Return of the Ender Dragon Read online

  “No, we need a miracle,” Yancy said.

  “We need Steve Alexander.” I didn’t realize the words were out of my mouth until I saw everyone was looking at me. My voice sounded as low and depressed as I felt. “He would come up with something clever.”

  “Stevie, Steve Alexander is gone.” This was Maison’s mom talking. Her eyes were red from trying not to cry, and I could tell she wanted nothing more than to run after the Ender Dragon until she caught up and got her daughter back. “I don’t know much about your world, but I know enough that’s been passed down in my family, ever since Maya lived. You can’t always look to other people to get you out of bad situations. You have to find your own courage.”

  “She’s right,” Dad said.

  Ossie the cat slunk slowly over to us, glancing around. She looked as startled as the rest of us. Destiny picked her up and held her close.

  “There’s something else that bothers me,” Yancy said. “What did she mean when she said, ‘Stevie, you know where to find me’? Stevie, do you have any idea? Uh, Stevie?”

  I was only half-listening because something had distracted me. At first I thought I heard the sound of a strange new monster. As the sound grew louder, I recognized it, and it wasn’t anything like the sound a monster would make.

  In the purple mist, framed by the black of the twisted trees, I saw the outline of a dog, its eyes shining in my direction. The dog raised its head and bayed toward the sky.

  I know that dog, I thought in the back of my mind. And I began to follow it.

  CHAPTER 4

  I was in a trance, like when steve alexander helped me during our clash in the ocean monument, two missions ago. The dark forest fell behind me like a backdrop, and all I could think about was this dog.

  When the dog saw me coming, he turned and trotted in the other direction. His white fur looked slightly pink in all the purple lighting, and his red collar jangled as he moved.

  While I walked, I uncovered more and more images of the End. Through the fog I saw violet-colored purpur blocks and white islands. This must be what the Ender Dragon meant when she said that the veil between the realms had been torn. No, they weren’t one and the same. But here I was stepping over a piece of purpur block that had appeared in the mist or turning my head to see a purple skyscraper jutting over the trees.

  “Stevie!” I heard Dad call. “Come back!”

  I heard Yancy shout, “Stevie, it’s not time to go into one of your little sleepwalking modes! You’re scaring us!”

  Oh, I wasn’t sleepwalking. Even though I didn’t feel quite there, I was totally awake.

  Every once in a while the dog glanced back over his shoulder to make sure I was still following him. He was leading me deeper into the End, into more and more purple. At this point we shouldn’t have been far from my home, but I didn’t recognize anything I was seeing.

  “It’s an End city!” I heard Destiny exclaim as they passed by the purple skyscraper too.

  “An End city?” repeated Maison’s mom. “I don’t think I like the sound of that.”

  I heard Yancy explain, “In the Minecraft game, you can find these big purple cities in the End. So the Ender Dragon must have …”

  I stopped moving. Why was there no more ground right in front of me? I peered over it, and saw nothing but empty blackness underneath. A wave of dizziness hit my head and I pulled back. An End island. This land had been turned into an End island!

  The dog was toward my left, trying to draw me along. He didn’t want me to go to the edge of the island, where nothing awaited me except for a fall down into … into what? Into the void.

  I followed the dog up a little hill. When I got to the top of it, I could look through the haze and see several white islands floating in the distance, looking entrancing and otherworldly. For a second they caught my attention so much I lost my footing.

  “Stevie!” Dad cried as I took a spill.

  I thumped down the little hill, landing on the bottom in a stupor. Ugh. I pulled myself back up and sat there for a second, letting my head stop spinning. The dog licked my hand and a man’s voice breathed in gratitude, “Thank you, Wolf. You brought him.”

  Wolf?

  My head flew back up. The purple was there like a cloud, and in the middle of it was a small prison cell. It glinted in the weak light like silver fangs, trapping a single man inside of it. The man was clutching the bars of the cell, trying to break it.

  “No way,” I gasped.

  Was I dreaming? Was I back in a memory from the enchanted book?

  No. I stood up and walked over to the cell, and the man there was breathing and as real as I was. I looked at his dark hair, his square beard. I remembered that voice.

  “It can’t be you!” I said, the trance breaking. “Steve Alexander!”

  CHAPTER 5

  There was the greatest man the overworld had ever known, locked up behind bars. The others were coming down the hill to join me, calling out my name. As soon as they reached me, I heard their intakes of breath. They couldn’t believe what they were seeing, either. Destiny was still holding Ossie, keeping her safe in her arms.

  “But … but …” I stammered. I didn’t know how to say it nicely, so it just came out bluntly, “How are you still alive?”

  “Stevie!” Dad barked. I knew he wouldn’t like how I said it. Trying to make up for me, Dad quickly said, “Steve Alexander, it is an honor. We’ll get you out of there right away.”

  Dad took his diamond sword and struck the lock of the cell. Nothing! There was a screeching noise and a sputter of sparks, and that was it.

  “No normal sword will work on this,” Steve Alexander said. “She made sure of that.”

  We didn’t need to ask who “she” was. We all knew.

  “Let me try!” Alex gleefully offered, pulling back her arrows. Several arrows hit the lock, one right after another, and they also had no effect. Alex looked outraged. I knew she had wanted to save Steve Alexander herself, so that she could show off.

  “Don’t worry,” Steve Alexander said. “You have the crystal shards. I felt you collect them all …”

  He stopped, seeing our faces. A slow horror went over his own face.

  “How much of the crystal did she get?” he quickly demanded.

  “Just one shard,” I said. “We have the rest.” I hoped that counted for something. Steve Alexander’s face went from horrified to grim, so I guessed it didn’t count for much.

  “Hand me one of the crystal shards,” Steve Alexander said. He tried to reach one hand out of the bars to help. His hand couldn’t quite get out. When the Ender Dragon had trapped him there, she’d made sure to make bars just slightly smaller than his hands.

  Wordlessly, Dad brought out the other crystal shards. Despite all the purple mist around, the purple of the crystals still burned much brighter. He struck the lock and the bars parted, releasing the prisoner.

  I was ready for Steve Alexander to leap courageously out of the cell, prepared to battle. Prepared to take on the Ender Dragon, to rescue Maison, to make everything better. I think my heart dropped when I watched him slowly stumble out, as if he hadn’t used his legs in a long time. His shoulders were a little stooped. He looked exhausted.

  This didn’t look like any sort of a hero. Where was the man who’d valiantly forced the dragon into the End? Where was the brave man in the statues, the hero of the Overworld we’d all been taught about since we were little? This was just an ordinary man, with sloped shoulders and a grimace on his face.

  Alex didn’t feel any of the disappointment I did. As soon as Steve Alexander was out, she and Wolf both jumped on him, Wolf to lick him and Alex to hug him.

  “I knew that mean old dragon couldn’t defeat you!” she said. “We’ll have no problem defeating her today. And we’ll be home in time for dinner!”

  Dad introduced himself and all of us, but Steve Alexander looked lost in thought.

  “Not having the last crystal is very serious,” my
ancestor said, thinking hard. “I thought I sensed something bad happen. Where is the last girl, Maya’s descendant?”

  Maison’s mom let out a long moan.

  Steve Alexander stared at us in horror. “Don’t tell me Jean got her!”

  Jean. That was the Ender Dragon’s old name, back before her betrayal.

  “The dragon said we could have Maison back if we give over the rest of the shards,” Dad said. “I don’t think we have much choice here.”

  “There’s always a choice,” Steve Alexander said. “Hold on, let me think.”

  He turned away from us, his hand to his chin. Something stirred on his back, like feathers.

  “What is that?” I blurted out, confused.

  “Stevie!” Dad snapped. What he meant was: stop talking and let Steve Alexander think!

  Steve Alexander sighed and turned back. “No, it’s all right,” he said. “I owe you some answers before we continue. The reason I’m still alive is very simple: time moves differently in the End and the Overworld. Thousands of years for you was just a few years for me.”

  “Talk about a fountain of youth,” Yancy said dryly. “But I guess it makes sense if time’s different in the End. There’s no day or night there.”

  Just darkness, I thought. And shivered.

  “After I pushed Jean into the End,” Steve Alexander went on, “I knew I was no longer any match for her. I quickly stole away, so that she didn’t know where I was in this new land. Then I journeyed around the End the best I could, given that it’s mostly made up of islands over a void. Eventually, I found a ship and inside of it were a pair of wings.”

  “Those are wings?” I said, amazed. They looked pretty ratty now, as if they could never fly.

  “Yes,” Steve Alexander said. “I call them ‘elytra.’ I began flying around the End, collecting supplies. I even began making a cell to put Jean in. Then one day, it was too late. Jean found me while I was flying, and broke my wings. She laughed at me, saying, ‘You want to fly like a dragon? I’ll clip your wings and send you straight back to the ground.’”

  “And then what?” I cried.

  “She took the cell I’d created, made it smaller and threw me in,” he said. “Then she tossed my toolkit—where I had all the supplies I’d ever made—out into the void. All I could do was sit and wait. Thank goodness I had Wolf here to keep me company. He’s always been a loyal companion.”

  He patted the dog on the head. Wolf’s tongue lolled happily and he barked.

  “Then I sensed Jean beginning to make her plans for escape,” Steve Alexander said. “I could sense Stevie and Alex at first, and then I could sense Maya’s descendant. Next I began to sense that they’d brought friends from Earth to help them.” He nodded toward Yancy and Destiny in acknowledgment. “I knew it would fall to them to stop her. I tried to speak out whenever I could, but Jean kept me under close watch much of the time.”

  “It’s okay now, though!” I said quickly. “We have most of the crystal shards, and we have you!” Tired or not, I had no doubt that Steve Alexander was just what we needed!

  Out of the darkness behind us, I heard familiar voices shouting, “Help! Help! Is anyone out there?”

  CHAPTER 6

  We all ran toward the voices, even Steve Alexander. I saw he was starting to get his footing back. Maybe he just needed more time moving around to get like normal again.

  On top of the hill I saw two figures stumbling through the violet mists. Their steps were so unsteady it made me think I was looking at zombies. But then I heard the voice shout, “Help! Help!” again.

  It was the village blacksmith, along with the village librarian. What were they doing all the way out here?

  “Blacksmith! Librarian!” Dad called. “We’re over here!”

  “Thank goodness we found you, Steve!” exclaimed the blacksmith. Both men began stumbling closer toward us. “The village is … the village is …”

  He choked on the words as if he couldn’t bring himself to say them. Dad was next to them in an instant, demanding, “What about the village? Are you hurt?”

  “No, not hurt,” the blacksmith gasped. “We managed to get away. All those storms started whipping up earlier, and then …”

  “A dark shadow fell over the whole village!” the librarian burst out. “And a dragon flew over it!”

  “We were overrun,” the blacksmith said. “Monsters came out of all corners of the Overworld. Mostly it was Endermen and armed skeletons, but there were zombies and creepers too! The armored skeletons surrounded the village like a siege, so that no one could get in or out. And then the Endermen started moving from house to house. Every household was given two choices: bow to the dragon, or become an Enderman.”

  “No!” I exclaimed.

  “What do you mean, given two choices?” Dad asked. “Endermen can’t talk!”

  “They can’t,” the blacksmith agreed. “But she can.” He pointed toward the sky. He didn’t have to say another word.

  “We could hear her voice in our heads!” the librarian said, shuddering. “She said the same thing was happening to every village in the Overworld!”

  “What did the people do?” Dad wanted to know.

  “At first, they tried to fight,” the blacksmith said. “It didn’t take them long to see it did no good. A few tried to make an escape and were caught by the armed skeletons. They were immediately handed over to the Endermen for transformation. Then the people began refusing, thinking this could stall time. It didn’t. They were immediately transformed into Endermen too. Finally some people started falling to their knees and singing praises of the dragon. They were given weapons.”

  “I knew it!” Yancy said darkly. “She’s saving Maison for us, but she’s just going to treat us all the same in the end!”

  “How did you escape?” Dad asked.

  “The only way we knew how,” the blacksmith said. “We went into some mines and tunneled our way out of the village. When we were beyond the village gates, we dug back to the surface and went running for you. Then we got lost in this fog …”

  “It’s even worse than I feared,” said a voice from behind us. Steve Alexander stepped forward, his head down. “Even with that one crystal shard, it’s raised her power immensely. It won’t take her very long to transform every citizen of the Overworld into an Enderman or a mindless servant.”

  “Either way, it’s the same results,” Yancy remarked bitterly. “Servitude to the Ender Dragon.”

  “We have to seek her out,” Steve Alexander said, pacing angrily. “We have to put a stop to this.”

  I bit my tongue, a sour feeling of guilt spreading all over me. If only we had taken better care of all the crystals, we wouldn’t be in this mess!

  “Don’t worry about us!” came a bright voice. It was Alex of course, beaming and holding her arrows. “We’re the Overworld Heroes task force. We were made to stop the dragon.”

  “I have no weapons,” Steve Alexander began. “And there isn’t time for me to make more.”

  “Take this,” said the blacksmith, handing over a diamond sword. “I got it away from a man who promised to follow the dragon. I didn’t think he deserved it …”

  “Thank you,” Steve Alexander said, taking back the sword. Was that a little smile on his face? “It’s good to know that diamond swords are still in use.” I knew he was thinking about the fact he’d invented them. I wondered how different the world must be if you’ve been away from it for thousands of years, and what would stick out to you.

  “If the Ender Dragon is going after villages, that should mean people in the countryside are relatively safe … for now,” Dad said to the blacksmith and the librarian. “You should try to find others in the countryside and see if you can take back any of the villages.”

  “But what about you?” the blacksmith cried.

  Steve Alexander held his new diamond sword up to the sky and watched how it glinted, even in this bad lighting. “What about us?” he said. “We�
�re going dragon hunting.”

  CHAPTER 7

  We left the blacksmith and librarian behind, going deeper into the purple fog, out past where Steve Alexander had been locked up. I walked behind him, totally in awe. Yes, he was definitely getting his footing back, and the more he walked, the more I could see the hero of centuries ago. We came to the end of a white island and Steve Alexander knelt down and studied below it.

  “I think I know where she went,” he said. “During our time in here, she collected her own set of Ender crystals. She didn’t use them to make a weapon. Instead, she used their natural healing abilities and she set them all up on another island, so that she can sit in the middle of the crystals.”

  “That’s just like in the game!” Yancy said. “You have to take out all those health crystals before you can finish the Ender Dragon.”

  “Game?” Steve Alexander repeated, confused.

  “Never mind him,” Dad quickly said. He found Yancy calling our world “a game” to be offensive, and he probably figured Steve Alexander did too. Standing in front of a living legend, I think we all wanted to be careful how we came across to him. You didn’t want to look stupid in front of someone like Steve Alexander.

  “No, explain it to me,” Steve Alexander said, turning to Yancy and Destiny. “I recognize you as being people from Earth, but your clothing and mannerisms are strange to me.”

  “Well, times have changed since you were last at Earth,” Yancy said. “You missed some things, like, oh, the printing press, electricity, the Internet … yeah, okay, so you’ve missed a lot of things.”

  “Are any of these things weapons?” Steve Alexander asked.

  “I … guess they could be used as weapons,” Yancy said, thinking over it. “But none of them were meant to be used as weapons. Here.” He took out his phone and showed it to Steve Alexander.

  Steve Alexander turned the phone this way and that, fascinated. “How does it work?”

  “It lets you talk to people miles away!” Yancy answered. “It lets you email people, text people, play games like Minecraft. Lots of people know about your world now, only they don’t know it’s a real world, and they think it’s a game. That’s what I was talking about earlier. They’re always coming out with new phones to make life better and easier!”