Hello once more, faithful readers!

The day has finally come after just under a month of waiting: the release of TPoM II: One Shadow Stranger! I hope you all enjoy, and I don't have much to say right now because I left everything out there in the A/N for Ignition Point which I released a couple days ago.

However, one thing before I begin: this story is kind of hard to understand. Before every chapter begins there is a quote from either a song, a video game, a TV show, or maybe even a real person that kind of corresponds to the theme of the chapter. As soon as this ends, assume that you are being told the story from the main character's interrogation cell in present time. Once the little thing pops up in italics with the date and stuff, then it is the main character telling a memory from his interrogation cell. Within these areas, paragraphs that are all italics are the interrogator intervening, and once there is a line break, it switches from the memory to present time and back again if necessary. Its kind of confusing, but hopefully you guys will get the hang of it.

And now, let the story commence!

Synopsis

If you're reading this story, then you have most likely already finished reading the one that predated this, The Prophecy of Minecraftia, or TPoM for shorter and more applicable uses. If this is referring to you as a person, you may skip this section. However, for my many new readers, here is a minimum rundown of the events predating this book. Or at least, the events that you are required to know. You'll find out more later.

In the year 2014, Markus 'Notch' Persson retakes the seat for main developer of the popular video game Minecraft from one of his employees, Jeb. Notch does this because he believes that he has found a way to harness energy by trapping a large amount into an isolated system to the point where it is so close to bursting that it creates an infinite amount of applicable uses. Notch turns the energy into electricity, and his experiments begin.

Over the next few years, Notch goes over a huge overthrow of Minecraft, adding features such as the well-received Aether mod and much larger, operational sailboats. Along with these, he takes away many things from the game as well, most notably the Endermen and strongholds. The End is still written in the games code, but it is impossible for anyone to access it without hacking, and it is locked down in ways that the rest of the game isn't within code.

This all builds up to Notch inviting three thousand contest winners to Mojang's headquarters in Stockholm, Sweden, for the grand unveiling of the world's greatest ever invention. Nobody not attending the meeting knew what it was, though, as on activation it released a wave of electricity (some would say magic) that caused the bodies of all humans within the city to mysteriously disappear. Along with this, there was a curse brought upon the people in Earth: an inability to create or form new ideas, which included inventions.

Seeing an opportunity later that year, the infamous hacking/terrorism group Anonymous, with thousands of followers spread out across the entire globe, launches a cyber-attack that cripples every government in the world, and in the chaos, releases gas attacks on thirty eight of the world's major cities. As Anonymous begins taking control of many governments and militaries, a lone few struggle to repair themselves before Anonymous strikes them: the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Germany, and France.

The war between these countries, the Resistance, and the countries under Anonymous' control erupts as both sides compete to gain territory to try and fend off the other side. Conflict erupts, but neither side can obtain the advantage because of that same curse Notch inflicted that restricts humans from creating new ideas or inventions, leaving the war at a standstill because of no new weapon ideas, no new strategies, no anything.

Two hundred years later, the Earth has become an apocalyptic wasteland. Every land has been militarized, or being fought for control between the two sides of the conflict. A lone United States Army soldier, Sergeant Dylan Richter, struggles for survival through a series of unfortunate events happening to his squad, and ultimately comes out alive with a secret message: the war criminal Markus Persson was sighted by him twice in Stockholm and gave him a folder with information inside. Not for Dylan, not until the time was right. As no one believed him, Dylan finished his service and went to go live in a civilization camp.

At the same time, it is revealed that the invention that Notch created was a portal to another universe that he generated: one with four Realms, and the first one, Earth, shrouded from his people. He was a god, along with his brother Herobrine, and were successful in establishing a new world, a perfect world for Notch to live in.

But trouble has broken out in Minecraftia as Endermen come back into the fight, killing people or even worse transforming them into Endermen themselves. As the shadow people take over hostile mobs to do their bidding, a prophecy is revealed by an Oracle: one man who receives the last name Glowstone in the naming ceremonies, a ritual performed by people in Notch's civilization once they are fourteen to determine their last name and job, will have the power and will to fight off the Enderdragon. It will be his destiny, and so be it: it certainly was.

Alex Glowstone, a newborn hero, watched as on the night after his naming ceremony, armies of mobs destroyed his city. He was left with nothing. But over the course of a month, he began his own civilization: a city named Novum Eboracum, one inhabited by the survivors of the world in the coming apocalypse of Minecraftia. He grouped together a group of seven friends to make the Imperial Battalion, a squadron led by him to take down the Endermen once and for all.

After many trials and triumphs, the size of the group ultimately grew to twelve, and the group was sent to the End, a long forgotten dimension that served as the home of the Endermen and the lair of the Enderdragon that controlled them. Through shocking revelations and an epic final battle, Alex finally was able to defeat the Enderdragon and find out something else: unlike the other people, he now knew that Earth really existed, and how it was all of his kind were from.

In other news, Alex found out that he was different: he was computer generated, which was why he was so special from everyone else. He had been created, his genes harnessed from Notch and his girlfriend Emily before Notch had unveiled his invention, but Emily had chosen not to come to Minecraftia. So Notch was Alex's father.

As civilization blossomed in Minecraftia and Dylan Richter awaited a new kind of life on Earth, the Enderdragon bided its time. It was still alive in a sort of way, and all that it needed was the perfect opportunity to strike.

It came with a man named Jay.

PART I

DISCOVERY

I'm not a prisoner, I'm a free man!

~The Prisoner by Iron Maiden

The instant that I woke up, I realized how badly my head was throbbing. It was annoying, like someone was constantly trying to bang a hammer on the inside of your skull to try and break it. My memory was foggy, but I certainly remembered key points. The giant figure of the Enderdragon flying above me. The faces of Tyler and Sydney. And most importantly, the droves of helicopters surrounding Wrigley Field as I waved my friends off into the dugout to escape. "They want me!" I had shouted, standing with my gun at my side as they hurried into the depths of the building, "Just get away with the intelligence!"

The Resistance had caught up to us, and now I was in captivity. I had figured that I would be at some point, but I had almost had my hands on what I had wanted for so long. The one thing that my father had left me to do when he died. And now I was stuck here, and the Resistance would interrogate me to try and find out what I knew about the Enderdragon. There was just one problem. I hadn't gotten to see inside of the folder, so I didn't know where it was. I was doomed.

Now that I was able to think, I realized how stiff my back was. I turned over, realizing that I was on a metal bed. There was simply two blankets, one that I was laying on and one that I had been under, and a pillow that my head rested on. It was comfortable, but it didn't help any of the throbbing. Besides, it was hard to be comfortable when you knew your terrible fate.

I stood from the bed, taking inventory of the room around me. The walls were simple stone, and there was a chair up against a small wooden table in the center of the room. It was probably about the size of a normal bedroom, but it was mostly empty. The bed was in the corner, and the front wall was a black glass window. It was one way, of course, so I couldn't see anything. In the left corner of that wall was a large metal door, and there was clearly no point for me to try and force it open.

I could also see a small speaker in one of the corners that two walls and the ceiling intersected in, the one directly above the door. I realized that I was just standing there aimlessly, and it would've looked pretty weird to anyone watching. Of course there was someone watching, after all, I was in an interrogation room of all places. Still, I squinted distastefully at the window. It felt weird to be in a room as secluded as this.

"Captain Jay 'Hawkeye' Richter. Resistance United States Navy DEVGRU Team Red Dawn leader. Enlisted in Resistance for four years since April 2246. Went M.I.A. on November 17th in Stockholm, Sweden, while in pursuit of an Anonymous HVT. Now found by the Resistance today on December 21st, subject for interrogation on the subject of Codename Enderdragon," the speaker said in an electronic voice. It was static, so someone was using a voice modifier on the other side.

"No kidding," I muttered, frowning in disgust. This was going to be one hell of a few days. And the worst part was, I didn't deserve any of it. The entire time, I had been fighting to try and save humanity, and yet I was being accused of working against it. That was just what happened in war, I supposed. You couldn't trust anyone with anything.

"Sit down," the voice continued, and I followed it's command and pulled out the metal chair out from under the table. It was cold steel, freezing my fingers on first touch as if it had been resting in a bucket of ice. With no hesitation, I sat down and scooted the legs up against the table. I remained staring at the black window, trying to see if I could see at all. Maybe it was just tinted really well. But a couple seconds proved that it was indeed not, and I wouldn't be able to tell what the body language of the people behind it, or who it even was behind it.

There was silence now, and I presumed that whoever was back there wanted me to talk. Obviously they wanted me to talk about the actual events that had led up to this point, but I was not going to make it that easy for them. After all, as I remembered, I had gotten to see inside of the folder that detailed the intelligence that the Resistance wanted for mere seconds. There was no way I could recount the locations, or even anything that important from just three seconds or so.

Knowing this, I spoke first, directly about that subject. "Look, I don't know where the Enderdragon is. I know that I had the folder in my hands, you probably have it on tape. But I didn't get to read any of it," I explained, knowing that that wouldn't cut it with my interrogators.

"Hawkeye, we do have camera footage, and you opened the folder," the voice countered.

"Well, based on the amount of time I had it open, do you think I would've remembered anything written inside of it?" I scowled, rolling my eyes. The argument that my interrogators were making was perfectly legitimate, but that didn't save me from being frustrated by it.

"So you're saying that you don't know where the Enderdragon has taken refuge on Earth? All we know is that it somehow got out of your so-called Minecraftia along with armies of mobs that are spilling out of Stockholm, and our weapons don't do anything against them. So you better think hard, Hawkeye, because you're all we've got. The war between Anonymous and the Resistance doesn't matter anymore thanks to this, so think hard!" the voice protested, shouting in anger.

"I don't know, dear God, I swear!" I yelled back at it, starting to sweat in discomfort. Was it just me, or was the room getting a lot warmer with every second that passed by?

A deep breath that was made unclear with static rattled out of the speakers, and I waited patiently for the people behind the glass window to make their next move. "Fine then. Where are the others that you brought out of Minecraftia? If you don't have the folder, we know that they do, and we want to know exactly where the Enderdragon is so that we can lock down the area."

That was a question that I did know the answer to. That didn't make it any easier for them to get the information out of me. "There are three possible locations, and I sure as hell will never break on that one," I spat, staring threateningly at the window to show that I wasn't kidding. "And you might as well not even try to find them without knowing where they might be, because there is absolutely no way that you'll be able to find them that way." A stab of pain went through my side as I remembered Tyler and Sydney again. I couldn't let them be found, or Prae, or Alex, or any of them, really.

The silence from before returned, and I heard the sound of typing through the speakers. The sound stopped and the voice spoke again. "You do realize that we'll do anything. We'll search all of Chicago, make a global manhunt of these people. We can have you killed if you really don't know anything. It doesn't make a difference to us."

"Me neither," I said bitterly, standing once more from the metal chair that was pressed against the wooden table. I turned away, about to make my way back to the bed as I realized how tired I still was. Without facing the window, I spoke once more. "Can I have something to call you, whoever you are? I don't like having to refer to someone as just someone."

There was a pause as the voice thought. "Cobalt," the voice responded shortly. "Cobalt."

"Cobalt," I repeated under my breath, sitting down on the metal bed. Surely a codename for someone in the Resistance, but I couldn't think of anyone that had had that name assigned to them. So instead, I pulled the covers over me and closed my eyes.

It felt that I hadn't slept for long when I heard the voice again. "Wake up, Hawkeye," Cobalt said, arousing me from my slumber. My eyes hurt, probably from a lack of sleep, but I didn't want to test these Resistance guys. Surely they would have me killed, and if I didn't cooperate on something as simple as that, it would be sooner rather than later that I was executed.

I stretched my arms above my head out of habit, loosening my body for whatever was to come in the following hours. I'm sure that going back to bed without being told to was not scoring me any points with Cobalt, so I hurriedly got seated and glared at the window. I had developed a strong feeling of despise for that window already, as it shielded those who squeezed information out of me.

"So what's up for today?" I yawned, sitting in the metal chair once more. "Torture, interrogation, or am I going to have to listen to a lecture on the consequences of what I've done?"

"The second one," Cobalt said simply. "Since we have no lead on where your allegiance stands or where the rest of your party is, we're going to have to get the information out of you."

"That isn't going to be so easy," I joked, feeling at ease all of a sudden. It seemed that I had bought my friends some time if I wasn't dying today. Any progress was enough to make me smile.

"We've realized that already, unfortunately," Cobalt responded, disregarded what could be viewed as an act of disrespect to him. "So we're going to go from the beginning. Your promotion."

"Celebration Day. What a great idea, glorifying your prisoner as you try and interrogate him," I said smartly, barely able to suppress another smile. Celebration Day was an unofficial term that people had given to the day that a person was graduated to the rank of Captain in the Resistance. Mine had been just before my mission in Stockholm that had gotten me into this mess.

"And what exactly do you want to know about it?" I queried, folding my hands in front of me.

"Everything."

Celebration Day

Lieutenant Jay 'Hawkeye' Richter

November 14th, 2246

14:57

Rome, Italy

Earth

The day had definitely not been any ordinary one. Well, really, that was saying the bare minimum. But it had gotten interesting just before three in the afternoon. That was when we blew up the Coliseum. Yeah, you heard me right.

"Set!" Corporal Samuels shouted, walking back from the last block of C4 that he had placed. We had been in charge of five columns on the northern side of the ancient building, and now that they were all set, our squad was ready to demolish the building.

We weren't doing it for just any reason. Rome was a major battleground at the moment, and the Coliseum was Anonymous' major hub. With it destroyed, then there would be a very low chance of Anonymous being able to maintain any sense of control on Rome. With a firm grip on this city, the Resistance would have a good opportunity to capture all of Italy.

I got my radio out from my belt and spoke into. "This is Hawkeye, we're all set to blow charges. How about you guys?" There were five other squads that surrounded the building, all loading C4 on a total of thirty columns. The supports were all key points, and since all of the columns would come down at once, it was highly likely that the entire thing would collapse.

The other squads all radioed in that they were indeed ready. Each group had four people in it, but there had been heavy casualties as we fought through the city to get to this point. Samuels and I were the only ones left in our group, and although I technically outranked him, we had treated each other as equals since the two of us had become the last ones in our squad. Thank God he had been the one carrying the explosives, or they would've wasted a lot more time looting whoever had died with the C4 in his hand. Though it might have been ugly, the mission was going successfully.

"Overlord, this is Hawkeye on the ground, all teams are set with explosives in position, are we cleared to destroy the Coliseum?" I asked through my radio, and waited. As soon as I nodded, Samuels would flick the switch and the entire building would come down. At this point we had backed up about fifty yards away.

"Hawkeye, you have the green light. I repeat, you have the green light," my radio responded, and I tilted my head slightly. Explosions suddenly rocked the air, the deafening noise drowning out anything else that the Overlord could have possibly said. Smoke blew out from the building in all directions, and I saw the rocks crumbling down.

The smoke blew over Corporal Samuels and me like a heavy cloud of fog, blocking any sight that I could have possibly had. "Move up! Everyone's hostile!" I shouted, hoping that Samuels might have heard me. And so I pushed forward from where I had been, a thermal sight equipped to my SCAR-H assault rifle so that I could still aim through the smoke. I checked it. There were no signs of life within thirty yards in front of me. Knowing that, I continued forward.

The sound of explosions had now been replaced by an eerie quiet with nothing audible except for the crackle of flames. At last, I walked into a pile of rubble that was taller than me, and the smoke began to clear up. I checked my thermal sight, looking forward. There were two men walking toward me, and they were not indicated friendly by a certain chip that was in the body armor of all Resistance members. They were enemies, and there was no reason to hold off.

I squeezed the trigger, firing at the Anonymous soldiers. A body scrambled up just behind me. Once I had dropped both of the soldiers, I turned to see Corporal Samuels there. Soot clouded his dark skin and body armor. "Samuels, you looked like you jumped into a pile of ash," I commented.

"Look who's talking, Lieutenant," he replied, flashing his white teeth at me briefly. "So what's the plan now? I want to get out of this hellhole as soon as possible."

"We just have to make sure that the structure is down and all that remains is the camp that stood within the walls. And according to my eyesight, that's exactly what's the case," I responded.

I picked up my radio again. "OK, Overlord, looks like it's down. Call in the anti-personnel run," I spoke into it. We looked up to the sky behind us. There were five planes flying toward us now, slowly descending to the level of the building. Bullets began firing, and explosions rang up from in front of us. The strafe run had obliterated the camp supposedly. Our job was done. Now we just had to get out of enemy territory and back to an area of Rome controlled by the Resistance.

The fact of the matter was that even though the Coliseum had been destroyed, Corporal Samuels and I had the hardest part of the operation coming up: trying to escape Rome in the midst of all of the Anonymous soldiers. We had literally stirred up the hornet's nest, and it was going to be quite an effort to try and make our way out. The two of us had about two miles to get to a Resistance controlled area, and it was quite simple. The course was simple, with just one street to make our way down. However, that one street was in the heat of the ongoing battle.

The two of us advanced forward to the point that we had left the heavy layer of smoke behind. The city of Rome had always been beautiful, and now, even amidst a war on it's streets, it looked elegant and pretty. Of course, the piles of debris weren't exactly a good addition to the architecture, but they didn't change it that much for the worse. And besides, you couldn't really admire all of the corners when you knew that people trying to kill you could be hiding behind any one of them.

Once we reached the first row of buildings, I ducked behind a fallen pillar from one of the buildings. It had severed down the middle so that one side was leaning against a stone facade of a building while the other side lay evenly on the ground, making a perfect spot for cover. I reloaded my assault rifle after having shot two men before with a fresh magazine. "You ready?" I asked.

Corporal Samuels nodded shortly, readying his own assault rifle. "As much as I'll ever be," he said, and we vaulted over the stone pillar. There was more rubble on the other side, but it was just littered on the ground, not enough in order for us to be able to take any cover behind them. So instead, we would have to make our way across without any obvious cover. I didn't like the prospect of that.

Luckily, my eyes were extremely good at picking up the slightest movements, and the hand moving on top of one of the roofs on the next intersection was a dead giveaway. "Sniper!" I shouted, sprinting off to the building on my right as Samuels went to the one on the left. A bullet hit the ground right where I had been standing, clearly a high caliber one as it made the rubble and dust shower everywhere within five feet of that spot. I was already climbing into a window to the inside, though.

Another bullet hit the wall just beside the window on the outside wall of the building that I had climbed into, but I was safe on the inside. I lifted my SCAR-H once more and aimed through the thermal sight up at the other roof. The Anonymous soldier had the upper half of his body exposed from my angle in the building across the street. The small red dot in my sights hovered over his chest, and I fired four bullets at him. They hit him cleanly, and the glowing red mass in the infrared sightline slumped backward once more behind the stone cover.

I jumped back out over window to the street, and I saw Corporal Samuels follow suit from the opposite building. "Move up! We have to get out of here as soon as possible. I don't like the feel of this street," I called out to him, and we kept going side by side. It was too quiet. I had expected a lot more force than a single sniper, but there appeared to be no one else. It would be stupid to assume that to be final, as most likely there were more enemies camping inside buildings or something.

As it turned out, that was exactly the case. About halfway down the street, just a mile away from Resistance territory, I heard the sound of spinning rotors. There was no mistaking the sound of a helicopter. And since our anti-aircraft squad member had been taken out on the way to the Coliseum, there was no way for us to shoot it down reasonably. "Get off the street!" I said hurriedly, and Samuels followed me into an old Italian restaurant.

The shadow of the helicopter passed over the street, and I stayed down behind a table. I thought that we were safe in the building, but in mere seconds, shooting began from the other side of the restaurant. I popped my head out over the wooden table and saw about five Anonymous soldiers behind counters and bars, all holding submachine guns and firing at us. I picked one off before I ducked back down under the table to avoid being shot myself. Samuels was crouched over next to me.

"Tangoes at twelve, ten, and two o' clock!" he alerted me after taking a quick scan of the room. I saw a bullet hit a glass salt shaker that ended up spraying white spray all over the table. Once more, I popped up above the table and took out another Anonymous soldier, and Samuels did the same. We were no longer outnumbered. That didn't mean that our fight was going to get any easier.

Maybe it could, though. I pulled out a frag from my belt and pulled the pin on it and held it in my hand. If I waited too long, it would blow up right in my face. One second, two seconds... Then I threw it over to the counter that two soldiers were hiding behind. It didn't take long for it to explode, shattering tables and killing the last two enemies in the room with us. I stood again, the immediate threat neutralized once more. "Let's keep moving."

After that, there were no more incidents. We reached the end of the street with the Resistance checkpoint, where a group of six men guarded the entrance to the Resistance area of Rome. I showed them my identification card simultaneously with Corporal Samuels. The man in front took notes that we had once more reached friendly territory, not acknowledging that two of our four man squad hadn't made it back. That was war, I supposed, but it was sad that people could be disregarded.

The two men that had died were good men. There was Corporal Sanchez and Corporal Biden, both of them good fighters throughout the time that I had been in a squad with them. There were many memories that I had of them-

"Really, that's not important. What we need to know is how you became a captain. We need you to remember everything. So don't waste time telling us about dead people and think about everything, think about where the Enderdragon is!" Cobalt said harshly.

Well, honestly, Cobalt, I had feelings for them. And for the last time, I don't remember! So if you want to hear me recount what is important, then don't interrupt!

"Hawkeye, remember who the prisoner is."

I am not a prisoner! For God's sake, I will not be a prisoner! Maybe I'm trapped at the moment, but this is just an interrogation thing. So let me talk.

"You screwed up pretty badly, Hawkeye. I will interrupt your story, as you call it, whenever I want because I need all of the details possible. So don't backtalk to me."

How about you stop talking to me like I'm a three year old?

Anyways, Corporal Samuels and I continued into the Resistance camp. The activity was everywhere as people polished weapons and got ready for their own missions. There was no spare time to be spent for anyone stationed in Rome at the moment due to it being an avid battleground. Five planes were flying back from over the Anonymous territory of Rome, the same ones that had just made a gun run over the Coliseum.

"I'm going off to the mess hall. Good work today, Lieutenant," Corporal Samuels told me, giving me a firm handshake. Our eyes locked for a moment, a silent grievance of the two men in our squad who had died that day, the ones that you don't want to hear about.

"Continue, please?"

Yeah, right. As Samuels walked off, I heard someone call my name from my right. I turned to see Admiral Johnson walking over to me. He was basically my boss, the head of my section of SEAL Team Six squads. "Lieutenant Richter!" he called again, approaching me. He didn't wear combat armor, but rather a suit, as if he were going to a dinner party or something.

I turned toward him and grasped his hand to shake it. "Admiral, what in the world are you wearing?" I grinned, greeting him. He broke his hand away and smoothed out his jacket as if making sure that there were no bugs on it.

"I've got a conference with some other Navy leaders, basically going over the statistics of the ongoing battle here. Not a big deal," he replied, and he began walking toward the airfield. "I was hoping that I might be able to catch you before I fly off to Manchester."

"Oh?" I said, surprised. "What exactly for?"

"Well, first of all, good job not dying on the job today. Two casualties out of your squad are minimal losses. We extracted Sanchez and Biden, they were both good soldiers that you led," he said.

I hung my head sadly, remembering my close friends. "Yes sir. I'm glad you said so."

"But speaking of you surviving, that was a good job leading the way to the Coliseum, it was a successful job. Thanks to your heroics, we'll be able to take Rome once more," he congratulated me.

I scratched the back of my head uncomfortably. I hadn't noticed how my hair was starting to grow back out from the stereotypical buzz cut for the armed forces. "It wasn't just me, sir..."

"Yes, but you led them all," Admiral Johnson smiled, now crossing the airfield toward an armed transport jet. "So in turn, happy Celebration Day."

"Cele-" I started, but couldn't finish the words. They had seemed to stick to the top of my mouth, and I couldn't speak for a couple seconds. "You're promoting me?" I queried once I regained my senses.

"Yes, and you deserve it. You're being reassigned as well, you'll be leaving for Sweden on a transport jet in about forty five minutes. Good work, Captain Richter." With that, we had reached Admiral Johnson's jet, and he climbed up the boarding stairs. I waved slightly, and then turned around once the jet's doors had closed. I was off to Sweden. Good job, Captain, I thought.

I didn't realize that I was grinning back in the present. I suppose that I had been so invested in telling the story of my Celebration Day that I had started smiling about the sweet memory. Admiral Johnson was such a good guy, but that had been the last time I had seen him. I assumed that he wasn't dead, but a month had passed, so who knows? Personally, I hoped that he wasn't, considering that he was such a nice person. I had no control over that, though.

"There isn't much else to tell about the Celebration Day. At about 17:00 I got on the plane and I flew off to Sweden. Nothing much else to it," I finished, biting my lip nervously. Maybe me smiling as I was interrogated wouldn't be scoring me any points either, but then again, it hadn't been my fault. It had just happened, and it wasn't that big of a deal.

"What happened once you reached Sweden, and where were you?" Cobalt asked, and I shook my head angrily.

"Why are you asking me these questions?" I blurted, staring at the black window. "You're Resistance, all of your records already indicate where I was up to the next day! If you already know the answer, then what is the point of hearing it from me again?"

"Hawkeye, there's more to it all than that. We need to hear it from you so that we know that you admitted it. Its a legal thing, I guess," Cobalt explained, sounding less and less sure of him or herself. The thought of legalities actually playing a part in my interrogation made me laugh.

"Do you really have to worry about what's legal and what isn't? The Enderdragon is on the loose, and you're trying to make sure that I can't call up my lawyer and sue you over something meaningless," I chuckled, not caring that it was not the smartest thing to do to your interrogator.

A heavy sigh filled with static emitted from the speakers. "Whatever. Some people just don't understand. But that's my point, Hawkeye, the Enderdragon is on the loose on Earth and you aren't cooperating with us at all."

"Oh, so this is about cooperation now?" I sputtered. "Is this all some sort of game to you now?"

There was a short moment of silence. "Well, technically, Minecraftia is based on a game."

That was the last straw. I stood so suddenly that the metal chair got knocked over by my legs as they found their footing. "Look, Cobalt, I have no idea what your problem is, but my life is not just some sort of game for you to figure out. I'm not a pawn, and neither is Sydney, and neither is Tyler, and if that is all you want to use me for, then you can go to hell!" I yelled at the window.

If I was nothing but a pawn in the Resistance's schemes, then there was no way I would cooperate. The thought that I might do that was laughable. A game. A pawn. That's all I was.

I'm not a prisoner. I shouldn't be being interrogated here. I'm a free man!