Crack Attack: A Collection of One-Shots and Other Disturbing Shit

M*therf*cking Zubats (in the M*therf*cking Cave) - A Posh Life Sequel

Lachlan:

Damn it, Pete. Damn you and your stupid, gaudy Fancy Pants, and your stupid, rigged casino, and your stupid, addictive games. I don't even like caving, but I'm stuck grinding on cave walls all day and night trying to get enough rich man swag so you'll let me into your casino. I already know how this is gonna go, and it's not gonna be pretty.

I'm gonna lose, I lose it all. I'm gonna lose all day. I'm not screaming. No, I'm not screaming... Should've stayed home and played the Hunger Games. It's already dark out when I make it back to the surface and the moon's halfway across the sky. Dammit, Pete. I've had enough of these fucking caves already.

I start walking back to my house, hoping to make it back before suntime. That's the bad thing about living near all of your friends - they use up all the resources and you have to walk like two thousand blocks to find anything but coal, Zubat turds, and lapis lashitlump. This sucks, boys.

I can see the torches at Spawn when I hear it behind me. Just another zombie, I'm sure. I turn around and prepare to smash its green, ugly face in, but I can't get my sword out in time. Something big, hairy, and wet tackles me to the ground and starts clawing at my back, dragging giant sharp talons along the back of my armour. I'm glad I wore it, after all. I dig the hilt of my sword into the back of its head and make a run for it while it's stunned. Whatever it is, it's a pretty big mob. I grab a torch out of my bag and hold it out toward the monster, gasping when it roars furiously at the glowing light.

"Jerome? What are you doing out here, mate?" His little black eyes glare at the flaming torch for a few seconds before he snarls and lunges toward me again, a stream of thick, pink spit flying through the air behind him. This isn't a good sign. "Jerome! Bruh, what're you trying to do? Back off, mate, or this's gonna hurt." The crazed Bacca can't even hear me as he darts forward again and clamps down on my arm, gnawing pointlessly at the iron armour. I knee him in the ribs and smack him alongside the head with the sword before he knocks the weapon clean out of my hands.

Fuck.

He pins me to the ground and looks down at me blankly as he latches onto the side of my bare neck. I watch in horror as globs of bloody foam drip from his gaping mouth and down my neck and face. Wherever he caught the rabies, he sure was generous passing it around. First time I've heard of a Bacca being generous with anything but vile creatures and handfuls of their own hair. I stretch out behind me and reach as far as I can, slowly scooting the sword close enough for me to grab. I snatch it up and bring the blade up next to his head and swing it as hard as I can, slicing the blade right though his thick, furry neck. With a giant splash of hot red blood, Jerome's frothing head falls off to the side, and I try my best to wipe his fluids off of my face. I get to my feet and slowly make my way to the rocky outcropping in the side of the mountain, choosing to wait the night out there rather than risk trekking back to my house at this time of day.

I'll make it back in the morning when the mobs do their morning suicide.

It's so hard to even walk. I lean against the rock and slide down to rest on the ground.

Not too much longer, Lachlan. Just stay awake, mate.

Just stay awake. Or you'll end up like Jerome.

-----

Vik:

"Lachlan?" I listen for the sound of him groaning upstairs, or for some badly remixed techno song from his DJ Skellex collection. Nothing. "Hey, Lachlan?" I walk toward the elevator and take it upstairs, walking past his beloved Zubat hanging upside down on its perch to look for any sign of its master. The little fucker hisses at me and makes that god-awful twittering noise it does whenever Lachlan feeds it silverfish. I told him that thing probably had all kinds of diseases, but of course he doesn't listen to me. Who brings an unwashed, untrained wild animal into their house to live with them? It sniffs the air behind me and its grotesque, eyeless face follows me as I walk around the room.

It smells dusty in here, vacant. There's no sound besides the restless Zubat's rustling, and I decide that Lachlan hasn't been here for at least three days. The apples he had stolen from the trees at the edge of Choco's massive industrial farm have started to rot on the table and yesterday's rain has leaked through a hole in his roof to turn the wooden floor into a mushy, bubbly mess. No, he definitely hasn't been here in a while.

I remember he said he was going to go mining for the grand reopening of the Fancy Pants Casino, but he isn't the sort of person to spend days upon days down in the mines. Did something happen to him?

I pass by the hostile, sullen Zubat one last time and hiss back at it, watching it bear its rows of glittering yellow teeth as I step into the famous slime elevator. I hear the little blue horror flapping around upstairs before it either settles down or heads out through the hole in the roof. Watch, I'll get blamed for that now. With one last glance inside Lachlan's empty house, I head toward Spawn to start searching for him. It's late afternoon and suntime is almost over, and I make it there just in time to check the map to see where the new community mines are. One hundred seventy-five blocks northwest from here through the trees, past Jerome and Rob's houses. I can already hear the mobs rustling through the leaves and branches on the forest floor so I unsheathe my sword and begin walking. I can't just let him suffer down there if he got himself into some trouble. Only about fifty blocks into the woods, everything seems to fall silent. Even the spiders have stopped scuttling around. Either I found a lucky spot with no recent spawns, or something much more dangerous is lurking around here.

Snap.

Something snaps a twig behind me and I turn around immediately with my diamond sword raised, prepared to strike. My breathing picks up and my muscles tense, ready to swing... when out of the trees steps Lachlan, hair mussed and mud smeared across his face. He doesn't look happy, but neither would you if you spent three days stuck in a cave.

"Lachy? What are you doing out here?" He shuffles forward with his head tilted back, his jaw clenched in anger. What could have happened out there that pissed him off so much? "Hey, Lachlan?" His eyes widen like he just realized I was here, and he makes this... horrible smile. It's almost like he's baring his teeth like his filthy Zubat. He begins walking toward me quickly with his arms flexed awkwardly at his sides, like he wants to grab me if I try to escape.

I turn to make a run for it and nearly knock myself out with a tree branch, quickly darting between the trees to try to make it back to Spawn and away from this zombified Lachlan in his blood-stained armour. I scale up the ladder on the side of Nooch's miniature casino and pull out my bow to keep the humanoid with the empty blue-red eyes away. I aim for the throat, the only spot not covered in scratched silver armour. One shot barely fazes him, two shots make him growl in anger, three shots send him falling backward in pain. With one final arrow, his writhing body falls limp on the ground, a pool of dark blood growing around the massive hole in his neck. Even after everything he's been through, he's still wearing that awful iron armour he made when he first joined this server. Typical Lachy.

A sharp pain in my ear nearly sends me tumbling off of the side of the building and I clutch onto the railing for dear life. Lachlan's homely little midnight blue Zubat titters at me as it flies away from the side of my head, its stomach covered in dark, wet blood. I hold my hand up to my ear to see that it is bleeding profusely.

"Lachlan and his motherfucking bats. He's going to kill us all someday." He's going to hear all about this when he respawns tomorrow, you can bet on it. I repack my bow and slide my sword out of its sheath, swatting at the obnoxious Zubat as I walk past Lachlan's mutilated corpse. The nasty little flying rat is clinging to its dead master's armour, its tiny claws clicking along the cheap iron chestplate. Its head follows me as I walk out of the clearing toward my house, its purple tongue lapping up the poisoned blood leaking out of the humanoid's ragged neck. "Ten out of ten rabid rodents. Ten outta ten, mate."