MCSM: Petra's Escape [COMPLETED]

Gone Wrong

After Jesse went through the portal, only two thoughts remained in Petra's mind: help other people escape, and stay alive.

It wasn't easy. The Wither Storm seemed determined to kill specifically  her. She managed to evade the swirling tentacles and tractor beams only because there were so many other people for it to go after. Petra wasn't able to save everyone, but she did her best.

She wasn't sure how long she had been fighting when she decided that all of the survivors were out of the temple. It wasn't until later, when the Wither Storm had moved on, did her other thoughts come back. It wasn't until later, when she had snuck away from the confusion of the crowd, did she think about her friends.

Axel and Olivia had jumped through the Nether portal first, and Jesse had stayed to help. Lukas had apparently been too afraid to go through the portal, or even to move. Typical. Lukas was a great guy, but he was practically useless in a fight.

Petra immediately scolded herself for thinking about Lukas that way. He wasn't completely useless, he just...got scared easily. And it wasn't his fault this time. The Wither Storm was horrifying. She hated to admit it, but when that thing  started rising above EnderCon, she had been almost paralyzed with fear. Only pure instinct had driven her to run and keep running.

Last she had seen, one of the Wither Storm's...(what were they? Arms? Tentacles?) had knocked Jesse and Lukas through the portal. Now that she had time to think about it, she hoped they were okay. The Nether was a dangerous place, full of lava and horrible monsters. She had been there a number of times, and knew her way around, but all four of them were completely inexperienced.

And now that she thought back to the battle...they might have to deal with Ivor, too. She could've sworn she had seen him running towards the portal, but she could be wrong. There had been so much going on at once.

The portal had destabilized shortly after she thought Ivor had gone through, destroying any chance of going through and catching up with her friends. She hoped once more that they were all alive.

Petra leaned against a tree and sat down. She didn't know how far she had run, just knew that Gabriel's temple was far, far behind her. Hopefully most of the people there had the same idea and abandoned the temple.

Who knows what the Wither Storm was doing now. Gabriel had said the temple was made entirely of obsidian, so the Wither Storm couldn't destroy it. Maybe it had gone back to annihilating EnderCon. It wouldn't go further, would it? Would it...destroy everyone's homes? Her home? Petra pushed this devastating thought away.

She had to stay strong, at least for now.

Eventually, her heartbeat stopped racing, and her breathing returned to normal. She didn't know how long she had been running, and at the time, didn't care. She was in a birch forest biome, and could no longer hear the screams of panic or the Wither Storm's roars.

She was alone with her own thoughts.

Her thoughts currently consisted of everything that had just happened: making the trade with Ivor, running all over EnderCon looking for him, accidentally finding the ingredients for the Wither, Ivor unleashing the Wither, it destroying EnderCon and becoming a Wither Storm, running to the temple, being pulled up by the Wither Storm's tractor beam, being saved by Jesse, fighting for her own and everyone else's lives, and running, running as hard as she could, far, far away.

And of course, the emotions that came with the memories. confidence
anger
fear
worry
more anger
more fear
gratitude
and exhaustion.
All of these thoughts and feelings jumbled into one big mess.

And on top of it all, a nice big serving of guilt.

Petra hadn't mentioned the sinking feeling she had felt when she first saw the three Wither skulls in the chest. It was her fault that Ivor had been able to make the Wither. If she had never given it to him...

He never could have made the Wither Storm.

EnderCon wouldn't be destroyed.

A great number of people would still be alive.

Her friends wouldn't be braving the perils of the Nether.

Gabriel wouldn't be missing.

She wouldn't be lost.

It was a long list, and thinking through the chain of events made her wince. Where had everything gone wrong?

Her thoughts came around to one topic: Gabriel the Warrior. Where was he? He had been pulled into the Wither Storm's tractor beam, and when Petra had tried to help him, she had gotten caught as well. Luckily, Jesse had gotten her down, but Gabriel had been pulled out of sight. What had happened to him? Was he still alive?

Petra tried to picture the amulet he had given Jesse. "Find the others, and then..." Gabriel said, before he was cut off by the Wither Storm's roars. The other members of the Order, of course. Jesse had seemed confident about the whole, 'reunite the Order' thing, but Petra was skeptical.

Find the other three members of the Order of the Stone, convince all three of them to help them and work together, and then defeat the Wither Storm? HOW?
Petra assumed that the Order had broken up for a reason. She doubted they would want to work together now. From what she knew about them, she guessed they were each living their own private, luxurious lives in some far-flung corners of the world. She knew that Magnus was the king of Explosion City, or whatever it was called. And apparently no one knew where to find Soren. That plan had some obvious holes in it.

And then there was Jesse, of course. Petra had never given her much credit. She had always seemed like a nice, if slightly dorky, girl with weird friends. But the last night had completely changed her mind. She remembered the fight in Gabriel's temple, before Jesse had gone through the portal. Jesse had jumped into the fight immediately, determined to save Gabriel, and Petra later on. She guessed Jesse was a lot braver then she seemed on the outside. Or maybe she had just acted on instinct, leaping into battle without fully thinking.

Kind of like Petra herself.

She closed her eyes and sighed, her thoughts mixing into a tangled mess once more. So much had happened in so little time. So much had gone wrong. Had it really all happened in just that night? It seemed impossible. And yet it had  happened, every horrible part of it.

After a little while, bit by bit, her thoughts stopped whirling, exhaustion overtook her worried mind, and she fell asleep.