"You didn't mention an 'us' when we first met," Ivor said, softly and in a very, very menacing tone. "And I don't like surprises." He proceeded to gesture in a wide, sweeping motion at Jesse and Evie collectively, his voice growing sharper and more threatening. "If these are the sorts of people you associate with--"
Evie had to wonder why she was being included in the group. She hadn't said anything so far.
Wait, had she? Rambled on a bit about how Petra had the Wither Skull but they didn't... no, that was literally it.
"Perhaps we should just call the whole thing off!" Ivor finished, glaring back at Petra.
"My friends are fine, right guys?" Petra immediately asked, voice adopting a placating tone, "There's no problem here." And she turned and shot Jesse and Evie a glare, which Evie shrank back at. That was a little unfair. She'd done her best to stay quiet throughout the whole ordeal. "Let's not be hasty, okay? This is just a... little misunderstanding."
Jesse, thankfully, took the hint and just shrugged a little. "I'm cool if he's cool," she replied, a bit coolly. With that, all three of the almost expectantly turned to stare at Evie, waiting for her answer.
Evie was now more than a little uneasy. One person staring at you is already awkward and, honestly, more than a little intimidating. Three is just overkill.
"Um-- yeah. Sure. I'm totally okay with it, too. I'm cool. Let's roll. I mean, let's do this. I mean--" Evie decided to stop talking and just keep her mouth shut, like she'd been told to do before.
"It's settled, then," and Petra turned back to Ivor with an almost slightly relieved smile. "We're all cool."
"Proceed, then," Ivor replied, in a suddenly-very-calm voice. Evie couldn't help but frown a little-- the tone of voice which he had just said that with was almost... a little sinister.
Well, but then again, everything about this guy kind of creeped her out, so maybe it was just an overreaction.
Calmly, Petra reached into her back pocket and pulled out the Wither Skull, holding it out to Ivor. Almost delicately, the older man took ahold of the skull, twisting and turning it in his hands as he scrutinized it, a strange smile coming over his face-- definitely a sort of sinister grin, she instinctively thought.
Evie told her instincts to shut up. It wasn't like Ivor could help looking sinister more than she could help being clumsy.
"I'll take that diamond now," Petra said quietly, as if reminding Ivor of the deal.
He glanced up, eyes suddenly seeming to have lost all interest in the three girls. "Take it. You've earned it."
Evie quashed down the instinctive urge to think-- once again-- that this guy was acting awfully weird. Maybe that was just the way he acted. Who was Evie to judge?
She belatedly realized that Ivor had already started moving away to leave, while Petra and Jesse had moved to go dig through a chest. Meanwhile, Evie was left standing in the middle of the alleyway like a sort of idiot.
"Uh--!" Ivor glanced over his shoulder at Jesse's sudden, blurted exclamation, dark blue eyes flashing with an almost alarmed look, before he started speeding up, as if eager to get out of the alley.
Okay, forget it. Ivor might not be able to help looking suspicious or acting weird, but that was just really sketchy behavior.
"This isn't a diamond!" Jesse finished, sounding almost startled.
"No-- it's lapis!" Petra groaned, standing up with the lapis piece in her hand and glaring at it as if she wanted to make it self-destruct with her gaze alone. Actually, with how intensely Petra was glowering at it, Evie was a little surprised that it hadn't already self-destructed.
Evie immediately, without another word, took off after Ivor. That probably was going to alarm the two of them, especially since they didn't know her, but right now, catching Ivor was more important than explaining that she was trying to catch Ivor.
Which was a commendable thought, but as she came skidding out of the other end of the alley-- the one Ivor had approached through-- Evie's foot caught on a particularly slick cobblestone and knocked her completely off-balance. She instinctively threw her arms out to catch herself, but being the clumsy person she was and forgetting that fact, the motion just knocked her even more off-balance and sent her toppling to the ground.
Ouch.
Evie managed to get back to her feet a moment later, wincing breathlessly as she felt the spot where her shoulder had slammed against cobblestone twinge with pain. That was definitely going to leave a bruise. At least she hadn't knocked her head against anything.
Although she'd lost track of Ivor. Damn.
"Honestly, Camry--"
Evie's head automatically snapped up at the name and the familiar voice. Yep-- that was Max, alright. With Christina and Camry at his side. Camry's long, dark brown hair was tied up in a messy ponytail as usual, and Max's usual, spiky hairstyle was blaringly obvious.
Immediately, Evie disappeared into the crowd, darting around people and trying to avoid crashing into them, tripping, or doing something else that might draw attention and therefore get their attention.
Call her a coward, but she did not want to deal with those three. Not right now, at least. Not while she was trying to track Ivor back down.
She spotted Lukas standing near a booth, in fact leaning against it, and debated hiding behind him or trying to engage in a conversation with him, before deciding that the three of them were too close-- Christina's voice carried clearly across even the din of the convention-- and turning a corner in the winding paths of the convention, ignoring the fact that she was fairly certain that she spotted Axel-- before spotting a particularly crowded area of the convention and squeezing through two people into it.
And then promptly running into someone. Great. Very elegant.
"Hey, what are you--?"
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean--"
Evie paused in surprise as she looked up to see a pair of celery green eyes glance down to meet hers. Oh, great. Another bully to worry about.
"--seriously, Christina, get over it--"
"She's such a little busybody--" The actual term was much ruder, but Evie's ears may have censored it out. "-- with the nerve to say we're not good friends? She's lucky we let her hang out with us!"
Aiden glanced over his shoulder to see who was talking, before back at Evie, who now was searching for a spot to hide, just in case they did spot her. "Are you hiding from them?" he asked quietly, jerking a thumb over his shoulder at her ex-teammates, who were walking through the crowd and shoving through with reckless abandon.
Evie remained silent for a minute, before realizing there wasn't much of a point to doing so-- it wasn't like they were on her team anymore. And if Aiden called her out, it might waste time, but having them yell her down now might end up being quicker in the long run. "Attempting to, yes."
Aiden chewed his lip, thoughtfully. Evie squeezed her eyes shut a little bit, bracing herself for him to call out and attract her ex-teammate's attention.
"... alright, c'mere."
"... ah?" Right. Yes. Very eloquent, Evie. Despite her reluctance to have a confrontation with her ex-teammates, she opened her eyes to see that Aiden was hastily beckoning her towards him.
Evie blinked at him, then at her ex-teammates, who were getting closer and closer by the minute, before taking the tiniest step towards him.
Aiden rolled his eyes at the girl and reached out, grabbing her arm and yanking her towards him in a powerful pull. Evie stumbled in surprise, actually staggering and nearly tripping and falling--
Before getting yanked back up to her feet, making her wince a little bit as he, once again, nearly yanked her arm out of its socket. "Careful," he said vaguely, but Aiden was already starting to walk through the crowd casually, one hand keeping Evie's arm trapped in his grip.
Evie wasn't the tallest person ever, but she could clearly see that they were walking in the direction that her teammates seemed to be in.
"Don't stare at them, but don't ignore them, either," Aiden said, quietly but loud enough for her to still hear over the din of Endercon. "You'll attract attention either way. And for goodness' sake, look more confident!" he added, shooting her a slightly irked expression, "you look like I'm kidnapping you or something."
Evie glanced at Aiden, who was striding forward confidently, as if he was headed somewhere. Now that she thought about it, she probably looked as though she were being dragged along against her will and somewhat frightened.
"Well, are you kidnapping me?" she asked meekly, although she did straighten up quickly and start walking along more briskly.
Aiden shot her a look, although he smirked a little upon spotting the meek smile on her face, realizing that she was making a joke. "Hmm... you're like a small pet. Probably not a lot of trouble to keep. Yeah, if Lukas had brought the kidnapping equipment, probably would've gone for it," he replied, amusement more evident in his voice.
Evie smiled back a little, feeling tension go out of her shoulders. "You sure I wouldn't be much trouble?" she asked, the faintest iota of a teasing tone entering her voice.
Aiden let out a brief, amused chuckle at the joke. Vaguely, Evie noticed that they had walked behind her teammates and were now cutting through several of the booths to reach a different area. "Yeah, I shouldn't think so."
(Through several of the beams holding up the other booths, Evie noticed there was a butcher's booth. Really? Why was there a butcher at Endercon? Evie knew that people sold literally everything at Endercon, but a butcher's booth? Really?)
"Alright, they turned off a different direction," Aiden said, suddenly coming to a stop. Evie didn't manage to stop in time and collided straight into him, making the taller boy stumble with a surprised sort of "oof".
Sometimes, Evie felt like an elephant in a glass factory.
"You should be good," Aiden finished, once he'd regained his balance and was rubbing his back with a slightly sheepish grin, releasing Evie's arm.
Evie gave him a grateful smile, shoulders relaxing significantly. "Uhh... thanks for that just now. I mean, you didn't have to do anything-- I mean, you could've done something but it might've been bad-- I mean I'm not saying what you're doing is bad--" she stammered, feeling her cheeks grow red at her flubbing what she'd been trying to say.
Even though she'd relaxed around the guy a bit, clearly her tongue hadn't gotten the memo.
To his credit, Aiden didn't sneer at her or anything. He just laughed. "I get what you mean, don't worry." He gave her a friendly clap on the shoulder, and began to walk back in the other direction.
A thought occurred to Evie, and her brow creased a bit as she realized this. "Uh-- hey, w-wait a second, please."
"Hm?" he turned back around, raising his eyebrows at her a little bit as he returned his attention to the shorter female.
Evie paused. Well, how was she going to put this diplomatically? What she wanted to ask wasn't exactly a diplomatic question. Or even a polite one.
Well, but it wasn't like she could just say nothing now that he'd turned back around and was looking at her.
"Why, uh... why are you being... well, you know. Decent. I mean, not, not decent, I'm sure you're a decent person-- nice! Why are you being nice to me." Evie wasn't turning redder than a pomegranate right now. Nope. No idea what you're talking about.
Aiden now looked slightly confused by the question.
Well, either he was confused by the question, or he was confused by the tangled mess of words that Evie had just spit out. Probably both.
"What do you mean?"
"I, I, I mean," Evie stammered, feeling her face grow even redder by the second, "earlier, at the building competition, when we were at the booth-- not the booth where we build stuff, I mean the booth where you have to enter the actual booths-- or the competition site, I mean, you know what I mean, you were--"
"Oh!" Aiden cut her off, to her immense relief-- she'd been, as usual, making a complete fool out of herself with her rambled stuttering-- and looked embarrassed. "Uh, I forgot about that. Sorry. I was just really stressed out and nervous for the competition. Put that down to nerves."
"Oh." Well, she supposed that made sense. Whenever Christina got stressed, she would snarl at people a lot, and whenever Camry got stressed or nervous, she'd chew her nails, and when Max got nervous, he would become oddly physical and shove people around a little bit. So she supposed Aiden acting like a jerk before the competition because he was stressed out wasn't too bad. "Okay then."
Aiden paused, still facing Evie, before extending his hand slightly, as if he was going to give her a handshake. His eyes were filled with doubt as he tilted his head to one side, almost childishly. "Uhh, so... are we cool?" he asked, hesitantly.
Evie blinked at Aiden almost owlishly in surprise. This was a very big jump from the sneering male she'd met earlier today at the building competition.
But not one she was particularly displeased with.
"Um... yeah, okay. Sure. I mean, yes. I mean, we're cool. Yes. We're cool. Mm-hm." Evie felt her cheeks grow warm as she reached out and gave his hand a quick shake, releasing it as quickly as possible-- it was better to shake his hand quickly than to accidentally hold onto it for a period of time that was just awkward.
Aiden laughed again, but it wasn't a mean one, like earlier at the building competition. This one just sounded more mild. "Cool. Maybe I'll see you around sometime."
"I mean, I don't really think that's likely, I'm the biggest wallflower I know..."
Aiden shrugged nonchalantly at the comment. "Flowers are pretty, aren't they? In that case, you'll be easy to spot."
Evie abruptly blinked, feeling her cheeks grow even warmer, and for once it wasn't because she'd done something embarrassing. Unbeknownst to Evie, she was actually starting to arch her eyebrow at him a little, almost in a skeptical way.
"What?" Aiden blinked himself, looking confused. "Did I say something?"
She could practically see the cogs in his brain turning as he cast his mind back to what he'd just said. And then his own face turned bright red as his eyes widened in realization, a slightly embarrassed look coming over his own face as he realized the implication of what he'd just said.
"... that wasn't flirting, okay? I wasn't trying to flirt with you, I swear."
"Uh... okay." Evie blinked at Aiden as he awkwardly scratched his cheek, and then waved a bit, and then awkwardly saluted before turning on his heel and walking back through the crowd, marching through as if he was eager to get away from her.
"... oh, wait, I didn't ask him if he saw Ivor..."
During those several moments of panic and movement, it had completely slipped Evie's mind to ask if Aiden had spotted the older man.
"... well, good to know that I'm not the only one that can be a huge dork, I guess," Evie mumbled, rubbing her cheek a little bit and turning around again, scanning the crowd--
And then seeing a familiar, black-haired, brown-robed figure striding through the crowd towards the keynote.
Instantly, Evie began to speedwalk after him, weaving a path through the crowd and always keeping him a good distance away-- that way, if he looked back, he might spot her, but that wasn't necessarily an indication that she was following him.
Besides, Evie was not the most outstanding person of all time, as she had just pointed out to Aiden. The chances that he'd notice her were very small.
She was so busy trying not to get spotted while keeping her distance and also keeping an eye on him, that she barely noticed that he'd angled around the ticket-keeper, walking through a booth-- which she followed him through-- before making his way towards the keynote.
Right before he was well and truly on the way to the keynote, however, he turned around.
x.X.X.x
A/N: Aaaand cliffhanger. xD
Sorry. Couldn't resist.
Anyway, thanks to everyone for reading what I've got of Minecraft: Normal Mode so far! I'm super, super excited to get this story going, although this is only while I'm on probation from FFN, so once I'm off probation and can update fanfictions again, this story might take a hiatus, though I will definitely be certain to let you guys know.
Since all of the forums that I currently have the story uploaded on allow me to reply to reviews directly, I won't do the responses until I publish the fanfiction on FFN.
Well, that's all for now, so see ya, so long, and g'bye!
x.X. A.L. X.x