Mortalized

Night Critters (15)

     I was woken from my short slumber when something as hard as a stick hit the back of my head. Quickly, my eyes shot open, eyeing several pears of feet before me. Most went shoe-less, and those who did wouldn't have them for long by the shabby looks of them. But most importantly, they weren't even normal feet at all. Several were green, and the stench leaking from their unhealing wounds reminded me of death. Several other feet, like the one that had kicked me, were bones held together purely out of luck.. or was it some sort of magic?... But that is beside the point. In short, they were monsters; a gang of skeletons and zombies to be speciffic.

     I rushed to my feet and ignored my limbs as the aching swelled. I had completely forgotten this downside of falling asleep: there was no way to look-out for danger. Wait- ...Where was Sam?!  Still in a daze from waking up so quickly, I spun in a circle in search of that mutt. There he was, tied to a far away tree, growling at the mob surrounding me, fangs showing.

     "What?! What do you want?!" I lashed-out at the crowd, igniting some fire in my hands.

     "What kind of question is that?! I mean, how stupid do you think we are? We know you lead those humans to the Nether! I knew it, all along, that someday you would slip up; reveal yourself as a traitor!" A skeleton stepped forward to speak, arms flailing with every word he shouted.

     "Wait.." My fire dyed down a little. "No-no! I didn't lead them to the fortress, I promise! I speciffically left that portal open so they would fall into the lava and die, but somehow they made it!"

     The same skeleton cut in. "-Oh suuuure, blaming it all on some massive scheme are we?! Oh please, we all saw what you did! You didn't even go after those guys who placed the TNT! Instead, you went after Null, who was clearly nothing but a distraction!"

     "I- I swear I... hhhh, fine... that last part was true.. I...wasn't in the right mind..... But that doesn't make me a traitor!" My shoulders finally slumped, but by voice stayed firm with the truth.

     "And how exactly do you plan on proving your point? Because," A forced chuckle was shaken from the skeleton's skull as he loosened his joints, leaning slightly to get a better look of my face. "Because I don't see anything to help your case here! Th- the base! The fortress is gone! There honestly isn't much to go off of when literally nothing is left! You destroyed it all by going after those humans, who you could have just chased away and let us pick off! Sorry, but, I don't see any way you could possibly manipulate us into trusting you now! Not with the stunt you pulled off back there!..."

     "..."

     "Exactly... You have no proof you are really on our side, because you were never on our side.. Your Excellency." Sarcasm was clearly what had ended that statement, made by a snobbish looking zombie.

     I dipped my dead in defeat. With a deep sigh, I realized there was no way to convince those who had once been my followers that I was not what they thought I was. "Hhh, alright, have it your way... Let me leave, and I won't enter the Nether ever again. You guys won't have to worry about me ever again."

     "Huh, I'm sorry, but that isn't how this works. We know what you've been doing. It may just seem like you are aimlessly wandering around out here, but we've been tracking your movements, and it looks like you're collecting an army or something. We even saw one of the smaller bases you visited, and it was pretty well hidden...just like the rest." Wait, was he talking about Steve's old house being a base? If so, that would be quite the pitiful place to house soldiers! "We know you are preparing an army, so, we came to grab you before you could even start!" On the skeleton's command, I was grabbed by a cluster of other mobs. So many gand were wrapped around my arms they felt as if they were wrapped up in chains.