Minecraft Story Mode Season 3, Episode 3: Every Rose Has Its Thorns

Part 5: The Uninvited Guest

 Lukas, Petra, Jesse, Jack, Nurm, and Romeo quickly walked in a line to Soren's fortress, making sure to not look into the eyes of the endermen as they travelled through the End.

Lukas- the leader of the line they had formed- stopped in front of the first of many flights of oak wood stairs.

"I remember these stupid stairs. Last time I climbed them I had Wither sickness, and I felt like I was going to pass out. At least now I don't have Wither sickness, so walking up these stairs should wear me down, but be at least bearable. It should feel like I just finished a big workout instead of like I just finished flinging my body at a wall over and over," Petra muttered.

"They're just stairs though, right? We should be able to take them without feeling exhausted," Romeo pointed out.

"Spoken like a person who has never been on these stairs before," Jesse quipped. Her eyes lit up and a smile appeared on her face. "Wait a second... Ro, you can teleport us, right?" Jesse asked. Romeo shook his head.

"Nope, I can't. It's pretty much a guarantee that I'll lose consciousness if I teleport myself and the five of you to the top of those stairs. Teleporting that many people to a place that's a great distance from where we're standing right now, combined with the fact that I'm already a bit tired from sparring... the odds aren't great for me staying conscious, and I bet none of you want to wait ten minutes for me to wake up," Romeo answered. Jack crossed his arms and glared at Romeo.

"If you can't even get us to the top of those stairs, what are you even good for?" Jack grumbled.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I probably should have told you ahead of time that my only contribution to this group is being eye candy," Romeo said sarcastically. He rolled his eyes. "Honestly, I've saved Jesse from serious injury, stopped the Blaze Rods from stealing items from Jesse's treasure room, uncovered the details behind the Ravena siblings' disappearance, helped fight off an army of cave spiders twice, killed some ghasts that were attacking a party, deciphered part of the clues we've been receiving, single handedly taken down Maya and Gill... And you're asking what I'm good for?" Romeo snapped.

Jack was silent and his expression was hard to read. Romeo couldn't tell if Jack was angry, pensive, shocked, impressed, or nervous... but Jack's expression definitely contained one or more of those possible options.

"You've really saved Jesse?" Jack questioned.

"Yeah. He did," Jesse confirmed.

"Well, Admin... you got one of my friends killed and then saved another," Jack said. A hopeful smile appeared on Romeo's face.

"So... you think I'm okay?" Romeo asked. Jack rolled his eyes and Romeo's smile vanished.

"No, I still don't like you... but I don't despise you and I guess you're somewhat helpful," Jack muttered.

"Well, there's some progress at least," Romeo thought.

"We should start heading up the stairs. Hit the Target could be planning his next move right now," Lukas said. Romeo ran up the first flight of stairs.

"Ro... you don't need to run. This isn't a race," Jesse insisted. Romeo stopped moving, turned around to face Jesse, and smiled.

"But it could be!" Romeo answered.

"Suit yourself. If you like to be so tired that it feels like you've been hit by five minecarts, which makes you completely defenseless against anyone that might attack us, go ahead," Petra quipped. Romeo winced and let out a sigh.

"Yeah, you have a point. I should save my energy," Romeo agreed.

Jesse, Jack, Nurm, Petra, Lukas, and Romeo began to walk up the stairs.

After what seemed like an endless amount of walking, they arrived at a fairly long wooden ladder that led up to a pair of oak wood trapdoors.

Romeo massaged his legs in an attempt to ease their agonizing throbbing. He hadn't been this sore in a long time, due to his powers giving him invulnerability, and it was a rude awakening. Overexertion was a lot worse than he remembered.

"Even without Wither sickness, these stairs are still freaking terrible. My legs are in so much pain right now," Petra groaned.

"Same here. Soren really needs to give people a less tiring way to get to his fortress," Lukas added.

"Yeah, because those stairs are basically a torture device for your legs," Jesse replied. Romeo felt that she was absolutely right, and he could have forced misbehaving prisoners at the Sunshine Institute to walk up and down a very long staircase as a punishment, but he decided to keep that thought to himself. "So how was your first experience of extreme pain since losing your powers, Ro?" Jesse asked.

"Terrible. I hate it. I wish I could go back to being invulnerable," Romeo complained. Lukas climbed the wooden ladder, opened the trapdoor, and pulled himself up into the room above the trapdoor. Jesse, Petra, Romeo, Jack, and Nurm followed him and they, too, pulled themselves up into the room above the trapdoor.

The room above the trapdoor was a forest that was made completely out of wool- except for the river, which was water, and the sun, which was made of glowstone.

Romeo looked up at the light blue wool sky and the white wool clouds.

"Here we are... welcome to Soren's artificial happyland," Lukas declared. Jack had a wide grin on his face.

"Soren is an amazing builder and he's the leader of the original Order of the Stone... it doesn't get much better than that! Nurm, I can't believe I'm standing in a room that a member of the Order of the Stone built!" Jack gushed.

Nurm replied in villagerese and his tone was gentle.

"Thanks Nurm. I'm glad that I got the chance to be here too," Jack said.

Jesse heard the plushy crunching sound of someone walking on wool.

"Did- did you guys hear that?" Jesse stammered. Lukas raised an eyebrow.

"Hear what?" Lukas asked.

"I heard footsteps while all of us were standing still. We're not alone," Jesse explained. Romeo pulled a diamond sword out of his inventory, knowing there was a possibility that he'd have to fight the intruder.

"Great. Let's hope it's just Soren and not someone who wants to kill us," Petra muttered. She unsheathed Miss Butter, her golden sword. Jesse and Jack grabbed their diamond swords as Lukas readied his bow and arrows.

Jack saw a shadowy figure sneaking around Soren's wool land. His eyes widened and he pointed at the figure.

"He's over there!" Jack whispered. The shadowy figure stealthily moved to one of the wool trees and hid behind it.

Jesse, Jack, Nurm, Petra, Lukas, and Romeo walked to the wool tree that they had seen the intruder hide behind. They crept around the side of the tree and Jesse pointed her sword at the intruder before she even looked to see who the intruder was.

But when she finally got a good look at the intruder, she was shocked by his identity.

The intruder had brown hair and dark yellowish green eyes. He wore black jeans, an unzipped black long sleeved jacket with two crossed blaze rods on the back, a green shirt, and brown shoes.

Without a doubt, the mysterious intruder was Aiden.

Aiden's expression was one of fear and panic as he held his hands up in surrender.

"No! Wait! Please don't hurt me! I can explain!" Aiden cried out.