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JOURNAL ENTRY: SMALL EXPLORATION

Day 5: Going Up

“I think we can try to dig our way out from the top,” said Sean.

This seemed like a good plan, but it also appeared to be quite difficult to pull off. I didn’t know how we’d reach the ceiling. We didn’t have a ladder and it was very high up. And once we reached the top, we might not be able to actually escape. It wouldn’t take us very far and Charles would probably spot us and force us back to the prison. Again. I told this to Sean and his face grew very sad. “I’m sorry. It seemed like a good idea, but you’re right—I don’t think it will work. I’m trying to come up with a plan that would work. I want to get out of here.” He was upset.

“We all want to get out of here, and we will,” I reassured him. “Now we have both Molly and Esther helping us. I think the more people we have on our side, the better. There is strength in numbers and we are going to need all the resources we can gather to battle Charles.”

“You’re right,” Sean said. He went over to the hole in the wall and asked Molly and Esther if we could join them in their cell. We were going to strategize yet another plan of escape.

Molly and Esther had some ideas of their own. They wanted to make a hole in Esther’s wall and free the person who lived in the next cell over.

“There is a voice that calls for help all the time,” said Esther. “And the more people we have on our side, the more likely we’ll be able to fight back.”

“I think it’s Thao,” I commented. “We should try to get to him. He was Charles’s partner. He could be incredibly helpful, because he knows Charles better than we do.”

We climbed through the hole in the wall to reach Esther’s room. I stood by the opposite wall and spoke. “Who are you?”

The voice was weak. “I need help. I am trapped here and I have been attacked by hostile mobs every day. I have no energy and all they feed me is a carrot per day.”

“This is happening to all of us. But if you want me to help you, you must tell me who you are,” I said.

“I don’t see how that is important.” The voice sounded even weaker. “I just need help. Can you help me?”

Before I could respond, two blazes spawned in Esther’s room. She quickly grabbed a snowball from her inventory and threw it at the yellow beast, but a fireball struck me and I was destroyed.

I respawned in my bed. My friends were by my side. “Are the blazes destroyed?” I asked.

“Yes.” Esther smiled. “And we have someone we want to introduce you to.”

Then Thao walked into the room.

My heart skipped a beat. Although I knew he wasn’t working with Charles any longer, I still remembered the many battles I had fought against him. It was going to be hard to work with someone I had considered my enemy, someone who had destroyed my life, who had destroyed my best friend’s life. But he was also a fellow prisoner, and now we had a common goal. We both wanted to escape.

“I know who you are,” I replied finally.

“I’m sorry for all the trouble I have caused you in the past. Esther set me free and now I want to work with you guys to escape from this prison. I’m no longer working with Charles. He turned against me. I can’t trust him anymore.”

I listened to Thao talk about Charles. I wanted to believe that he could have changed and that he was truly on our side this time, but I was wary. I knew how mean he could be and it was hard to let that go. “I’m going to accept your apology, but I want you to know that you were very destructive when I was an explorer. Both you and Charles tried to stop me from sharing my discoveries with the Overworld. I’m not sure I can trust you.”

“I was being forced to do that because of Charles,” he replied.

“You don’t have to do things just because others want you to do them. You’re responsible for your own decisions.”

“I promise that even once we are free and back in the Overworld, I will think for myself and will only help others.”

Thao sounded sincere. And I knew it would be helpful to have him on our side.

“Is there anything that you know about Charles that would help us? You worked with him for so long—you must know some of his secret plans and his weaknesses.”

Thao paused and thought for a moment. “I know a lot about this space. I was here when Charles built it. If we get to the room next to yours, there is a tunnel to a stronghold and we can escape through there.”

“Excellent!” I replied. We took out our tools and chipped away at the wall until it began to crumble.

Peeking through the hole we’d made, Esther said, “I think I can fit through now.” She crawled through first.

I kept banging the wall with my pickaxe to create a larger hole. “Esther, what’s in there?”

“It’s empty. But Thao is right—there is a hole in the ground and it looks like it leads to a tunnel.”

“Great,” I said. “Wait for us. We’ll be there in a minute.”

We finally made a gaping hole in the wall big enough for all of us to climb through. We followed Esther down the hole, into the ground.

Molly was nervous as we entered the long tunnel to the stronghold. “What if this is a trap?”

Thao reassured her. “I know how to escape from this stronghold. We just have to avoid Charles. So we need to be very quiet.”

We silently made our way into the stronghold as we followed Thao. I hoped he couldn’t hear my heart—it was beating very fast and very loud.