(*waves*) Hey. Here's something that I've been working on for quite a long time. I love Minecraft: Story Mode and I love The Last of Us, so when this concept danced its way into my mind, how could I not run with it and see what I could come up with?

This first chapter was...surprisingly difficult to write. That said, I am happy to get it out there (uh..again ;-;) and I hold out hope that some of you guys do like it, so here goes nothing.

Fic-ward, ho!


They'd been married five years ago, in early Spring. The sky had been blue with whitish tints that day, endless and perfect, and it wasn't as though either of them had minded the fitful showers of rain one bit. Not when they'd both been so happy.

Happy was something she'd once expected never to feel again. She'd reconciled herself to that fact - or, at least, she'd convinced herself that she had. Happiness, love, peace, comfort...those had been little more than words back then, none of them meant for people like her.

But she didn't have to dwell on that anymore, she reminded herself, gloved hands busy tinkering with the cauldron she'd been leaning over for the past few hours as darkness began to drive off the daylight on the other side of the window. There was really no need to. Not since Ivor had come into her life, anyway.

Speaking of Ivor...

He wasn't quite as proficient at sneaking up on her as he used to be. Or maybe she'd simply grown used to it over the years. Either way, she sensed someone stealing into her little redstone lab and coming up from behind several seconds before a pair of arms wrapped themselves around her.

"You work too hard," a familiar voice reprimanded into her hair.

A grin tugged at Harper's lips. She turned to return the gesture but, upon spotting the flowers clutched in Ivor's hand (each one fresh and flawless with smooth, perfectly formed petals and tied together with braided grass stems), instead settled for rolling her eyes even as she pressed a thankful kiss to his cheek.

Ever since she'd let slip that flowers weren't something she'd seen a lot of while living and working in the mesa, Ivor had taken it upon himself to bring her what seemed to be every colour and variety of bloom he could find. It was for that reason that the little flowerpots that crowded the house's windowsills were always well-stocked with a rainbow of plants.

"I could say the same for you," she countered, feeling his eyes on her back as she walked around him to slip the posy into one of said pots.

Ivor let out a long sigh, the sound low and weary, and leaned back slightly against the workbench. "Touché. The difference being, of course, that I have good reason."

"So have I." Harper gestured towards her current project, another grin crossing her face as Ivor stepped closer to both her and the contraption to take a closer look. "Let me demonstrate."

In one deft, fluid movement, she picked up the bucket of water that had been sitting patiently atop a chest off to the side and emptied it into the cauldron she'd been bending over. A faint mechanical click, a narrow stream of water flowing down from some kind of system in the ceiling into a channel ready to catch it, and the lab door slid open as seamlessly as if by an invisible hand.

"Wow," Ivor muttered, casting his wife an admiring glance in between his close examination of the cauldron. "What a builder."

"Make sure you don't drool on my floor, now," she called wryly over her shoulder without missing a beat, her soft smile a mirror for his own.

(Except that hers was utterly beautiful, of course.)

"That wasn't quite what I meant, though," he continued, smile dropping as he turned his gaze to the opposite wall. "I meant the wave of sickness that's broken out across the centre of the city."

Harper paused in her tracks. "Sickness?" she echoed, eyebrows raised to her hairline. "What sort of sickness?"

"It's nothing you need to worry yourself about," he hastened to assure her, holding up a hand into the space between them. His voice dipped into a slight grumble. "I suspect all it means is that yet again, somebody in town got sick, others ended up infecting themselves by violating the basic rules of common sense, and I have to spend my every waking moment working on potions to fix whatever's going wrong this time."

She slowly tilted her head to the side, looking at him through narrowed eyes for several long moments.

"Be careful doing that," he said in a lighter tone, gently tapping the creases in her forehead with his finger.

The frown melted away and she playfully swatted at his hand with her best mock-stern look, evidently deciding to drop the matter.

He had a point regarding her work ethic; she couldn't lie to herself in that respect. It had always been something like her modus operandi, working and hypothesising and working and testing and working until Ivor threatened to hide or take away her equipment so that she would tear herself away from her lab and get a decent night's rest for once. Not that he would ever have done such a thing, of course; when it came down to it, Ivor was a terrible enabler in a similar sort of way that he was a wonderful partner in every sense of the word.

But she supposed that, in this case, she was indeed done for the night...although only as long as he was too.

If there was one thing they both knew by now, it was that there was no better sort of lullaby to fall asleep to than that of a familiar heartbeat next to your own.


Harper woke up to a dark room, an empty space beside her and a chill in the air.

It shouldn't have been cold on such a mild night. But this was a different sort of cold, the kind that prickled the back of Harper's neck and set tiny shivers chasing each other down the length of her spine.

First things first. She put out a hand, blindly running it over the spot next to her. Cold. Wherever Ivor was, he'd been gone for some time.

Her fingers found the redstone lamp beside the bed and a halo of light illuminated everything in the vicinity, falling softly onto the silver frame of their wedding picture. Five years. Five rollercoaster years that had pulled the both of them through every up and down and finally allowed them to end up where they were now. And that was why she wouldn't change or take back any of it for anything.

Harper bit her lip hard, then came to a decision and swung her legs out of bed. His potions workbench was empty, save for a cauldron half-full of what appeared to be an unfinished, congealed healing potion.

Unless he's been sneaking away to try and work on the sly again...it wouldn't be the first time, she told herself as she traced a finger along the edge of the table, forcing the anxious thrum in her heart to steady itself.

But then why would he, workaholic that he was (not that she was in any position to criticise), leave a potion partly finished even if that were the case? A healing potion, no less? And where in the world was he now?

"Ivor?" she called into the silence, wincing at the way her voice seemed to come out an octave or two higher than usual. The carpet swallowed the sound of her footsteps.

All of the windows she passed were closed, latched firm with the curtains drawn. That might've helped someone else to feel a little safer. But it made Harper's lips tighten, her body subconsciously arranging itself into what she still privately considered her 'battle stance', even if it had been a long time since such a stance had been necessary.

And it was for one single reason: namely, that they had never, not once during all the weeks and months and years they'd called this house home, had every window shut all at the same time. Ivor knew that Harper liked it when cool breezes drifted in (especially after spending so long trapped in the suffocating heat of the mesa) and she knew that, for all his griping about rain and insects getting in and possibly contaminating his potions, the man would never deny her anything that made her a little happier.

SMASH!

Something shot straight through the nearest window, instantly reducing it to sharp fragments. Harper jerked back instinctively, stumbling over an uneven patch of carpet, arms raising to ward off the threat.

...which turned out to be a wild-eyed green blur scrambling to its feet.

Harper's flinch fell into a scowl and she let her arms drop, irritated with both herself and- "Magnus, what do you think you're doing?"

"Where's Ivor?" he demanded, almost cutting her off. His head whipped from side to side as if he thought Ivor could be hiding in a corner or behind a curtain somewhere.

Harper could almost have snorted. "Took the words right out of my mouth," she replied dryly, running her hands through her hair.

Magnus rolled his eyes behind his mask and thrust his arms out, gesturing uselessly with his gloved hands. "Somethin'...bad's goin' on," he stated with a low growl in his voice, apparently under the impression that this constituted a decent explanation.

As though on cue, a distant scream rent the air and sent ice through the very marrow of Harper's bones. And at almost exactly the same moment, the front door slammed open and Ivor all but fell over the threshold, face terribly pale.

"Ivor? Where have you been?"

At the sound of his wife's tense voice, Ivor whipped around and pushed Magnus aside to cup Harper's face in his hands, eyes scanning her with a frantic rapidity. "Are you all right? Nobody's come in here, have they?"

"Not unless you count Magnus diving in through the window," Harper deadpanned, examining him almost as closely as he was scrutinising her (and absent-mindedly leaning into his touch as she did so).

"Don't wanna interrupt or anything," Magnus drawled, "but ya have any idea what's goin' on out there?" He jerked his head towards the tightly-shut windows (well, except for the one with a glaringly obvious griefer-shaped hole in its pane), eyes peering out into the night.

Harper looked at Ivor, but he was following Magnus's gaze. "I have some notion," he muttered, the words steeped in sarcasm. He tried to shove Harper behind him, but she pulled herself free of his grip and instead made him face her.

"What is going on?"

Ivor finally met her eyes. But somehow she got the impression that he wasn't really seeing her at all. "That sickness...it's worse than I thought. It's spreading," he told her, the words spilling into one another. "And it's doing things to people. Things I've never seen before. It's like they're being eaten alive, from the inside out. The people in the city who weren't...sick were supposed to stay in their homes until further notice. But of course they wouldn't listen."

Something frigid stole through Harper's chest. She shook her head as hard as she could muster in an attempt to dispel the nightmarish mental images painting themselves around Ivor's words. "So..." she got out, before taking a deep, steadying breath and continuing with more strength. "How do we- what does that mean?"

"What it means," Magnus cut in from where he was standing with one hand tight around the doorknob, "is that we gotta get the Hell outta here. Now."

He glanced from Ivor, who was staring directly ahead with his jaw set, to Harper, her muscles tensing in anticipation, then graced them with a single nod before throwing the door open.

"Go, go, go, go!"

And they ran. Tripping over each other even as they tried to push and tug one another along. Seeing and hearing the turmoil assaulting their senses yet not really taking it in, whether they were unable to process it or simply refused to.

People running and screaming in all directions like they could outstrip Death itself. Primal instincts manifesting themselves as bodies rammed and lunged at and grappled with one another in their attempts to get themselves to safety. Random belongings, the relics of broken lives, strewn all over the ground. Children stumbling along with drowning eyes and pets or younger siblings or bundles of worldly goods nestled in their arms. Incomprehensible cries, far-off explosions, a tempest of footsteps, the hiss of flames blazing amongst ruins, the shouted names of missing relatives all rising and falling and intermingling into some twisted version of a symphony that battered the air and the mind.

"Heard the guards are tryna block up the roads. Guess they think that'll stop it from spreading," Magnus explained between ragged bursts of breath. "First they said that it was just the people out in the city gettin' sick, now they're goin' on about Redstonia and Champion City being torn apart by whatever-the-Hell-this-is too...God forbid they actually tell us anything, though," he added under his breath, rubbing at his temples.

"Did they say how many people are-" Harper's voice caught just a little on the last word. "-sick?"

Ivor reached out and threaded his fingers through hers. "Enough. No, too many," was all he said, bestowing a tight squeeze upon her hand. "But not us."

Harper didn't reply. But not us. As though they were too quick, too clever for it. That was probably what all those others had deluded themselves into believing too. And look at how well that was turning out.

Then again, she supposed that nobody ever really thought anything like this could actually happen. Everything they thought they knew, collapsing in on itself in the blink of an eye. In a snap of the fingers. She certainly hadn't.

Stupid of her. Hadn't she already lost everything once before?

Don't borrow any more more trouble than you've already got, Harper. If there was ever a time when you should not tempt fate, it's now.

Quite suddenly, there was more clutching at Ivor's throat than simply fear.

Hands. Mottled purple-grey skin peeling in numerous places, flakes the size of postcards hanging off like cheap tissue paper. As dead as the dead, dead, dead purple eyes boring into his own with chilling emptiness. What used to be its mouth stretched open into a gaping maw, choking out a hellish gagging sound-

A blade swung through the air, slicing the thing's head clean off in a spray of blackish blood.

Ivor staggered backwards, pulling a deathly pale Harper out of the way as it pitched forward into the dirt. Behind the spot where it had just been stood a haggard girl in torn clothes, holding her sword aloft in a white-knuckled grip, chest heaving.

Ivor stared at her wordlessly for a good few seconds, still seeing those soulless purple-tinted eyes, until the ground lurched violently under his feet, jolting him back into reality. "Petra? Where's your father?"

"Can't find him," Petra muttered, her dark eyes darting around, standing out like bruises in her ashen face. Something in it seemed to change, tauten, before she heaved a shuddery breath. "You guys go on. I'll stay here and do whatever I can."

"Petra." Harper grabbed the girl's shoulders as though she could shake some sense into her. "I'm sorry, but this is beyond our help right now. And we're definitely not gonna be helping anyone, least of all your dad, if we let you get yourself killed out there."

Petra roughly shook her off. "This is just something I have to do. Go ahead. I'll meet up with you on the other side, I swear I will. And I'll bring my dad with me. He'll know what to do. He always does." Her voice was thick with a strained conviction. Desperate to believe her own words.

Magnus threw his hands up. "Hell, let her stay if she wants to stay! Let someone else burst her bubble!"

"What? No-" Harper reached for Petra's arm again, fully intent on dragging the kid along with them if she had to, but Petra recoiled like she'd been burned, jerking herself free and darting out of reach, taking off in the direction Harper, Ivor and Magnus had just come from without looking back.

Ivor's lip curled. "Such bravery." He shook his head as Petra's red hair vanished into the chaos. "Of course, there's often a very fine line between bravery and stupidity. And she's just crossed it."

Harper gazed at the spot where the girl had disappeared as though struggling to register it, opening her mouth to speak - but whatever she was about to say was lost beneath another explosion, this one close enough to jar every nerve in her body. Another layer of screams rang out, their owners hurling themselves to the ground and covering their heads, entire walls caving in, Magnus shoving both Ivor and Harper forward, the three of them barely making it out of the path of the smoking debris raining down behind them.

Harper's throat constricted, but she forced herself to keep on running ever faster even as she twisted to look back over her shoulder, heart all but throwing itself against her ribs. "If something happens to her...not only would Gabriel never forgive us, I'd never forgive us."

"You heard her, Harper. It'd be a waste of time to try and convince her." Ivor's words came out clipped. "And time is exactly what we don't have."

Harper shook her own head, jaw clenching. "Fine. But if she doesn't meet us there, I'm going back to look for her," she said in that tone Ivor had long since learned not to argue with.

Ivor closed his eyes briefly, releasing a long-overdue sigh through his teeth. "Let's get ourselves there in one piece before anything, shall we?"

The buildings (or, in many cases, what was left of them) were beginning to peter out, instead being replaced by clusters of trees glowering down at the three of them, their shadows drawing long figures upon the ground. The upheaval was growing fainter now, more muffled. But it still lingered in the air, reverberating in their ears, prickling deep in their skin. All the strangers' faces they'd felt that they recognised simply by the expressions that had ranged from utterly distraught to hauntingly emotionless, tattooed upon every swathe of darkness.

That wasn't what made them stumble to a halt, though.

"Stop right there."

A lone figure had materialised in a clearing a little off to the side, his pallid face (the only part of him that was really visible, as his dark suit made him seem almost a part of the night) coldly expressionless, seemingly indifferent to the tumult still being borne towards them on the wind. In his gloved hand was a single torch, its flame reflecting oddly off the dull gold monocle-like device that covered one eye.

"Nobody comes in. Nobody goes out. I suggest you turn around and go right back to where you came from."

Magnus bristled, moving to the side in an attempt to shield Ivor and Harper despite being quite a bit shorter than either of them. "Listen, buddy, we've just been through Hell!"

"Magnus," hissed Ivor, arm curled protectively around Harper's side. "Shut up and just think for a second, will you?" And he nodded towards the block of TNT sitting on the ground in front of the deeply hostile-seeming guard. Just waiting for a spark.

After a few seconds' hesitation, Harper stepped stiffly forward as much as she dared, trembling hands half-raised in what she fervently hoped was a gesture empty of any sort of threat. "Look, we're not...sick. None of us. You can clearly see that. All we need is-"

But the guard cut her off, not acknowledging anything any of them had said. "It's my duty to bring order to all these...poor, chaotic individuals." His face was a blank mask. Yet his eye blazed with something almost demonic. "And when that order is threatened...I eliminate the threat."

He opened the fist of his other hand to reveal a flint and steel gleaming like a silver bullet under the torchlight.

And Ivor knew what was going to happen an instant before it did. After all, even though some people were sworn to protect the world and everything in it, they were almost always the ones with all the power. The ones who understood what caused pain.

His intent was to throw himself to the side whilst gripping Harper in one arm and catching Magnus in the chest with the other, effectively hurling them all out of harm's way. He barely managed to fling his arms out before the clearing erupted all around them in a flash of light.

Ears ringing. A faintly metallic taste somewhere in his mouth. Head splitting along some invisible seam. Something warm and red trickling down his face and dripping steadily onto his neck.

Dull footsteps. Rough hands hauling him to his feet. And then Ivor was face to face with Magnus.

He was quick to shake off the shock and find his voice, gripping the griefer's shoulders emphatically. "Are all of the ways in and out guarded? There has to be one somewhere that...that isn't..."

The words died on his tongue. Magnus's wide eyes were fixed on something out of Ivor's line of sight and something in his friend's expression made Ivor's blood run ice cold.

Time stilled for one eternal moment until Ivor turned around to look behind him.

And barely managed to catch Harper before her blood-splattered form fell to the ground.


It's like the worst kind of betrayal, the ultimate breach of faith, isn't it? The cold hard fact that forever is never quite as long as you think. The feeling of all your thoughts and ideas of having all the time in the world being ripped away from you. The sudden forced realisation that in the end, nobody really ever gets long enough.

And you can hold them in your arms as tightly as if you could keep them hanging onto life and yourself from falling into the chasm opening up beneath you that way, you can whisper "stay with me" and mutter all sorts of stupid useless lies like "you're going to be fine" while every fibre of your being is crying that they have to be fine, because this isn't right, this isn't fair, their life should be measured in decades, not moments, never moments, moments that are slipping through your fingers even as you hold and whisper and mutter...

All the while, something inside you will still tear and bleed with the knowledge that there's nothing you can do.

Nothing except watch as she tried to form speech and only managed to hack a series of deep, wet, bloody coughs. As the light began to fracture in her eyes, the tenuous grip her hand had on his own (slick with his futile attempts at staunching her wounds) slackening before sliding away altogether.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Five.

Six.

Nothing. No heartbeat next to his.

Six breaths.

Later, it always seemed much longer and much shorter – because of course Ivor clung on to the memories almost as desperately as he wanted to bury them.

They were all that remained.


...I have nothing to say for myself here, except that it pained me to do that. Sadly, as much as I love Harper, it simply to be. I'm sincerely sorry if it upset any of you. But...if you didn't check the rating before clicking, then...well, let this be a warning that although I do intend for this story to have a not-terrible ending eventually, there is quite a lot of bad stuff coming for some of our favourite blocky people.

Oh, also, many thanks to Toni for providing this story with a very nice cover image :)

(*tiredly tips hat*)

~ Rainy