the last | awesamdude

Ch. 1 - The Prison and the Prison Guard

Asteria

***

"Dream!" I shouted, seeing the man in full netherite armor moving quickly. He turned at the sound of my voice, "where are you off to?"

"Tommy." Was all he said.

He spends almost all of his time in exile with the kid. As much as I would like to hope that he is helping him and boosting his morale in such a difficult time, I knew that was too good to be true. I hardly ever saw Dream anymore, my best friend.

He noticed my disappointed look and stepped down from the portal. He slid a hand under my chin and tilted my face up to look at him smiling.

"No worries, Aster. We'll hang out soon. I think there's a mineshaft nearby if you'd like to raid it once I get back."

I smiled back at him, "Of course."

He kissed my forehead gently and stepped through the raging portal. I look at him until his figure disappeared from sight. He loved me. I knew that much.

I adjusted my helmet, planning on maybe making a visit to someone, but no one in particular came to mind. Thankfully, by some god up above, it began to rain. I grinned and took out my trident, and then flew into the air. It was a bit dangerous and I did almost lose one of my lives from it, but I've gotten the hang of it since then, always having my water bucket handy. Eventually, I made it to the Badlands. Ponk lived somewhere around there, despite his allegiance lying in the Dream SMP. He and I were close, seeing as I took his side when Sapnap burnt down his precious Lemon Tree.

He was sitting under a tree, petting a cat. Although he had a rocky history with the animal, he appeared to be getting along well with it, due to Bad's insistence.

"Hey, Aster." He smiled. Ponk was so adorable.

"Hey, Ponk. How's it hanging?"

He smiled even wider, "Quite well. I have to go help Sam in a bit. Well, not help him. And I don't really have to, he just seems stressed so I'm going to go annoy him to lighten his mood."

"You've spoken about him before, although I've never met him. You two are close?"

"Oh, yeah. He's one of my best friends." He said proudly, "Wouldya like to meet him?"

I was surprised, but pleasantly so, "Yeah, of course, shall we?"

We both traveled by trident, Ponk almost messing up, but he saved himself and laughed about it afterwards. Ponk was such a positive person, always silly and could make me laugh. He was fun to be around, and I'm sure he can lighten anyone's mood, even "Serious Sam" as he refers to his friend. Ponk explained a bit about Sam as we walked the rest of the way due to the rain ceasing. He said Sam took the prison very seriously and took no jokes regarding it, so it caused him to be incredibly strict and stressed him about a bit.

Hopefully we can cheer him up.

***

"Hey Sam!" Ponk greeted. We were at the site of the prison, only the foundation being done so far. A man was organizing some redstone compartments, moving them around in a large chest, but turned at the sound of Ponk's voice. He wore a mask that covered the bottom half of his face, looking similar to a gas mask. I couldn't help but notice the similarities between him and Dream: tall, a central theme color of green, full netherite, a mask, and all around a little bit mysterious.

"Hi, Ponky." The man greeted nicely and came down from the raised foundation, "and who's this?" He looked at me.

Ponk gestured towards me, "This is Asteria, she's a friend of mine. She's also a friend of Dream and she helped me when Sapnap burned my Lemon Tree."