Bailey slowly opened her eyes. 'I'm alive... didn't I die...?She thought. 'Is this the afterlife...?'
Bailey felt numb, and her face sore. She can't move, it's hard to breathe, and yet the white emptiness that surrounded her felt... soft?
Throughout history, in the religions of Notch and Herobrine, there are many afterlives created by the two gods.
People always have their own versions and interpretations of the religion, usually saying that one is better than the other. At their core: Notch is good. Herobrine is bad. Yet only the most humble and wise preachers of the religions would say that's all a matter of perspective, as deciding that which one is evil and other one is good.
So what is this place? It's just empty!
Is this one of the afterlives created by Notch? It's not tormenting from what she heard of what Herobrine's afterlives would be like, or what she would consider 'evil' since there is nothing here but her.
Or is this placed created by Herobrine? The isolation is terrifying enough! No other people, no voice of a god to guide her, as it's hard to breath here. She can't even move, like her body is being restrained. There is nothing here, just silence and suffocation.
She didn't want to admit it, that action would terrify her, but it actually makes more sense that this place would be of Herobrine's creation.
But at that moment she silently cried. Bailey just realized, and couldn't believe, she died.
Jesse. Petra. Olivia. Axel. They just... abandoned her! Axel punched her. Leaving her to die as that man- no that thing, brutally killed her!
She can still feel his decayed hands gripping her head. How his body is practically the definition of rot and pain. She felt a ghost of a pain of his serrated-clawed thumbs digging into her eyes.
Then snap! With a violent twist it was over. The pain ended, and she woke up here in this pseudo hell. What did she do to deserve this?!
So many regrets surfaced in Bailey's mind. But one of them included her not telling a certain blonde how she felt. How she had feelings for him. And how she lacked the courage to just say four words: I like you, Lukas.
But she was always afraid, never taking that first step to even say hello. Always admiring him from a far, seeing him builds with his group. Sure, he was kind of arrogant, but he wasn't like the rest of the Ocelots: he's nice!
He would never start a fight, and sometimes break them up. He smiled as he did, to his fans, and to everyone else. So why, despite his welcoming nature, was she so afraid?
Rejection? Embarrassment? Humiliated by him, or his friends? All of these possibilities that could happen, but it was definitely, all of the above.
The more she thought about it, she should have just said something. It wasn't like Lukas was in a relationship with anyone. He certainly wasn't a friend with anyone but his own gang.
What did she even have to lose? Lukas didn't even know her! So it wasn't like he was going to publicly humiliate her by spreading her name in a negative view.
It would have been over soon if she confessed it. But no, Bailey told herself over and over, "I would just wait a bit longer. Find that right moment to tell him."
But she waited too long. So many events happened that widen the gap between her and her crush.
First the war made Lukas stick closer to his friends, making sure that they stick together and never focusing on anyone else.
It didn't help that his crew's attitude, from losing to the Order of the Pig's cookie fountain, made them more desperate to find rare blocks. Basically anything to beat their rivals, and Lukas practically had to babysit his friends so they wouldn't get themselves killed. They almost did by a one-armed, masked woman in the Nether.
But even before that, Aiden, Maya, and Gill made things worse. The Ocelots, except Lukas, were still sore losers as the three, and Bailey still couldn't believe that they did, crashed Jess' funeral that her brother made for her when everyone thought she was dead.
Once everyone heard what the three did, Lukas had to keep a close eye on them from causing any more drama and pain. Although it was easy since fighting with Jesse bedridden them for a few days, even crippling Maya.
Not too long after, that Building Competition three years ago, one that all of the members of the Order of the Stone attended, made things worse.
Sure it was like a fantasy come true. There were booths of food and games. The members of the Order brought their own talents and skills to show to their fans, awing them even more.
Then the Building Competition happened. Sadly, only a few people could compete due to the keynote exploding, and Ellegaard's assistant, Marcus, going missing, presumably dying in that explosion and setting back days of preparations.
Obviously, Jesse's group gets a spot since they beat the Ocelots in the previous Building Competition. And of course the Ocelots get a spot since they actually were champions of the Building Competition.
A long story short? Jesse's group won! Sure the Ocelots built a Nether-themed rollercoaster, but it was pitiful in comparison to the Order of the Pig's cake waterfall.
While not literally a waterfall, it still supplied a steady stream of cake that slowly bounced down on a wide, and tall, set of stairs made of slime blocks that had hoppers at the bottom.
The cake then goes into the hoppers, which leads to the minecarts, and transports it back on top of the stairs to automatically repeat the action. So technically, the build is also a rollercoaster for cake.
Oh and that's not all! When the Order, and Jesse's group, was on the iron golden-framed stage, announcing them as the winners, each member of the Order even gave the group something special.
Olivia got the position to be Ellegaard's apprentice for her detailed explanation of the mechanics behind the build. Axel's creative solutions for the problems of the build impressed Magnus so much that Axel got trained by the rouge, and even earned a place in Boom Town.
Petra even received weapon training by Gabriel before he set out on his adventures. Soren couldn't really pass on his building expertise, since it's more of a passionate art than step-by-step construction.
But nonetheless he still congratulated Jesse's leadership, even adding his own advice, and gave the boy the chests full of rare materials Soren donated for the prize of the competition.
And so the Order of the Pig won, and the Ocelots lost again much to their dismay, and Aiden's anger and jealousy. So that didn't stop them, except Lukas, from falsely accusing Jesse in public for ripping off their build when Soren was giving them the prize.
It got so bad that Order of the Stone had to intervene, and removed them from the competition site, including Lukas even though he actually tried to stop his friends and defended Jesse.
But no one cared. From a public perspective, all of the Ocelots tried to bully Jesse. Including Lukas. Bailey knew something was off from that, but she didn't bother to try.
She is afraid. What if her crush actually behaved like that? That mental image of his kind personality would be destroyed. So, to her, it was better to hold onto a possible lie than seek out the truth.
And as the years passed, she slowly drifted away from watching Lukas, avoiding him even, and still wondering what would happened if she confessed. But when she was at the Tournament, watching Jess stab him through the chest, she didn't hesitate to rush towards his dying body.
Even as the second she got to him, crying pointlessly trying to heal him with her potion, she didn't even have the courage to even confess to him even though she was crying to his corpse.
And yet, despite her mental rambling, there are still so many things she will never know. How would Lukas react to love confession? There are too many possibilities, and not a lot of positive outcomes.
But what did she do to that cloaked man?! That alone made her sad: she must have done something pretty horrible to turn, possibly, an innocent human being into a monster.
What she did could have been a mistake, or unintentional, but she still caused harm to him. He's forced to live each day in agony, and yet that word alone isn't enough to describe his suffering. He, and no one else, can end his life. Him living life is his hell.
So Bailey admitted it, maybe just like the cloaked man wanted. "I'm a horrible person," She whispered into the white void as the tears came back. "I don't know who you are, or what I did, but... I'm sorry. Please, forgive me..."
"Lukas... I'm sorry," Apologized Bailey. "But it looks like I'm not going to be seeing you in the afterlife like I hoped."
Maybe that was her true punishment: never confessing to her love in the land of the living, and never in this damnation.
A/N: The road to hell is paved with good intentions. For hell is full of good meanings, but heaven is full of good works. And no good deed goes unpunished.
*Lets out a blissful sigh* I love those quotes. They're my favorite. Bailey should have a good idea of what it means, since she fits the requirements! Don't worry, what she did to the cloaked man, and his identity, will be revealed.
Hope this lived up the OC's character personality, didn't exactly get a detailed description of her personality other than 'likes outdoors' and 'Lukas is bae', so I had to fill in a HUGE gap in terms of character traits because I couldn't just make her a nature-obsessed girl who hugs trees she calls Lukas.
(-_-) That would have not only been disrespectful to my own writing, but to rosequartzTHEBAWS who asked nicely for her OC submission.
Next chapter I'll address a certain issue with the audience reading this story, if it still happens. If it stops, then I'll just drop it.