Minecraft: a Novel

Chapter 9

  My stomach churned. I was now a part of a war I never even knew was happening a week ago. What was I going to do? I'd just started my training. I was going to look like an idiot in front of all the HH.

  We all stood up from the table and made our way to the armory.

  Ben opened the door. I'd seen the armory before but this time it was different. I was going to use these weapons to save my own life.

  We entered. Ben and Jane put on full sets of diamond armor, and I could only wonder how much they must have cost them. Grace and Lora were both clad in iron and wielded infinity bows.

  I found a set of spare iron for myself and put it on. I hadn't ever worn a full set of armor before besides at my week-long training camp. 

  The sword chest was powerful. On the inside were 15 diamond swords, all with different enchantments. I grabbed one with Knockback, and enchantment I'd always had fun using.

  "Everyone grab two enderpearls for absolute emergencies," Jane instructed. I'd never used an enderpearl before, so I almost hoped for an "emergency."

  "What are we expecting?" I asked.

  "I'll admit that I'm not sure," said Ben. "We've only ever had a few face to face fights with Herobrine. He uses fire very often, so don't choose Fire Aspect. I'm sure his men are immune."

  Everyone, including me, nodded and followed Ben through a trapdoor in the corner of the room that I hadn't noticed before. A ladder lead us to what looked like a garage that had two tank like vehicles inside.

  They floated about a block's height above the stone brick flooring. Each was green and had a large cannon in the middle on top of it. A door was on each side. The second Ben jumped inside one, the entire thing lit up. I leaped back in surprise. Jane smirked in my direction and joined her friend.

  Ben waved for me to come inside too, and Grace and Lora mounted another one.

  The inside was almost as cool as the outside. There were two small rooms, one that was just the cockpit with a bunch of levers. It reminded me of the control room I'd gotten to see inside the HQ yesterday. The other room had benches on one side and chests on the other.

  Ben sat himself down in the pilot seat and Jane sat in the co-pilot seat. Quietly, I sat down on a bench in the other room where I could only see them through the doorway.

  "Time to launch," said Ben.

  Jane pulled a lever on the dashboard and what it did made a strange feeling run through my whole body. I was invisible. 

  Bit by bit, the entire tank had melted away until it felt like I was simply floating in the air. I could see Grace and Lora disappear also.

  My brain searched for an explanation of how they could have possibly done this. I was so used to mechanics that nothing could go without a logical reason. At last I assumed they must have had some kind of dispenser with splash potions of invisibility.

  The whole vehicle began to hum and start moving. It inched it's way out the door and slowly grew faster until we were speeding out into the sky. I looked behind us and could see homes and streets growing smaller and smaller. A pit grew in my stomach. This reminded me to the days when the world was always set to "creative" and the people could fly around as they pleased.

  "You'll get used to it," said Jane. I couldn't see her but I could hear her voice as we sped through the air. I suddenly grew self conscious, as if they could see me and I couldn't.

  I sat in silence a bit longer as I took in the view. We had to be a least a thousand blocks high into the clouds. The only time I had been this high was in an airplane, and those were rarer than a spider jockey.

  Before I knew it, we were descending. Once we came below the clouds I could see a forest stretched out below us as far as my eye could reach. Only a hundred blocks away, I could see a mass cloud of black. 

  I gulped. The HSP.