Blue Fire | Stickman story

Chapter 11

Second ran to the house where Chain and Red were supposed to be. He ran into the house, but no one was there, in Red's room there was only a rabbit. Panting from the fast run, he sat down on Red's bed and he was scared. He didn't understand why, because Red was with Chain, which means everything is fine with him! But Second continued and continued to think that something had happened to them and no matter how much he tried to calm down, he only became more nervous.

"They are all right, they are all right, they are all right!" 

Second began to feel bad from bad thoughts that filled his head. He began to think where they could go, but unfortunately, he couldn't remember a single nearest place. So instead of trying in vain to remember, he decided to look for them through the Nether.

He almost literally flew into the portal and ran to look for other nearby portals. Less than an hour later, he found one of the portals and, hoping that they would be there, entered.

He was greeted by very high mountains, the ends of which he couldn't see, rare spruces trees and blue sea behind him. He ran in the only familiar direction where he was once.

Stumbling with tiredness, he began to climb the hill. Under his feet, heavy with every step, the stones seemed to crack, creating the feeling that now everything would collapse into a bottomless pit. Here and there, little by little, white pieces of snow began to appear, through which rare grass peeped through. The air began to get cold, and Second was completely exhausted, but he hoped that he was going in the right direction, so he decided to switch from running to walking. In the distance, he heard an incessant noise, as if a strong wind was swaying the leaves of the trees. Second ran there, as if the wolves were chasing him. Taking a shortcut through a shallow tunnel, where a familiar noise echoed, he stepped onto the snow and a waterfall appeared before him.

A wide, half-frozen river running from the horizon carried fish and pieces of ice in a fast current. Large gray stones, which were smooth in places, sharp in places, hung from the cliff, intending to fall on someone's head. The water falling from the cliff frothed, creating a rumble as it fell into the water and onto smooth stones. On the cliff, tall spruce trees grew along the river, and below the gray stones glittered from the water, creating a road deep into the forest. Snow lay on the trees and the ice, which slightly covered the waterfall, dazzled with its brilliance. Thin ice covering the stones and several centimeters of the coast made this place dangerous.

Fortunately, there was a stairs made of dark oak, it was old and creaky, but reliable. Second ran towards it and started going down the stairs, making a loud creak with every step. Almost falling a couple of times from rush and tiredness, he stepped onto the slippery snow and immediately noticed that there weren't many footprints. But when he came closer to the waterfall, he noticed that there were already more footprints. The trace led in different directions, but he was attracted by those that led to the waterfall, or rather, they led behind it.

Second followed the trail and saw that there was a cave. Exactly, the cave! How could he forget about it? He was here not long ago. Entering the cave, he saw that there were no longer those yellow flowers peeping out from the ice and cracks in the stones. But there were only a couple of small petals lying at the entrance. Second raised one such petal and twirled it in his hands, thinking where they could go later. 

The orange stickman came out from the cave and looked around for traces that might lead to another location. He climbed up again and went to where the river began to flow, hoping that there he will find them. And not much time had passed when he saw barely visible footprints in the snow, which led along a path through the forest somewhere into the distance. Second was delighted and ran along the path. Dodging between the trees and trying not to fall, he heard another noise, which was similar to the one where he was a couple of minutes ago, but this noise was much quieter.

"Another waterfall?" Second thought, because he had never been in this place.

And he was right. Another waterfall, only much less high, where a simple bridge was built of stone, cobblestone and some kind of planks. You can't even call it a bridge, it's just a piece of stone with pieces of spruce planks and an iron fence, which in some places wasn't there. A half-destroyed bridge with two spots. Coming closer, Second saw that it was Red and Chain.

Second quickly hid behind the trees and hoped that he wasn't visible because of the thick wall of trees. He wanted to get closer, to hear what they were talking about, but he couldn't get too close, otherwise they would see him. He only saw Red sitting on Chain's lap and they were talking about something. They were sitting on the edge of the bridge with their legs dangling and Chain was hugging Red.

Second was already beginning to freeze, while these two seemed to be warm like there was no snow and low temperature. He came even closer and he had to strain his hearing, because they were far from him.