The next morning, I woke to the smell of…well, you know. But I didn’t care. Summer was right about getting used to the fireplace. And besides, there was so much wonderfulness to wake up to: the crackling fire, the flicker it cast on the wood walls, the memories of yesterday, and the anticipation of seeing the rest of Summer’s mountain today.

I sprang out of bed with the speed of a dog about to go for a walk. I threw on my armor, opened my guest room door, and trotted down the hallway to the double doors. There was no way I could have imagined anything close to what my eyes took in the moment those dark wood partitions parted.

“Whoa.”

How do I describe that underground palace? How do I even begin?

I guess it makes sense to just start at the sheer size of the hollowed-out room (because I learned later that Summer had, in fact, picked it out from solid rock!). Two dozen blocks—twenty-four!—across and high! A quarter, or maybe a third of the entire mountain was this one single cavern.

And at its center was another hot tub! No, hot pool! At least three times as large, and surrounded on all sides by irrigated rows of crops. Wheat, carrots, potatoes, watermelons, pumpkins, and some other root crop I didn’t recognize at first, but that Summer told me later were beets. And behind them, on the four corners of this indoor farm, trees! Oak trees!

I didn’t kill the last ones! I thought, feeling suddenly absolved of the eco-disaster I’d committed on my island. And this beautiful, impossible grove, growing tall and healthy by nothing more than torchlight, was just the beginning of what continued to take my breath away.

Hundreds of torches lined the smooth, gray stone walls, broken by at least a dozen doors per floor. That’s right, there were two floors. This room had two stories to it, the second one ringed by a railed, wraparound oak balcony.

How to get up there? There wasn’t any staircase or ladder.

I called “Summer!” but didn’t get a response. She had to be behind one of those doors, maybe sleeping or having breakfast.

Will this world let me knock? What if I barged in on her in the middle of a steam shower?

Steam shower.

The thought almost sent me back to my guest room for a quick, heavenly soak. But why bother when this Olympic-sized pool was right in front of me.

It looked so inviting, so absolutely decadent. If only I could dive in from way up on the balcony. But for right now, a running jump would have to do.

She won’t mind, I reasoned, backing up a few steps. A quick dip should give her more time to finish whatever she’s doing. I took a deep breath, lined up my leap, then sprinted forward.

“STOP!”

Summer’s voice, freezing me in place like in a cartoon. One more advantage to the whacked-out physics of this world: no momentum.

Stone still, my feet barely a mini-cube from the edge, I looked up to see Summer calling down from the railing. “Bad idea.”

Looking down, I saw why. The pool’s bottom wasn’t standard glass-covered lava. This surface had dark brownish splotches within brighter, glowing veins that shifted from dull yellow to muted orange. And above it all, the water. Not just steaming, but literally boiling, a pond of angry bubbles popping right below my face.

“Magma blocks,” said Summer. “Very common down in the Nether.”

There was that word again: Nether.

“Be right down,” she called, and disappeared behind one of the upper doors.

Three seconds later she was bounding out one of the lower doors toward me. “The boiling water does wonders to humidify the air, but you wouldn’t want to walk on them, trust me. And walking is all you can do, because the bubbles won’t let you swim.”

She glanced past me at what was essentially a giant cooking pot. “Can’t imagine a more dreadful way to go.”

I was about to ask her about the Nether, this mysterious place of “magma blocks” and “netherrack,” when her eyes darted past me again, up this time, to a clock on the far wall.

“You’re just in time.” And trotting past me to another door, she added, “Fancy a leg of mutton?”

“Mutton?” Another new word.

“I know,” she chuckled, “it sounds a little heavy for breakfast, but I think I remember having sheep for breakfast occasionally.”

Sheep?

Uh-oh.

“Yeah, well…” I hemmed, feeling a nervous sweat break out above my eyes.

Yes, I’d eaten the rabbit stew last night, and yes, I’d saved wolf-killed sheep meat in my pack for emergencies. But this wasn’t an emergency, and, honestly, even if it had been, could I eat something I’d just come to consider a friend?

Okay, judge if you want to. I guess if you’re into absolutes this does sound a little wishy-washy. But, at least for me, eating a rabbit that I’d never bonded with seemed a world apart from eating a sheep I’d fed, talked to, and had actually risked my own life to protect.

I couldn’t do it. But could I refuse her generosity?

“I’m sorry I don’t have any on hand,” Summer continued, “which is why I was out hunting when we met.”

Hunting?! She wanted me to go hunting?! For sheep?!

“Here we go.” I watched her pull four bushels of wheat from a chest. “To replenish the members of the flock we take.”

Think fast! Redirect!

“No need,” I stammered, fumbling for the remains in my pack. “I’ve totally got some mutton if you want it.”

“Oh brill,” Summer chirped as I handed her the meat-wrapped bones. “Thank you, Guy.”

One bullet dodged. One to go.

“And,” I nodded, grasping at what she’d just said, “ya know, you’re right about mutton so early in the morning for me.” Bingo!

Just tell her you don’t eat meat, I told myself as she led me into her spacious, ornate kitchen. My internal wrestling faded away at the sight of brick walls, oak floors, ceiling beams made from the trunks of trees that were as unfamiliar as the brown, pod-looking things attached to them. What was familiar were the cakes, several of them, sitting ever-fresh on half-plank shelves between storage chests.

“Won’t be a minute,” she said, and slid the sheep limb into one of the furnaces.

As the flames instantly lit and the room filled with undeniably tempting smells, she asked, “And what can I get for you?”

“Oh, I’m fine,” I said, trying to play it cool. “I’m really not that hungry.”

Grrrp, growled my traitorous stomach.

Two against one!

“You must have something,” insisted Summer. “A baked potato, a loaf of bread, or…”

Reaching back into the chest, she produced a roundish red treasure. “Care for an—”

“Yes, please!”

An apple! How long had it been? How many days, how many meals, how many times had I missed that juicy sweetness?

“Mm…mmm…mmmm!” I crunched on the delicious treat.

“Would you like a moment alone?” Summer asked, giggling at her own joke. I was barely listening. As the taste ran down my throat, it brought up more feelings than I could handle. That first comforting apple on that first, terrifying day. The desperation of burning the seedlings for fuel, the despair and guilt at knowing that I’d destroyed an entire food supply. The wondering if any more apple-bearing oak trees lay anywhere beyond the horizon. And now, this second chance, this brighter future. This snack of hope!

“More?” I groaned, and without asking, without thinking, I pushed past Summer and reached for the open chest.

The lid slammed, and suddenly Summer’s face was right in front of mine. “Oi!” She barked. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s not polite to grab?”

“Sorry,” I said, snapping out of my euphoria.

Fresson three: Friends respect each other’s property.

“I didn’t mean to grab,” I explained. “I just haven’t seen one in a long time.”

“It’s all right,” said Summer, her voice calming to an even pitch. “Just please ask next time before you go snooping.”

“Deal,” I replied, hoping that was the end of it, and it was, because then she opened the chest again and said, “Well, if you’re still hungry…”

What she tossed me next was roundish again, but flat, and brown like bread with darker brown flecks that looked exactly like they smelled.

“Fancy a biscuit?”

I did, but that sure wasn’t a biscuit where I come from. Back in my part of the other world, I’m pretty sure a biscuit was a light, fluffy, salty muffin thing you had with fried chicken. And that wasn’t what she tossed me now.

Sweet and chewy, and filled with gooey nuggets.

A cookie! An honest-to-goodness chocolate chip cookie!

“How?!” was all I could say, savoring every bite.

“Easy,” shrugged Summer, her face rising to the beams above my head, “once you get your hands on some cocoa beans.”

So that’s what those pod-looking things were!

“You have chocolate!” I gasped, and quickly repeated, “How?”

“Farther to the west”—Summer pointed to the wall—“past the forest, and the next tundra, there’s a deep jungle. Massive trees. Tall as mountains. With cocoa pods growing on some of them.”

She reached up, swiped at one of the hanging pods, and caught a collection of brown beans. “They only grow on this type of jungle wood, though,” she explained, refastening some beans back up to the beam, which immediately morphed into a small, light green pod. “I’ll have to take you there sometime,” she added, handing me another cookie and taking one for herself.

“You bet!” I answered, raising my confection to toast hers. “Maybe we’ll make some time to explore it when passing through.”

“Passing through?” Summer suddenly lowered her biscuit.

“Yeah,” I answered before crunching down on the cookie. “You know, when we get going.”

Now the cookie was back in her belt. “Going where?”

“Well,” I began, with growing confusion, “anywhere. Anywhere there’s answers.”

“Answers?”

I suddenly realized that Summer had no idea what I was talking about. And why should she? In the short time we’d known each other, I’d learned a lot more about her story than the other way around.

“Sorry,” I began, “you don’t know my story. I guess we haven’t had time yet. Well, it all started—”

“Tell me while we work,” Summer cut me off. “This morning’s crops need harvesting.”

Which we did, heading into the garden, collecting any ripe wheat, carrots, potatoes, and beets. And in the process, I filled her in on everything I’d been through up until that point. I told her about the island, my challenges and triumphs. And she was a pretty good listener, nodding and “mm-ing” as we gathered her garden’s bounty. Every so often she’d cut in with a question about something I’d done, or a lighthearted, even teasing comment like “Another lesson?” or “It took you that long to figure that bit out?” Again, it was all in fun. Until the story changed to why I left the island.

Okay, at the time, I wondered if it was all in my head, as we took the crops back into the kitchen and organized them into different storage chests. But I could swear that her teasing barbs and listening “mm’s” faded to practically nothing. And when I finally wrapped up my story with “So you see, I came here to answer all the really big questions about this world, and, hopefully, find a way to return to my world…our world. Right?” Summer just looked at me blankly. That was the moment I realized one of the biggest disadvantages about this blocky, limited form: You can’t read someone’s face!

I’d never thought about it until then, never had any reason to. But now, with another person right in front of me, I realized that there’s a whole language of expression that goes far beyond spoken words.

A smile, a frown, even a raised eyebrow. So many ways to complement your speech, or react to someone else’s. I’d never considered that when someone is listening to me, they’re speaking volumes before they even open their mouth. Now it was all gone, and I was staring into a face so flat and unresponsive it was as if I was, literally, talking to a wall.

All except the eyes. At least she told me something with those. But what? What did glancing at the floor mean?

“You wan’em too, right?” I blathered on, my confusion rising. “You wanna answer those same questions and, of course, you wanna get home.”

“Yes,” Summer finally answered after what might have been the briefest of pauses, “yes, of course I’d love to find my way home, I just”—again, a beat—“I haven’t had much time, what with trying to survive and learning new skills.”

“Yeah,” I said, interrupting with a wash of relief, “totally. I was the same way. And maybe if I’d had more land to explore, I might have stayed closer to home, I mean my house, I mean…You get it. Point is, now that there are two of us…”

“Yes, most definitely.” Now it was Summer’s turn to interrupt. “And we will, definitely. We’ll set off for the great unknown soon enough.” Another half-beat. “But not yet.” And then, more confidently. “Not until I’m finished.”

“Hm?” I wonder what expression my round, soft face would have made at that.

“I’m working on something,” she said, heading for the kitchen’s back door. “Here, let me show you what I mean.”

I suddenly felt a slight queasiness, and it didn’t have to do with eating too many cookies. What was going on with Summer? Why the pauses, the hesitation in her voice? Why wasn’t she jumping at the chance to help me find our way home? Was it tied to her weirdness with the windows?

I figured I’d find out soon enough as we passed through the back door into her workshop. It was actually more like a factory, with walls of furnaces, a dozen double chests, two anvils, two crafting tables, and a pillar of lava encased in glass. “My washroom tub’s right above it,” she explained, sensing what had to be my coming question. “You’ll see.”

We passed through another door, up a flight of stone steps, and into a palatial bathroom that made my little guest room model look like a cheap motel. All the amenities but twice the size and built from a polished pink stone I’d thought useless until that moment.

“If your feet feel warm,” she said over her shoulder, “that’s the magma blocks under the floor.” I stopped for a second, just long enough to feel the warmth through my shoes.

“Best feeling, first thing in the morning.” Summer continued talking as she opened another pair of doors. “This is what I mean by ‘unfinished.’ This is where I sleep.”

At first, I couldn’t see anything. The room was pitch dark.

Then…

Flick!

The luxury! Solid purple carpet, pinkish jungle wood walls. Paintings and framed maps and a clock fixed to the dormant, double-wide fireplace opposite a double bed between a disc player on one side and a potted blue flower on the other. And all of it illuminated by a glowing ceiling of dark yellow cubes.

“Redstone lamps,” said Summer, “all wired together by redstone trails.”

“Wha…” I could barely whisper. “How…”

“Have a go,” she said, stepping back from the lever.

I reached out to switch it off.

Darkness.

Flick!

Light.

Flick-flick-flick.

Disco.

“How did you…” I began.

“Here.” Summer opened a side door to a storage closet lit by another lamp. “Just redstone and glowstone,” she said, opening a chest to toss me the wondrous cube. “Four, then four, nothing more.”

Nothing more?!

It was unbelievable, that amazing little device in my hand. The ability to turn night into day. The power, the control. I still remember the rush of lighting my first torch, of never having to be afraid of the dark. But these torches never went out and, even though it never bothered me much to sleep with the lights on, I hadn’t imagined I could re-create the light switches of my home world. And with nothing more than redstone and…

“Glowstone?”

“You’ve never seen glowstone?” Summer sounded puzzled.

I shook my head.

“Not even from a witch?”

Another shake. How many witches had she killed?

“It took a while,” Summer elaborated, “to gather enough glowstone to make my first block. And I thought that was something, the fact that it glowed forever. But when I found that redstone book with all its recipes…”

I had that same book, I think, unless there were different versions around. Had I missed the part about lamps?

“In fact,” Summer continued, “the one you’re holding is the first one I ever made. Back before I discovered the Nether.”

Again with that word.

“What is that?” I asked. “The Nether you keep mentioning.”

“You really don’t know.” More a statement than a question. “You really must have been isolated on that little island.”

“What’s the Nether?” I pressed.

“A whole other world,” said Summer, “or, perhaps, a part of this world you can only reach by a portal.”

“A portal?!” How often had I dreamed of finding those? “You found a portal?”

“Made,” said Summer, and, with calming, knowing hands raised, added, “and it can’t get us home.”

I sighed in response, trying to get past my disappointment.

“I found a book in one of the abandoned mineshafts that explains everything: how to make a portal to the Nether, what kind of mobs lurk there, what treasures you can find, including more glowstone than an army of witches could cough up.” She gestured to the ceiling. “That’s how I gathered enough to light this room, and”—she walked over to another set of double doors, threw them open, and swept her stubby, angled arm over the expanse of the main chamber—“eventually the entire mountain.”

And then I understood, even before she spoke. “You see, once I start on a project, I can’t just abandon it. I’ve worked too hard on this mountain, and all that’s left is to light up the rest of the chambers. Once I do that, there’ll be nothing left to do.”

“That makes sense,” I nodded.

And it really did. How many projects had I started that took up all my attention and time? Would I have just dropped the building of my house, or the torch-lighting of my island, if someone had come along and asked me to leave? Maybe, maybe not. I will say that even when I eventually decided to leave the island, I’d spent days getting everything in order for another traveler who might arrive after I’d gone. How cool would it be to leave a whole electrified mountain for someone to find?

It was such a relief to finally have such an uncomfortable mystery solved, and on the heels of that good feeling came an offer. “How about I help you? I can go to the Nether with you, help you collect more glowstone for these lamps?”

“Are you sure?” Summer looked back at the expansive ceiling before us. “I can’t be sure how long that would take.”

“It won’t take as long if we do it together. And besides, it ain’t like I’m going anywhere without you.” I stepped closer, offering my fist. “How ’bout it?”

“Yes,” answered Summer, “that would be lovely.” Had she hesitated just a half-breath before answering, or had it been my imagination? “Promise?” she asked, her hand still at her side. “Promise you won’t go anywhere till we’re done?”

“Promise,” I said, fist still hovering.

Fresson four: Friends keep their promises.

“Right then.” Her arm raised to bump. “Tomorrow, we journey to the Nether!”