Hello once more, faithful readers!

I come to you with a sincere apology and a reason for not uploading so long. It was a combination of writer's block and life catching up to me. But really good news, first of all: I'm applying for the eighth grade Creative Writing class at my school, and I'm using Chapter 1 of Ignition Point as part of my submission. I did some heavy editing to it, which I have also incorporated onto the website, and printed it and made it look all snazzy.

Second, regarding this story in particular, I promised OC's this chapter. And then I was like, but they aren't going to have that big of a role, so why even incorporate them? But a promise is a promise, and although it may be a short appearance, I would like to present to you:

Lianne Park from HarryPotterEncyclopedia24 and Leo Alpin from SimonStormCloak! It really pleases me that I got a ton of submissions, and I'd like to thank you all for trying because I was completely bombarded more than I ever have been.

And now, let the March Madness of Ignition Point commence!

V

Swarms

The root of Jake's hatred for nomads came from a long time ago, when they had changed his life forever. His reality had been perfect for his people for a long time, skyscrapers towering over the people in every city, mobs rendered as a minimal threat thanks to the skill and strategy of the Minecraftian Republic's armies and technology. And yet, the black market for weapons unseen to any other reality was always growing, allowing nomads living in between the cities to assault heavily armed convoys with equally deadly weapons. As the government grew stronger, so too did the nomads, just like in Crystal's base reality.

Jake was merely nine years old when the nomads struck him while on vacation, venturing on the bullet trains between the cities, in particular towards Emerald City from his hometown of Mirage in the Deserted Dunes. Like in Crystal's reality, Mirage was a large vacation destination, built on the other large lake in the country, Lake Paradise. The temperature was never below sixty degrees Fahrenheit, it seemed, and the beaches along the lake were never too crowded because of its vast size. Additionally, it was a large base for technological development in Jake's reality, and where his father worked for most of his life. In the underground labs of Mirage and the ones far away from civilization deep in the Sky Straits were where the Withers had been created, effectively creating the reality's apocalypse.

But that wasn't for another six years after Jake's own destiny was decided. The events of that day were what sent him off to the labs in the Sky Straits to begin helping the technological experiments there. At that point of his life, Jake barely even knew the magnitude of his ability, merely using it to create ice crystals for himself in his room in private so that his parents wouldn't find out about it. Especially in Jake's reality, if he was found to have these supernatural abilities, the scientists, including his own father, would run many rigorous experiments that would sometimes be painful. For a nine year old, that was the worst thing that could possibly happen: locked up in a room by yourself and constantly being forced to drain your own energy so that people can try to replicate your special abilities.

Luckily, vacation was no time for Jake to hear about the very tests being developed by his father that could be used on him. Instead, he laid his head back on the comfortable seat, the desert speeding past him out the window with his smartphone set to play music through a noise blocking headset, his eyes slightly drooping from fatigue of getting up early in the morning to make this particular train. Because of this, he couldn't hear his parents' conversation about what they were doing first once they actually reached Emerald City.

As interested in science as his father was, his mother wanted this weekend to be all about fun, and not about Jake being bored out his mind in a museum about mobs and the myths and truths about them. Instead, they would be going around the town just to simply see the sights of the city, going on tours to the top of every skyscraper, going to different sports events, everything that a young kid would be interested in. For now, however, Jake simply listened to his music without even noticing the passing landscape.

A light on the dashboard that showed the train's status for all the passengers began blinking red, and the bullet train began to slow down. Jake didn't notice except for a slight decrease in motion, but didn't bother opening his eyes. The passengers on the train were skeptical, however. After all, the train was still another twenty miles out from Emerald City, its final destination for this particular route. Jake's parents were among those looking around in confusion as the train slowed to a stop. The red blinking light flashing in front of every person on the train frightened people, and the angered shouts of those thinking they would be late for any appointments that they might have in the city.

If they kept up their shouting and persistence to blame the train company, however, the only thing that they would be late for were their own funerals. For a large pulse of energy went off outside the train, disabling all the electronics and causing it to fall a short two inches from its suspension in the air thanks to the magnets that powered it. An electromagnetic pulse had been set off outside the vehicle, sending the passengers into further panic.

Now, his music abruptly cutting off and being able to hear the screams of other people on the train, Jake looked up at the ensuing chaos around him. The people were as confused as he was, tapping the screen of his smartphone with no response, the black screen a symbol of dread for him. The battery on it had been nowhere close to being dead, and it had abruptly shut off without displaying the message saying it was dead. Along with his phone being deactivated, the red lights that had indicated a technical failure with the train hadn't gone back to green but simply shut off completely. It wasn't a technical failure, but rather sabotage.

As was the explosion that rocked the bullet train, sending the front half skyrocketing into the air while still connected to the other half, causing it to come tumbling down on top of the back half of the train. Luckily it didn't smother it, but crashed down upon it while sliding back down to the sandy dunes that made up the ground the tracks were built on. Jake was sitting in the back half of the train, and flinched to the point that he slid up the chair in a mix of fear and surprise, sparks flying around outside of the window along with smoking shrapnel.

The screams of the people on the train were quieted now, dominated by the sounds of wreckage smashing against other wreckage, almost like a steel plant working to produce sheets of metal from iron. Jake stood up from his seat, brushing some broken glass off of his shorts andlooking around frantically for any other sign of life. Luckily, his parents were regaining consciousness right in front of him, and he helped them up. "Oh, Jake, thank Notch you're okay," his mother breathed, wrapping her son in her arms.

Jake looked outside of the shattered window, where the overturned remains of the front half of the train lied, smoking and on fire in a few spots. He resisted the urge to use his powers to create a jet of water to quell down the flames, as that might arouse suspicion that the crash was his doing. He had found that in old stories and in movies, anyone with supernatural abilities was an easy person to blame for the simplest of failures.

"What the hell just happened?" his father asked skeptically, vaulting over the frame that would have held the shattered glass window. Pulling out an enchanted iron sword, powered with Sharpness II, he led the way forward onto the smoking remains of the train while his wife and son followed him at close distant. He crouched down at a shattered window that led into one of the front cars' passenger sections, peering inside with curiosity. There were pieces of shrapnel on the floor of the car, which was actually the ceiling thanks to it being flipped over in the process of the crash. Along with those were the dead bodies of many passengers, arms and legs twisted into awkward positions that no one could possibly survive.

Chills ran down Jake's spine as he stared inside, the bodies of the damned sprawled all over the place as a result of the crash, an eerie feeling encompassing the whole train car and spreading to Jake from his viewpoint on the sandy ground. The combination of nervousness, the hot desert sun, and the burning flames on the parts of the train made of wood or other flammable materials began to make Jake break intoa sweat. "C'mon, we have to find other people," his father told them, leading them back towards the half of the train that hadn't been completely overturned. The opportunity quickly ran short, however, as an arrow from far off flew toward them and pierced his father between the eyes.

Jake's mother let out a high pitched scream as his father fell to the ground, just as dead as the people inside of the train had been. Tears stung the young Jake's eyes, too young to truly understand the magnitude of what had just happened, too young to fight back against the nomads assaulting the bullet train with ruthless intentions. "Jake, run! It isn't safe here!" his mother shouted, and he began backing away uncertainly as she picked up her deceased husband's sword, staring at the nomads that walked atop the front of what was left of the train, wielding swords and bows, many of them glowing purple to indicate that they were enchanted and therefore a lot more deadly towards the innocent people on the train. Another volley of arrows came flying toward Jake and his mother, two of them hitting her and one of them sticking into the ground at Jake's feet. That was his queue to turn and run, sprinting away from the madness that had become an innocent family vacation. There was a man running back at Jake wearing a police uniform and holding an odd-shaped object in his hands. It was made of sleek black metal, a trigger being fingered by the police officer as he stared down the pillaging nomads.

"Hey, kid, get back there!" he alerted Jake, pointing behind him in a hurry. "There's a small group of refugees, if you're parents are still alive then they'll be there or making their way there!" He disregarded Jake and got down to one knee as Jake ran past him, aiming the front of the object towards the enemies that climbed down the sides of the train to take what they could from the luggage of dead passengers, walking along the top of the train as clear as daylight.

Jake stopped a couple feet behind the man, however, watching him as he squinted his eyes towards the horde of nomads assaulting the train. He pulled the trigger on the small object that he was holding, and a loud noise like an explosion erupted, shattering the air around Jake in a blast louder than the explosion that had caused the train to crash had been. The train's crash had been caused by the nomads setting up TNT under the tracks, lighting it so it blew up while the train was passing under it, creating a level of havoc unseen by many.

One of the nomads suddenly gripped his face, red blood spurting from a wound that Jake assumed had come from the weapon that the police officer was holding. "It's just a prototype, they call it a gun. Get out of here!" he shouted, waving him off before returning to shoot another one of the raging nomads with the small gun. Jake slowly stepped away more, keeping his eyes locked on the destruction unfolding before him.

The hot desert sands stretched out in every direction, expanding far beyond his vision as he tried to scope out any other nomads that weren't on the train at the moment. Then he remembered that there was a refugee group at the back side of the train and turned back to run towards that part, hoping to find some support. The loud cracks from the gun in the man's hands sounded like thunder every time he fired at the attacking nomads.

Jake knew the man had told him to go try and find his parents in the small group of refugees, and still continued there in search of some form of protection. The fact that his parents were gone permanently was tearing him up on the inside, but he had to keep going; it was the only way to ensure his own safety. There was no way for him to resurrect them, however, and so Jake willed himself to banish the thought from his head and focus on what needed to be done: ensuring his own safety. He really didn't want to have to use his powers over water to aid him as the others might take him as some superhuman freak, so he simply ran towards the back of the train in a blind fear that erased all his senses from his mind.

The small group of refugees would ultimately be saved by a large group of militants arriving from Emerald City, killing off all of the nomads in the process of assaulting the train and accounting for the wounded. Unfortunately, among the wounded there were many dying and some already dead. This included Jake's parents, both of whom were given peace forever at a funeral in Emerald City along with all the others casualties of the assault. What had been planned to be a fun weekend getaway for the Elwoods had instead turned into Jake being orphaned. It wasn't for long, however, as his father's brother Samuel, who worked in the secret technological development towns far east in the Sky Straits, took Jake in to raise as his own.

From there Jake learned all the tools of the trade in his reality's technology, learning how to build his own circuitry out of the most basic materials. Everything had a purpose that could be put to use through electricity, his uncle told him often, and it was up to them to find it. Jake learned more about smartphones, redstone, and even the prototype weapons still under lock and key like the one that he had seen the day his parents died: guns. Under lock and key meant that no one except for the researchers were supposed to have them, and that only meant in the actual laboratories. The man who had most likely saved Jake's life had gotten it off of a black market, but he refused to tell anyone of his encounter with the weapon all those years ago.

In six years the development of Withers began, and after just a few months they were supposedly ready, Jake's uncle one of the heads of the entire project. This allowed Jake to be able to work on the Withers himself for a while, but no one foresaw that they had accidentally mixed in the skeleton's DNA when creating them. All hell broke loose the day that they were activated, and Jake escaped the reality with intent on realizing the missing part of the Creation Story. If he could find the others like him, then he could put a stop to the Withers.

Hatred for the nomads was still part of his blood, and Derek was no exception, despite his attempts at helping him and Crystal. Now, back in the present as Crystal sped off towards Ice Alcove to find Lukas, Jake stared Derek down with eyes intent on ripping apart the nomad's body by some sort of mental capacity. "So, you decided to be a coward and betray all of the people in your little group," Jake spat, walking around Derek while the latter's knees and feet were bound to the ground by a case of ice. "If there's anything worse than a ruthless nomad, it's a nomad that can't even stand by his own friends."

Derek had no response, instead staring straight ahead at the snowy landscape that stretched on far in front of him. He awaited whatever wrath Jake was sure to unleash on him, though he didn't know why Jake hated nomads so much. "Look, I don't know why you see this all as a bad thing. Without my help to start the battle before my entire group attacked you, you would be dead right now," Derek replied bitterly, glancing up at Jake with eyes that were just as angry as Jake's.

"May I remind you," Jake retorted, turning to face him directly and making the ice crawl up a little further up Derek's legs towards his waist, "that Crystal was the one that started the fire that effectively saved your life back there. So stop trying to give yourself credit for our heroism." Jake continued pacing around in front of Derek, shaking his head with frustration. "I don't even know why I'm interrogating you. After all, there's no information about the Withers that I can squeeze out of you. Maybe I should just kill you and be done with it."

"Withers?" Derek asked, now suddenly intrigued in what his captor had to say to him. "Are they flying, almost like small versions of the Enderdragon?"

Jake had now stopped directly in his tracks, turning back to Derek with an eyebrow. "And three heads?" he asked, and Derek nodded.

"I wasn't able to get that good of a look at them, but it almost did look like there was a three-headed torso and then more bodies being supported on the back of them," he explained to Jake nervously, biting his lip as he remembered the droves of black shapes flying over the sky the day before. "I'd assume that those are what you're talking about."

"What else do you know about them?" Jake sputtered, now crouching down in front of Derek with interest. The ice trap that entombed Derek's legs was slowly fading away, the feeling returning in his muscles as he began to regain sensitivity in that area of his body. If he could keep talking, then maybe he would have enough time to break free from the ice trap and get away from this maniac, and whatever he wanted out of him.

"Nothing else except for the fact that you and this Crystal girl have something to do with them, but only from the last ten minutes of conversation," Derek replied nervously, scratching the back of his head as beads of sweat began to pop up on his forehead. "Where is she now, anyways? Gone off to run for help?"

The ice briefly grew colder and crept up his legs an inch more, but shrank back down as Jake realized that it was simply an empty threat. Derek reminded himself that things like that were not going to be helpful in situations like this when all he needed to do was keep talking to get anopportunity to escape. The more he thought about it, though, where would he go? The towns of the Minecraftian Republic, according to Jake and Crystal, were falling apart in the attacks from these Wither things, and his own gang in the Wild would never take him back in after he betrayed them and killed two, maybe three of their members. Derek took a sideways glance over at the border of the forest, finding the bodies of those that had ridiculed him for so long with relentless effort.

"That's information that I'm afraid I won't be able to tell you," Jake answered, looking off far into the distance in the direction of Ice Alcove. "Information that, if falleninto the wrong hands, the entire safety of your reality could be compromised."

"Reality? What are you saying, my reality? If that's implying that you come from a different one, then you can just stop lying to me, because I'm not that stupid," Derek exclaimed, trying to keep in laughter the whole way through while Jake stared dead serious at him. "Other realities are just a myth, an urban legend that so many people have sought to prove but have never come close. There hasn't been the right equipment."

"Well, then do I have the perfect explanation for you, don't I?" Jake replied smugly, mocking a sort of enthusiasm as Derek looked at him skeptically. "In my reality, we progressed a lot faster than yours did, and therefore were able to open up wormholes to other realities. You know what, I don't have to explain this all to you. You aren't going to be joining our group, and considering the average nomad's lack of education, you wouldn't be able to get it through your thick skull anyways." Jake frowned as he looked back at the snowy road that led to Ice Alcove, awaiting Crystal's return. "I suppose I'll just watch you for now, right?"

Derek rolled his eyes while Jake's back was turned, amused at the whole oddness of the situation that he was now in. "As if I really need watching," he muttered.

My feet tore through the layer of snow that rested atop of the cobblestone that led towards Ice Alcove from the intersection where Jake and I had been stopped by the group of nomads. Whoever that nomad that Jake had captured, he was about to become very unlucky as Jake interrogated him about… about what exactly? I didn't know what the nomad could possibly know about the Wither, and I thought that it was a blessing that someone outside of our pairing had finally decided to help them in any way.

I suppose that it was Jake's decision what to do with their prisoners of war, if that was what you wanted to call people like this nomad. After all, he had started the group of people with special abilities that would be useful in putting an end to the Withers' bid for domination over all the realities. Or at least, all of them that centered around mine, the so-called base reality. Still, it worried me on what punishments we would enact on a seemingly innocent nomad. There was obviously some hatred towards nomads burning inside Jake, and it was a prejudice that I figured it would be unwise to touch on.

Instead, I focused on the long road ahead of me, snow piled on top of more snow, and even more on top of that. All of that snow made it very hard for me to keep up a steady pace towards the city of Ice Alcove, let alone one as fast as the one I was currently exerting.

It was about ten minutes after I had taken off from where Jake and I had encountered the group of nomads that I first heard the distant explosions of a city being beaten to the ground relentlessly by an entity virtually unknown to this reality. The black forms of the Withers spiraling throughout the sky entered my vision, flying just under the clouds like they had been in Spruce Arbor during their initial attack there. This was most likely a different group of Withers, although I was intent on destroying them with as much hatred as if they had been the ones to take the lives of so many of my townspeople.

The path that I had been following eventually led towards the entrance of the city, an opening in a large wall with barracks and archery towers installed in it. Obviously this defense hadn't done all that much to stop the Withers from their assault on the city. I walked right through the opening in the wall that I assumed was the main entrance of the city, stepping back into the battlefield that Jake and I had left early that morning. Taking out my smartphone with haste, I opened up the application that Jake had instructed me to and watched the radar for some sign of Lukas' signal within the city.

On the green map that outlined the city with a bird's eye view, a small white dot representing me appeared in the center of the screen. As a wave of green light passed through the surrounding areas of the map, a small red dot appeared in a location about five blocks to the east of where I was standing, indicating the location of Lukas. I looked up at the burning city above me, trying to piece together a plan to get down this street with minimal contact with the Withers. That turned out to be nothing except for a fantasy as a group of the mobs came flying down all of a sudden, shooting their explosive skulls at the ground in front of me.

The smell of death hung in the air as I flung myself onto the side alley between the smoky remains of two battered houses. The Wither skulls that had been sent in my direction instead hit the road, creating heavy dents in the already damaged surface. Smoke rose from the spots that they had hit, green just like the color of the skulls that had caused the impacts. In the small alley between the destroyed buildings, I planned a route to get to the building that Lukas was pinned down in, praying to Notch that the Withers were still mainly focused on the center of town in order to cause the most destruction possible.

Realistically, however, I knew that this might not be the case. Unlike Spruce Arbor, Ice Alcove didn't have much of a downtown, but rather important just spread out throughout the city in random places, mixed in with the houses and effectively becoming very confusing for anyone trying to find their way around the city. At least if they had been searching before the buildings had been reduced to ashes, anyways. Right now, landmarks weren't making that much of an impact on a person's sense of direction.

Popping back out of the side alley and examining the damaged street before me, I glanced up at the sky as a precaution. If there were any Withers about to make impact with one of the buildings near me, then it would help if I knew and was able to duck down for cover. Luckily, all I could see were the large swarms of Withers flying high over the center of the town at the moment, apparently focused on a small district of businesses there. That made my job of extracting Lukas from this hellish wasteland a lot easier.

The gates into the city and the minecart station faded in the distance as I followed the map on my smartphone, growing ever closer to the building that Lukas was hiding in. The cobblestone path under my feet was more and more cracked, as if under more and more pressure with every second that ticked by. After sprinting for a minute or two, I reached the building that the red dot was blinking on in the small map. I realized that I wasn't even sure that that was indicating that Lukas was there.

Crouching behind a bench whose legs had been blown apart into small pieces of metal, I looked at the building from the cover with my thermal vision on. There were about ten Wither Skeletons camped out around the entrance of the structure, which looked like a house that had collapsed on itself. Inside of the house was a figure in red in my vision, huddled over and emitting a stronger source of life than the undead mobs standing in my way. I assumed that there was some sort of cellar or basement under the ruins of that particular house, and that was where Lukas was obviously hiding. Now there was the matter of reaching the house safely.

For a second I had forgotten that I could summon fire, and jumped up from behind my makeshift cover to aim a beam of flames at an unfortunate Wither Skeleton. The white hot flames enveloped it in a blanket of smoke and embers, and while that Wither Skeleton crumpled to the ground in a heap, I shot another line of fire at one of the other forms standing in front of me. My enemies were surprisingly helpless against my attacks succumbing almost immediately to the fire that I conjured with little effort. Over time, I could feel my skills increasing, and I convinced myself that maybe someday I would be able to fight the actual Withers.

After only a minute or so, the area was cleared out from the hostile mobs, and I advanced forward to the ruins of the house. Stepping over the smoking remains of the Wither Skeletons, I reached the rubble of the house. It was mostly made out of spruce wood, although there was a substantial amount of cobblestone that made up the ground. Shattered glass littered the ground as well, and I had to step carefully over to the basement door.

Explosions from the Withers off in the distance ricocheted off of every solid object in the vicinity, creating an endless banter. The door into the basement was leaning a little to its side, the hinges seemingly weakened from the explosions. I pushed the door open and stared into the darkness below. Clouds of dust rose, and I advanced down the stairs ten steps until I reached the bottom, where the air felt like it was charged with electricity. I had forgotten what power Lukas had, if Jake had even told me, but I suspected that it was electricity from the way that the air was tingling oddly. My smartphone's radar had the red blinking light exactly where I was standing at the moment, and I looked around the room.

Darkness had enveloped me completely now, and I started a small fire in my hands so that I could see. The dust flew around me increasingly, and I stared at a small form against the blackened wall. It was his eyes that stood out, dark blue and seeming to pulsate with electricity while staring directly at me in the darkness. "Who are you?" he muttered quietly, blinking and then looking down at the fire in my hands. "Are you with Jake?"

"Yeah, I'm the new girl, Crystal," I replied, looking around warily at the darkness that surrounded us. "And you are Lukas, correct?"

There was a small flash of movement on the other side of the room, and a light bulb hanging from a string over the center of the room flickered on. It was a dim light, but it was enough that I could see his facial features and vice versa. I extinguished my fire and flinched as an explosion closer to the demolished building than the others rang out from above us. "The Withers are going to be closing in on our location, especially since there are two of us with elemental powers in one building," he warned me, standing up and walking over to the stairs that I had just walked down. "Where is Jake, anyways?"

Jake. I had completely forgotten about him. He would be able to find us using the smartphone radar if he did end up coming to the Ice Alcove after us, but there was no guarantee that that was going to happen. For all I knew, the nomad that he had captured might have escaped Jake and even injured him. I doubted it, considering Jake's powers over water and ice, but I had learned that you can't doubt anything.

"He's back on the road to Ice Alcove, interrogating a nomad that was among a group that attacked us," I answered, turning back to the stairs as Lukas continued toward me cautiously. "We should get moving, the faster that we get out of Ice Alcove, the better. The other two people that we need to meet up with are going to be in or around Jungle Junction at this point, and we need to get back to Jake also. And personally, I really don't want to have to deal with the Withers here."

Lukas nodded in silent agreement and followed me up the cracked stairs until we were back up on the surface, smoke rising from the center of Ice Alcove in terrifying amounts. It almost looked like the sky was turning black in the distance, with the combination of the smoke and the swarms of Withers flying through the sky at intense speed. "Yeah, I really don't want to have to fight those things," I commented, and the two of us began jogging back to the city limits.

"How do I know that I can trust that you're with Jake?" Lukas asked, looking at me skeptically. Now in the light of the sun and not a dim light bulb, I could see that his face at faint smile lines in it, and I realized that he must be a good person if he was getting those at this young of an age. Not the best detective skills, but I was decent.

"Would Jake just pick up anyone for the group?" I queried, conjuring a beam of fire and blasting a long stretch of the cobblestone ground with it. The flames seemed to lick the ground, spreading out in long blankets of fire so that they enveloped the ground in a white hot blaze. There was one thing that I hadn't expected, however. The cracks in the ground grew larger, splintering the cobblestone apart so that the ground almost looked like it was suffering from an earthquake. Then I realized something really important that I should have thought about before.

Ice Alcove was literally built on top of a frozen lake, the cobblestone ground all carefully placed so that if the weather got warmer, the ice wouldn't melt and create a lake in the middle of the town. With all of the pressure that was being applied to the cobblestone throughout the Wither's attack, the cover was sure to be depleted in many places. Any sudden impact could crack it apart, and a large increase in temperature might superheat the water in some places. This was precisely what my fire was doing and the explosions from the Withers, and I immediately stopped my fire as I realized the consequences of what was going on.

"We have to leave, now," I told Jake frantically, picking up the pace along the cobblestone path as the cracks in the ground began spreading at an alarming rate. "Come on, Lukas, this is really dangerous!"

"Well, yeah, there are plenty of Withers that want to take all of our souls, me and you in particular," he replied, following me at a brisk pace. "What could be a larger threat right now?"

"The frozen lake under the city, it's going to burst back up to the surface under all this pressure!" I alerted him, now just four blocks from the edge of the city. It was then that the unbelievable happened, however. The ground broke apart under our feet, hot water spewing up in hot jets of water. "Oh, Notch!" I shouted in surprise, narrowly jumping around a crack in the ground that widened to three feet or so, shooting boiling water into the sky.

"Hold on!" Lukas yelled back at me, grabbing my arm hastily and implying me to do the same to him. The air around us seemed to warp around us at his will, and the ground left my feet. Or rather, my feet left the ground. Slowly, but still, I was actually flying or levitating or something like that. Rapidly cooling water came raining down from the sky, eventually reaching the limit of its force and coming back down on whoever was left in Ice Alcove.

I was gripping tightly to Lukas' shoulders, jets of water showering us every two seconds. Suddenly, a burst of speed caused Lukas and I to fly away from the city as it crumbled into the ground, what was formerly the base of the town becoming the source of its downfall. Along with the water that now filled the air, a heavy wind had picked up, and Lukas tried desperately to steer me away from the hot geysers opening in the city. There was one pillar of water that Lukas narrowly dodged, although I caught a good amount of water in my shirt and hair.

At last, we had made it outside the area that was built on top of the frozen lake, and Lukas slowed to a stop before descending to the ground again. My hands were clenched around a good amount of fabric that he was wearing, fingernails cutting into his skin ever so slightly. Once my feet touched solid ground, I released him and stood on the snow dusted cobblestone path that would lead us back to Jake. "That was… amazing!" I breathed in sheer astonishment, although Lukas took little notice to my reaction. Instead, he stared in wonder at the sight of Ice Alcove thanks to the Wither attack.

"We need to get out of here. That collapse of the city will probably hold off the Withers for a little bit, and we need to take advantage of that," Lukas told me, staring worriedly into the distance. "I sense a large trouble looming in the air."

"You can do that?" I queried.

"Electrical frequencies," he replied shortly, barely finding the time to look back over to me and shrugged modestly. "It's nothing really, just a simple power that I learned a while ago."

With that, the two of us began the sprint back to wherever Jake was waiting for us on the long cobblestone road that would lead back to the intersection of four cities. From there we would proceed to Jungle Junction, and from there on with our quest to stop the Withers.

The old cabin was dark and gloomy in general, and Leo Alpin found that to be very depressing. Not that anything would cheer him up at the moment, sitting here in the cabin with absolutely nothing to do except wait for Lianne to get back while she scouted. It seemed that everything that could possibly have gone wrong was just as they had been about to be finished with recruiting their team of kinetic people, as Leo liked to refer to them. It wasn't the best name, but it would do at the moment. Being their own species, kind of, the name for them didn't really have to have much pizazz. So instead, it was short and simple. They were people, and they had kinetic powers. Big deal, the name said. In reality, it was a very big deal.

Dark and gloomy was supposed to be Leo's middle name, after all. He in particular had power over the shadows, although this seemed especially odd to him considering his personality traits. A person with control over darkness and invisibility and stuff was supposed to be quiet, reserved, almost to the point of creepiness. Instead, Leo was laid back and outgoing. Heck, his favorite color was yellow. This all created a personality crisis inside of his head, and this made Leo quiet and reserved at times. But not as usual as you would expect from a person like him.

Leo, as stated above, has control over anything related to darkness and shadows. Things like invisibility, and the ability to bend shadows or erase them completely, including those of other people or objects. This all came in use when using stealth, which was often needed when searching for that last person with powers in this reality.

Leo hadn't had the luxury of finding one, as he was the one to join just before Crystal. In turn, Crystal's reality was the first he had ever visited besides the one that he had grown up in. The idea of traveling to other realities had seemed to silly to him at first, but he had grown into it. After all, he would never see his family or friends again until he completed the task of defeating the Withers.

Unfortunately, fourteen year olds don't have the greatest sense of self confidence. Leo highly doubted that he would make it out of this voyage alive, and if he did he would be very grateful to Notch. At the moment, there was nothing that he could do to ensure his survival, and simply waited. Lianne was certainly taking a while, and Leo looked in the cracked mirror that hung crookedly in the wall. Through the reflecting glass, Leo saw a face that normally looked cheerful and bright, but was dark in the hollowness of the abandoned cabin. The dark of the cabin outlined his dark green eyes so that they pierced into the mirror. He was wearing a yellow sweatshirt and dark gray sweatpants that barely hung over his leather boots, which he always wore even when not in a combat situation. His dark hair was matted over his forehead, and as he swept it back up into the mess of hair, he got a short look at some pimples that had begun to pop up near his hairline, which was usually hidden by loose strands of hair. Maybe Leo wasn't the best looking guy, but his personality usually made up for it.

Usually, as in since he had found out there were other people like him. In Leo's reality, one where the Nether and Aether were accessible to people of certain professions, he had been in an inner circle of friends that kept to themselves. It had been nearing the end of summer break when Lianne herself found Leo in his reality's version of Emerald City, living in one of the tall skyscrapers that dominated the skyline. With working water elevators and stairs that seemed to ascend to the heavens, Leo had made it very hard for Jake, Lukas, and Lianne to find him. Luckily, however, Lianne had been the right person for the job, considering her abilities.

At that moment, a small black bat fluttered into the dark cabin with the squeaky floorboards through a broken window next to the cracked mirror that Leo was currently looking at and settled down on an old chair. Leo shifted his gaze to the small form as it rested its hind legs on the frail chair, gazing up at him. "Any news?" he asked the bat glumly.

With a flash of white light, the bat transformed back into Lianne Park, sitting in the chair and looking back up at Leo. She was sixteen, with black hair tied behind her head in a crudely made ponytail. Her blue green eyes stood out significantly less than Leo's did, although there was a small white light that danced in the center of her pupils. She was miraculously skinny, wearing a dark red T-shirt and gray pants almost identical to Leo's, and a pair of black trainers. The white light in her eyes signified her own ability; one to change into any mob that she desired, which was becoming very useful as their journey went on.

Just now, after all, she had been scouting the area as a bat to see if Lukas, Jake, or the new girl, Crystal, had arrived yet. Lianne and Leo were hiding out in a small cabin on the outskirts of Jungle Junction, the building suspended above the ground high up in the mahogany trees. From here, the two of them could see the odd terrain of Jungle Junction, which was mainly built in the underbrush far below, and the clear waters of the Great Lake to the north. On the western side of the Great Lake was the road that led to the intersection that Crystal and Jake had previously been attacked at, and now there was little to do except to wait for the others to arrive. They had originally planned to meet in Emerald City, but that plan had fallen apart quickly.

Lianne, individually, felt especially bad for Leo because of the situation that she had wrenched him into. She had found him while he was testing his invisibility using the sonar impulses that all bats have, and since she couldn't see him but knew he was there, she was able to pinpoint that he was the person she was looking for. She had confronted him and told him of their mission, but Leo had initially refused to come with. And so, after three days of rejection, Lianne had simply kidnapped him and brought him to a shelter where the rest of them were hiding out in the Sky Straits, near the portal that would take them to the last reality. There, Leo was finally convinced of their true intentions, but Lianne still felt bad about it.

Lianne herself had been found by Lukas in her reality, one where hostile mobs were much rarer and refused to actually harm common Minecraftians. Rather, they would mind their own business, but still only spawned at night and grew calmer or even died in the sunlight. This was the main reason that Lianne had always found herself fascinated by the mobs, and her ability to turn into them was widely accepted by the other people in her reality. They were a peaceful people, and in turn Lianne had been brought up to be a thoughtful and caring person with no intention to hurt anything or anyone. That is, until she saw the Withers destroying Crystal's reality merely to kill her. The Wither and Wither Skeleton were the only two mobs from the Overworld that she could not transform into, and this was because they hadn't existed in her reality. Therefore, she had never been able to learn their attributes to the level that she could become one of them, whereas any other mob from the Overworld was fair game. She couldn't transform into Nether, Aether, or End exclusive mobs, however, because of the lack of availability of a portal to those dimensions in every reality except for Leo's.

Now, sitting here in this dark cabin with Leo, she shook her head no to his question. There was no news of Jake or the others arriving in Jungle Junction yet. "I think that our time is running out. It won't be long before the Withers launch an attack on this city given our presence here," she elaborated solemnly.

Leo took out the scythe that he had powered with dark energy, his weapon of choice built so that it could reach through walls and turn invisible when he did. The scythe had always made Lianne think of Leo as the grim reaper, because the whole idea of shadows and stuff plus the fact that he used a scythe as a weapon all resembled the figure that represented death. And yet, through all of these odd assumptions, Lianne still felt bad for Leo. It was the least she could do.

Leo nodded grimly, looking back to the cracked mirror and staring in his reflection, now with Lianne sitting behind him and looking just as solemn. There was still a vast sense of hope that the others would make it to Jungle Junction soon, but that was fading all too quickly.

Across the Great Lake and into the Frozen Frontier once more, Jake awaited Crystal and Lukas' return to him from Ice Alcove, which was still being attacked by the Withers despite it erupting in jets of hot water. And still, the Withers came flooding into Spruce Arbor, destroying the remains of the city desperately as the short trace of Crystal and Jake still hung there. The swarms were growing, and our heroes' time was fading. The race back to the portal in Sky Straits had begun, but the kinetic people would have to fight their way there.

Fighting had become routine for most of the members of the group. Their next task was nothing new, but still threatening just the same.