As the sun rose and peeked over the forest of trees over the horizon, a beam of light kissed Alex's cheek through the reflective mirror above her. Opening her eyes to the bright light, Alex immediately turned away with a wince. The chair she had slept on brought major pain and headaches.

While preparing for the day ahead of her, Alex spent the entire night working on gear for their expedition. She felt that their encounter with the Enderman painted a clear picture that they were underprepared, and voyaging into the unknown that was the caves was luring them toward their deathbeds. She didn’t want to take any chances, so with whatever material she had, she prepared dozens of tools.

As she looked around the room, she noticed the stranger was no longer in the room. The bed she laid him on was now empty and neatly prepared. Her eyes widened before she could panic but then she heard grunts and slashes coming from outside. Peeking over the window behind her, she saw Steve swinging a wooden sword through the air while trying to get a hold of his grip.

Ever since the Enderman’s attack, Steve felt he had a long way to go if he wanted to help Alex, and find out who he was. If the other monsters were anything like the Enderman, in his current form stood no chance. Learning how to fight and craft were essential to surviving in the world he was thrown in, and they were also two skills that he had no experience in.

The little training he did with Alex the other day proved useful in helping him craft a wooden sword, but even he could tell something was missing about it. Whether that be the weight of his swings or the craft of the sword.

Alex approached him with a new pair of clothes on and two stone swords in hand. Their gray blades quickly caught Steve’s attention and curiously made him drop what he was doing.

“When did you get up?” Alex asked while Steve wiped the sweat on his forehead.

“While the sun was starting to rise,” Steve answered with heavy breaths. “Did you make those last night?” Alex nodded.

“And there’s plenty more where they came from.” Gently handing the sharp sword to Steve, Alex looked at the bright blue sky with a smile. “Today's the day, Steve!” She let out a breath.

Steve stared at the sword she gave him with his eyes narrowed. He dreaded the thought of encountering something like the Enderman a second time, and with a tight grasp of the sword’s hilt, he sighed.

“Whatever happens, we’ll make it back here together.” He turned to Alex while her emerald eyes brightly stared into the sky. “No matter what we face… I want you to promise you won’t leave me behind.”

“As long as you promise to do the same,” Alex glanced at Steve’s way and lost her smile.

“Of course.”

Alex let out a hand and in Steve’s direction, waiting for him to shake, but Steve cluelessly stared at her still hand. Awkwardly, Alex pulled her hand back and nervously looked away.

“With that being said,” Alex said in an attempt to hide it under the rug, “I found a cave while you were asleep. As long as we follow the torches, getting there and back shouldn’t be much of a problem.”

She pointed toward a path of unlit torches that had been lined up the night before. They were inconsistently spaced and looked to have been placed while in a rush. Had the sun been down, seeing them on the ground would be nearly impossible and their small build was nothing to commend. Like matches sticking out of the ground, it was very easy to miss one while in a rush.

Steve nodded and took a step forward.

“Before we go!” Alex called out. Steve hesitantly stopped and turned. “We’ll need some food. Who knows how long we’ll be away, or what we’ll come across?” Steve narrowed his eyes almost as if he could see through Alex’s fear. “I’ll go gather the sheep to get some mutton…”

“I already got some.” He answered before Alex could step away. Laying his hand out, a piece of cooked mutton hovered over his palm. “I found them in the furnace. I was starting to get hungry, sorry I just sort of-”

“What about the wood?” Her sudden interruption surprised Steve, and her question confused him. “Did you pick up the planks too? They were in the furnace with the food.”

“No…” Steve answered, “I only took some food.” He was beginning to grow suspicious of her haptic responses and nervous demeanor. “I did cut down a few trees, though.”

“Then we ought to chop down some more trees!” Alex replaced her sword with a stone axe. “Can’t be underground without the most important resource.” She walked by Steve with the axe over her shoulder and looked towards the water. Steve noticed that Alex had been acting strangely. As she passed him by, Steve turned and grabbed her wrist, stopping her in her tracks.

Caught by surprise, Alex quickly turned back to Steve with her eyes wide.

“Is something wrong, Alex?” He asked with a raised brow.

“Of course not!” She shouted and pulled her hand back. “I just want to make sure we don’t dig our own graves.” Steve didn’t trust her word. He told himself the same excuse the other day, so he had a hunch he knew what was going on.

“We have all the equipment we’d need in the caves.” He held out his hand and scrolled passed all of the items he had in his inventory. Alex watched as the items from her chest hovered over Steve’s hand. She wondered how Steve had any clue on what was required to cave-dive.

“How did you…”

“We can’t keep delaying this, Alex,” Steve said, interrupting her mid-sentence. Alex looked away from him feeling embarrassed. “It’s the first hurdle to getting stronger.”

“You’re right…” she mumbled. “I don’t know what I’m thinking.”

“Revenge is what you want, isn’t it?” Alex hesitantly nodded. “Then let’s go.”

Steve walked ahead of Alex and followed the path of torches in front of him. Alex watched as Steve blindly followed the burned torches while her body refused to take a step. Shaking in place, Alex couldn’t understand what was going on with her. Unlike Steve, her lack of understanding of the caves made her fear them more than anything.

There were no books detailing the various paths within the caves, nor any information on what kind of creatures laid dormant within them. The villagers weren’t a mining species, and everything they happened to get their hands on would miraculously appear in their grasp. She never felt inclined to enter the caves and feared going out for long periods of time.

Her fear of what could be tied into what she knew. Steve’s knowledge of the world was the Enderman and the training he had the other day. Monsters refuge in the caves, and Alex was the only one that knew.

Without saying another word, she followed Steve, and in silence, they trailed the torches on the ground.

~

As the two of them approached the last torch on the other side of a torturous forest, Alex suddenly stopped in her step and grabbed a hold of Steve’s wrist. Caught by surprise, Steve turned to her with his sword in hand and looked around. The bright sun had still been high in the sky, and no sign of any monsters was nearby. A chicken passed by them with a cluck and silent clicks with its feet.

“What’s wrong?” Steve asked in a whisper.

“I’m not sure I want to do this.” Alex whimpered. “The caves…” she looked over his shoulder and watched the final torch burn out. “they’re too dangerous.”

“We’re almost there, Alex.” Steve softly smiled. “After we’re in, I’m sure there’ll be nothing to worry about.” With her heart pulsing through her chest, Alex nodded and followed Steve while holding his hand.

Once they walked past the final tree and the light of the sun shined down on them, they came face-to-face with a gaping hole in the middle of nowhere. Steve stared at it in disbelief. The depths of the hole were pitch black, and only a small portion of it – the bit that was next to the surface, had any light. Its placement was rather strange, and the lack of wildlife surrounding it caught Steve’s attention. The closer he got, the more he noticed it wasn’t a hole that went straight down.

The cave had a steady decline that made it very easy for anyone or anything to venture within it. Alex, who had already seen the unnatural hole, froze upon first sight and tightened her grip on Steve’s hand. He was unsure of what had her shaking and decided that this was a good time to take a break. He handed her a piece of mutton and sat where he could rest his feet in the cave.

“Have a seat,” He said while patting the patch of grass next to him. Alex shook her head and took a bite of the food. “There’s nothing to worry about, Alex. The sun’s out and there’s plenty of space between us and the dark.”

Alex took several more steps back and sat next to the torch near the forest.

“Going in there is suicide,” Alex said.

“If we stay together, there will be nothing to worry about.”

“What do you know?” Steve turned to the darkness within the hole and stared in silence.

“Nothing. That’s why I want to go down.” He turned back to Alex and narrowed his eyes. “Not only that, but if we want to get stronger, we’ll need the tools, wouldn’t we? The things that destroyed your village won’t kill themselves, will they?”

“It’s more complicated than that,” Alex said in an attempt to refute, but Steve wasn’t having it. He got up from his seat and took the first step into the cave. Alex quickly stood up when she lost sight of him and desperately ran toward the hole.

When on the edge of the grass, she froze in place and suddenly started trembling. Steve unexpectedly placed a torch that illuminated a bit of the dark cave and looked at Alex with a smile. He noticed her shaking and grew worried for her.

“Nothing is more complicated than taking the first step, Alex. I know it seems scary, but once we’re in, we’ll be out in no time.” He let out a hand and reached for Alex who was on the outside of the cave looking down at him. “We will be fine.”

Listening to his reassuring words, Alex reached down and grabbed a hold of Steve’s hand, and he helped her down the steep jump.

~

The two traversed the near-endless cave for several minutes. They came across several ores and items they had never seen before.

Steve found a black ore that Alex claimed was called Coal. It was a more efficient tool for smelting than wood and would prove to be extremely useful. They also came across Copper, but neither of them knew what it was.

A lot of their journey was full of blindly placing torches and traveling across the multiple paths of darkness the cave had to offer. They collected a lot of strange material they had never seen before, like granite and andesite, and almost filled their inventories with coal and iron.

They created upgraded tools with their abundance of new resources. Primarily forging new swords and pickaxes to help them across the cave system. Alex quickly learned that the iron ore had to be smelted into ingots and that the speed of the furnace they made was significantly slower than what was at the village.

Everything was surprisingly smooth sailing. Alex had thought that the caves would have been crowded with the night monsters, but not even one showed its face. The two remained close together regardless of how safe it felt like it was. They made a promise to one another that they would remain in arms reach, and they kept it.

Just as the two decided to head back, Steve caught sight of iron ore in the wall not too far from the cave's path. He wondered why Alex hadn’t noticed it and went to mine it out. Alex kept her eye on him while he walked toward the iron and watched as he froze in place while looking to his left. Like his body had randomly gotten possessed, Steve stood still with his eyes narrowed, looking down an unexplored path.

“Is everything alright?” Alex asked as she approached him. “Do you see another Enderman?”

“You said the villagers can’t mine or build… right?” Steve asked softly.

“Yeah…” she answered, “I’ve never seen them do anything other than sell items and do their jobs.”

“If that’s the case, then why…” Alex made it to his side and took a look at the direction that left him petrified. To her surprise, what lay on the other side was more shocking than she imagined. What lay in the path ahead, were the remnants of a mineshaft corroded with moss and vines, with bits of wood and rails scattered about.

“is there a building underground?” Steve finished and turned to the dumbfounded girl standing next to him.

“I…” Alex whispered, “I don’t know.” Alex slowly walked toward the direction of the mineshaft, her body hesitating with every step. The shaft provided minimal light throughout the corridors, via a glowing berry that hung from the vines. She slowly walked past the first door and continued down, while Steve silently trailed.

They noticed webbing hanging from the corners of the shaft, and a silent growl coming from further in the cave. Alex replaced her pickaxe with the sword of iron while hugging the walls. The further into the shaft they went, the louder the growls got. Their breaths grew heavier, and their heartbeat increased.

When they could hear the growls from over the corner, Alex forced Steve to a halt and looked into his eyes. They locked eyes and listened to the groans coming from whatever was on the other side.

Alex leaned over and peeked over the corner. A green lifeless husk barely lugging its head around and limping with every step while slowly walking away from the two, oblivious to their existence. Its body, although with moss-like skin, oddly resembled Steve in height and shape. It had a mudded cyan shirt on, and darker pants that were barely holding together. Alex gasped at the sight and caught the attention of the beast down the hall. It slowly turned, allowing Alex enough time to hide once again.

Steve looked at her in shock. Her grip around her sword had tightened and a noticeable vein formed on her forearm. His curiosity was growing, and he had to know what was on the other side.

He quickly leaned into the corridor and locked eyes with the beast staring back at him. It's gauged black eyes that were staring into a void frightened Steve and locked him in place. The beast let out another cry, and Steve cowered, stepped back, and shut his eyes. He heard Alex silently calling his name, over and over.

When he finally decided to open his eyes, he was surrounded by darkness. He couldn’t interact with his inventory, nor could he move. His breaths hastened, moistening the dark atmosphere around him. Legs shaking, mind in agony, and fear taking over his entire body. Steve didn’t know what to do. He shut his eyes again and tensed up.

“Please! Please!” He whimpered.

“Steve!” He heard Alex’s cry once again and opened his eyes.

He turned to where he heard her voice and saw a giant pair of purple eyes staring down at him from within the void. The iris of the eyes was far darker than the cornea to the point they nearly blended in with the dark sky. Without a head, the eyes shined a dim purple light back at Steve. He stepped back and stared in disbelief with his jaw dropped, eyes widened. He was trembling as he thought back to the Enderman that attacked him.

The eyes were releasing the same cry the Enderman made while agitated, a cry that filled the void, progressively growing louder and more distorted. Steve covered his ears and shut his eyes.

“Alex!” He whimpered.

“Steve! Run!” Steve opened his eyes again and suddenly found himself back in the mineshaft.

In front of him, the molding beast widened its mouth and reached for Steve’s frozen body. He was suddenly brought back to his senses, and in a frantic action, he leaped back toward Alex’s direction.

Alex ran toward Steve with an arm reaching for him as he landed in front of an unrelated four-legged monster disguised like a hunk of grass.

Hiss

Steve turned to see the black eyed hissing monster slowly turn white and expand in size. Alex was too far and knew what was to come, however, she couldn’t leave him.

Everything went silent for a moment. Like time had frozen, Steve was surrounded by green monsters, all with a plan of finishing him. Alex wasn’t far from him, however, the four-legged beast blocked her reach.

BOOM!