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Dear players of the Unstable SMP. I Spokeishere, plan to nuke Capital City.
You have one hour to evacuate the citizens, and anyone that tries to stop me, will be swiftly eliminated.
If you want to save your home, I only have one demand.
Show me that my best friend, Mapicc, isn’t dead.
Prove to me that he’s alive, or has been somehow captured.
Because otherwise,
I will leave this server in ruins.
…
…
…
The wind whips through his hair, much stronger because of the elevation he was standing at.
Spoke stood, overlooking a city that will be blown to bits if he doesn’t get what he wants.
Homes that will be disintegrated like the passing of time.
His breathing is even, calm even.
He is calm.
Spoke is calm.
…
…
…
…He chooses to ignore the way his heart pounds in his chest.
…
…
…
Spoke expected someone— anyone to show up. He didn’t think Capital City would just… let their home get decimated by someone other than Wemmbu this time.
Spoke breaks and replaces the redstone in the machine he was standing on to pass the time.
Why is redstone even red? Like, it could have been, blue! And then it would be bluestone! Or purplestone! Or the rare variation called rainbowstone!
He was getting distracted.
Messing around with hundreds of stacks of TNT probably wasn’t his smartest idea.
He’s done stupuder things, though.
And he finds that he doesn’t care.
Not anymore.
Spoke is aware that what he is doing is rash.
Spoke is aware that he will likely die in the explosion.
…At least it will be a quick death.
…
…
…
Still nobody.
Nobody is coming.
Spoke’s heart sinks.
…
…
…
All he wants is Mapicc back.
It’s all he’s ever wanted.
Because who is Spoke without Mapicc?
Without his entire world?
…
…
…
Maybe if he paid closer attention.
Maybe he would have noticed his best friend had disappeared.
Before it was too late.
Way too little, way too late.
…
…
…
Spoke was spiraling again, that much he knew.
He looked at his hands, slightly shaking.
His silhouette was slightly flickering.
…
…
…
…Usually, Mapicc would help ground him again when he fell back into a spiral.
But he wasn’t—
Mapicc wasn’t here.
Mapicc isn’t here.
…
…
…
Spoke hugs himself.
Brings his arms close to his chest and squeezes his eyes shut, focusing on anything other than the current situation.
…like flowers.
Flowers were nice.
He pictures himself standing in a field of flowers, all the pretty colours surrounding him and wrapping him in a blanket of comfort.
There are lilacs, daisys, poppy’s, sunflowers, roses…
Roses.
Cornflowers.
…
…
…
“My little brother, he loves these cornflowers!”
Fuck.
“His favourite colour is blue”
No, no, no. Not now.
“I don’t like to kill innocent players”
Please, not now.
“I was just trying to play Minecraft with my brother”
…
“This is not my fault. This is not my fault.”
…
“Give me the flower, I promise I’ll give it to him.”
…
“I don’t want revenge, I just want to play Minecraft with my brother!”
…
“Spoke, who are you?”
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“Where’s my sister? Where’s my sister! Tell me— tell me!”
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“I’m sorry.”
…
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…
He was breathing hard now, his chest felt as if it was closing in on him.
It’s not my fault.
It’s not my fault.
It’s not my fault.
…Spoke didn’t even kill Ash like he promised he would.
…
…
…
The flickering was worse now.
His clothes felt wrong.
His skin felt wrong.
Like it wrapped around bones that didn’t deserve it.
Bones that have done more wrong than right.
Spoke feels like he might throw up.
He feels like he isn’t breathing enough.
Too short, too fast.
God, why does his skin feel so wrong?
It’s so loud.
Becky’s cries fill his mind.
Roses pleads.
Ash’s voice.
The world didn’t seem completely real anymore.
What was, and what wasn’t, he didn’t know.
It was suddenly so very warm, and he could feel sweat form little drops on his forehead.
He wanted it to stop.
Needed it to stop.
Nobody was coming.
Nobody would come for somebody as horrible as Spoke.
But it wasn’t his—
It wasn’t Spokes fault.
It was necessary!
He was saving the server!
He was—
Spoke was trying.
The world spins.
Details pass by him without his notice.
Birds chirping, fires crackling in the fireplaces of homes he’s about to destroy.
Nobody knew that Spoke was standing on a machine full of hundreds of stacks of TNT, having the worst panic attack of his life.
Sobs escape his chest before he can stop it.
He wants to scream.
He covers his ears, pressing down until they ring.
It doesn’t help.
The cries only grow ever louder.
His—
Spokes eyes snap open.
And he—
And Spoke sets off the machine before he can change his mind.
…
…
…
He hears the hiss of TNT, finally something other than the cries of all the people he’s hurt.
And the machine goes off.
The effect is immediate, with the bombs flying in all directions.
The shock hitting him off the edge of the platform.
He yells out as one of the explosives hits him as he falls, debris cutting into his eyes.
He falls.
And falls.
And falls.
The wind screams in his ear, the sound of buildings collapsing ever present.
He barely places down water before he hits the ground.
But his momentum is too fast.
Spoke trips.
Black spots appear in his vision, pain becoming another present in his shitty life.
His head hurts.
He thinks he hit it on the ground.
Tears fall from his eyes as he lays there, waiting, waiting for death to take him.
His whole body hurts.
Pain shoots up his limbs, the worst he’s ever felt.
His head is the worst of it.
If he had to guess, it was probably bleeding.
…
…
…
He still hasn’t passed out.
Or died.
So much for a quick death.
Spoke guesses he doesn’t deserve that luxury.
…
…
…
He slowly sits up, bringing a hand to the back of his head, where he hit it.
He could feel something warm and sticky flow around his hand, the smell of iron hitting his nose along with smoke.
He pulls his hand away to see, only to find that his vision was blurred.
Whether it was from hitting his head, or his tears, he didn’t know.
He could still see the white of his own blood though.
He stares at it.
And then he slowly gets up again.
If Spoke wasn’t dead yet, then he was going to make damn sure that he died somewhere nice.
Not that he deserved it.
Spoke starts walking, one foot in front of the other.
Slowly.
Very slowly.
Excruciatingly slow.
…
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…
Spoke has no idea how he walked without falling, as his vision wasn’t getting any better.
At least his mind was quiet.
It was weird.
Spoke’s mind is never quiet.
He’s always thinking about something or another, the gears in his mind constantly turning.
But now, now there is nothing.
He guesses he should think of Mapicc.
…
…
…
He listens to the birds instead.
Free.
Without worry.
Spoke wished he were free.
Free from the shackles of his actions.
The guilt that consumes him late at night.
…He guesses he is free now.
Free and slowly dying.
He laughs.
Not a sad laugh.
A harsh one.
The situation isn’t very funny.
He laughs anyways.
…
…
…
Spoke has no idea how far he’s walked, he’s in a forest now.
The trees tower over him, blocking the beaming sun from his eyes.
Still blurry.
He can hear water.
A river.
He walks towards it.
Sits down at the bank.
Feels the grass between his fingers.
Listening to the gurgle of the flowing water.
He’s starting to feel lightheaded.
Well, he was before, but more than before.
…
…
…
He turns his head.
There’s a flower next to him.
A singular rose.
…That doesn’t naturally generate.
He picks it.
The thorns dig into his skin as he clutches the flower, drawing small pinpricks of blood.
How ironic.
…
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…
Spoke lays down.
One arm falls and grazes the water.
He’s too tired to move it.
The other hand clutches the rose to his chest.
He can feel a pool of blood appear under his head.
And Spoke closed his eyes.
The sound of the water lulls him to sleep.
…
…
…
Spoke’s grip on the rose fails.
Not because he disliked the pain.
Because he couldn’t anymore.
…
…
…
He was dead.
Unable to take another breath.
And maybe, just maybe, it was for the better of the server.
If Spoke was dead, he couldn’t hurt anyone anymore.
…
…
…
The rose’s stem grows, seemingly magically.
It wraps around Spoke’s unbreathing body, then sinking itself into the ground.
Rooting itself.
More stems appear from the ground, flower buds blooming over his body.
Not stabbing into him.
Covering him.
As he lays there.
Succumbing to the cycle of life.
Decaying as the plant uses him as it's source of life.
Spoke will never know any of this happened.
Nobody would find his body.
The plant would make sure of that.
The plant— although it has no feelings— understands that this is what Spoke might have wanted.
To do some kind of good for once.
Not pretend good.
Not a wrong action for the right reasons.
True good.
Even if it’s in his death.
The plant stops growing.
And time continues to pass.
As if Spoke is nothing but a burning memory.