimed as she pulled her enchanted sword out of her inventory and bravely ran into the room as the rest of us did the same.
I ran over to one walker and stabbed it, making it groan in pain and collapse in a giant heap of rotting flesh. Ew!
"YAA!" I heard someone yell before the sound of a walker dying from behind me. I turned around and saw that Lukas had just taken out a walker that was about to attack me.
"Thank you!" I said, memorized by him. He flashed his perfect angelic smile and jumped away to kill another. The song I'll Wait for You by Moriah Peters began to play in my head at the sight of him.
"Maya! I can hear the love songs playing in your head from here!" said Aiden with a cheesy grin. How did he know?!
"Alright," Jesse said from across the room, "I think that's all of them. Good job!"
"Now the question is, who's cleaning the walker carnage?" asked Gill. I gasped and quickly put my finger to my nose. Aiden and I traded glances. He had his finger on his nose too, then we looked at Gill and grinned at the sight of his standing idle.
"What are you... Oh!" he exclaimed as he quickly touched his nose.
"Too late, Gill," Aiden said.
"Um, what are you doing?" asked Petra. Completely ignoring her, Gill argued,
"Wait! What about Jesse, Lukas, and Petra?! They aren't touching their noses!"
"Gill, Gill, it seems as though you have forgotten your manners! Jesse, Lukas, and Petra are our guests," said Aiden smugly, obviously trying to appeal to Petra.
Gill rolled his eyes in annoyance and muttered, "Doesn't give them the excuse to sit around and be a bunch of bums."
"Oh, no," said Jesse, "It's really okay if we hel—"
"No need to do that!" Aiden interrupted, "Maya, Gill, and I already played a very official game of Nose Goes, and Gill is the loser. That's that."
"Well, I think what the real question here is how all those walkers got in, and what we can do to prevent it from happening again in the future," said Lukas.
"But those walkers could have done anything to get in here! We didn't actually see them come in, so how will we know?" I asked.
Jesse pointed to the roof.
"How 'bout that gaping hole in the ceiling?" she said.
"...oh," I said as I realized that that was a stupid move on my part.
Jesse's POV
"Aw, come on, can I be done yet?!" complained Gill from the other room later that night, "These walkers are heavy!"
"Not until there are no walkers left," replied Aiden, who was casually resting against a wall, "We don't want them in here too long or else they'll stink up the place."
Gill grumbled to himself as he went back in to clear another. I wanted to go in and help him... but then again... walkers.
By now, we had already filled the hole in the roof with dirt blocks as The Order and the Blaze Rods (minus Gill) discussed tomorrow's agenda in the main room.
"Lukas, Petra, and I are going to go out and look for the portal back home tomorrow," I explained, "How about you, Maya, and Gill stay here and make sure no more walkers come in?"
"Sounds good," said Aiden, "We should probably get some rest now, it's getting late."
"Yeah, you should," complained Gill as he heaved a walker through the main room, "always leave it to Gill to clean up the walker corpses." We leaned back as he carried one across the room.
"Is he gonna be okay?" I asked after Gill went outside.
"Yeah," spoke Maya, "he always gets cranky whenever he has to... uh... basically, work in general."
Lukas changed the subject and asked, "So, how do you guys think that hole got in the ceiling earlier?"
"Maybe a creeper blew it up?" suggested Petra.
"No, if it was a creeper, it would have exploded some of the ground around the hut, too," said Maya.
"You don't think..." I began, then paused as I re-thought my conclusion.
"What are you getting at?" asked Aiden.
"...what is someone made that?"
"Hmm," Aiden thought, "Yeah, that could be true."
"Well, whatever it is, I know we can catch it!" said Maya cheerfully.
"Yeah, but seriously we should go to sleep now if you guys want minimal hostile mobs tomorrow," said Aiden.
"Right," agreed Petra, "'night, guys!"
We separated into our different groups: girls on one side, boys on the other. For some reason, Maya was slightly grumbly at first about the sleeping arrangements. She eventually stopped complaining and we were all able to fall asleep.
HOOOOOOONK!!!!
"Mornin', guys!" Gill exclaimed. HOOOOOOONK!
I looked up to see what that ear-piercing sound was, and saw Gill was standing in the middle of the room holding some kind of can.
"Gill," groaned Lukas, "what is that?"
"An air horn!" Gill replied. HOOOOOOONK!
We quickly covered our ears.
"Where did you get that and why do you have it?" grumbled Aiden.
"I was experimenting with crafting recipes last night!" said Gill. HOOOONK!
"Dude, you've got to get rid of that!" I said.
"Why?" HOO-
Petra grabbed it from his hand.
"Because it's practically screaming, 'Hey, walkers! Over here! It's a bunch of lost people that would be really good to eat!'" she imitated Gill's voice, "and seriously? Why would anyone want to hear that?"
"You don't want to hear it! That's why I'm blowing it!" Gill tried to snatch it from Petra's hand, but she held it high above her head.
"Nope! Not happening, Gill!"
"Ugh, fine," he sighed.
"Come on, guys," I said getting up and trying to get the ringing out of my ears, "let's find that portal!"
Petra and Lukas followed me out as Gill exclaimed, "You'll see, someday, Petra, the air horn will become a legend! And you'll feel like a fool for taking my dreams from me! You will rue the day you crossed me! BLAZE RO— "
Petra rolled her eyes and shut the door behind her.
"Let's go," she said. We left the hut behind us.
"Ugh, I think I slept wrong last night. My neck is killing me!" Petra complained as she cracked her neck.
Lukas cringed, "Do you have to do that?"
"Yes," she said with a smug smile.
"Both of you guys, keep quiet," I whispered, "we might attract walkers!"
"Sorry," whispered Lukas.
Sure enough, walkers did approach us, but we easily were able to take them down.
"You know something," began Petra as she stabbed the walker she was fighting, "fighting walkers is way cooler than fighting normal mobs!"
"You think so?" I asked as we put our swords back after they were all defeated.
"Yeah," she continued, "They just look way more awesome. The glassy, white eyes, the rotting body, the blood, and gore, it just feels better killing one!"
"Well, I'm glad you think so," I said, "but I can't wait to get out of here! No more walkers for me, thank you!" I chuckled.
"Jesse, Petra," Lukas said with excitement in his voice, "look!"
I looked forward and couldn't believe my eyes.
"Is that...?" I began.
"You bet it is!" said Petra happily, "We totally found the portal!"
"Let's test it out, just to make sure it works," suggested Lukas. We ran over to it.
I happily patted around in my pockets expecting to find the flint and steel, but...
"Jesse?" asked Petra with concern, "Any time now?"
"Yeah, I know," I said.
Uh oh.
-------------
Hello, my friends! I got my computer back! (yay) Sadly, this chapter got deleted when it crashed, (because I didn't email it to my friend before posting because she read it in person, lesson learned.) but on the bright side, I think the re-written version of this chapter is better than the original!
Also, I'm going to post an extra chapter today as a gift for being patient with the delay. And it's not even Wednesday! (You're welcome)
One more thing, comment below what you think a potion of healing tastes like. I imagine that is tastes like Sprite or some really strong soda for some reason.