"You'll be coming back though right?" I nervously shuffle my feet in front of my friend, knowing he's going to reassure me but I won't feel any better.

"Of course Binta, I'm just going to get together with my friends." He smiles at me, but I could see the worry in his eyes. He knew that more likely than not, he just lied to me.

"Here, I want to give something. To help clear your mind." Fred reaches back and pulls out a compass. It looks completely ordinary, but probably isn't. Fred's an Admin after all, it could sing a song if he wanted it to.

Hesitantly, I reach out and wrap my fingers around the sleek metal. "What does it do?"

"It points towards home. If I don't come back, some part of me will always be there." Fred stood up, and sent another reassuring smile. "And remember, you'll always be safe here. With or without me, the monsters can't get in here.

"It's time."

I turn away from him and walk down the steps, that way he'll have the whole platform to himself. A really worried part of me just wanted to run back to him and wrap my arms around him. But that's childish, Fred will come back. He always does.

"My faithful friends, please gather."

All the other kids stop playing at once and scamper over to Fred. I see Wanda look away from her painting with warm brown eyes, before standing up and walking over. The adults curiously gazing over at Fred and joining the crowd.

"My friends, I will shortly be leaving to go see my friends." Whispers spark up instantly, which makes sense. Fred hardly ever leaves, always smiling and helping us out here.

"Please do not be alarmed, but my friends might take me somewhere and it could be a long time until I come back. It might even feel like forever until I do." Forever, that's an awfully long time to be gone.

"However, despite how long I'll be absent, I want you all to continue living. No matter what happens, I want you to all keep going. It is safe here, I've made sure of it."

A few people sigh, relieved that we will all be safe until Fred comes back. Hilda's green eyes glimmer excitedly. I bet she's probably already planning to stock up on wheat so we can have plenty of bread when Fred returns.

"Willy, please come here." Willy's cobalt blue eyes widen in surprise, and he approaches Fred in shock.

"Xara doesn't really like Waffles." He chuckles a bit while looking off to the distance. "So I am appointing you as his caretaker."

Willy's back straightens. "I won't let you down Fred!"

Fred smiles at him and pats his shoulder. "I know you won't."

Suddenly, I feel really nervous and scared. I fidget a bit, not wanting to disturb the people around me. But I can feel myself starting to shake and dreading what Fred's about to say next. I need to ignore it though, it's irrational. Nothing can even hurt an Admin.

"Well, it's time for me to go now. Remember to stay faithful my friends." And with that, Fred simply popped away. Gone, and I can't help but think that he really meant that he'll be gone forever.

"Is there something wrong Binta?" Kent peers at me closely with his hazel eyes, frowning slightly at my distraught face.

"It's just... I have this awful feeling that-" I hesitant, I don't want to get people all worked up over nothing. "I got this gut feeling something bad is going to happen."

"Hey, don't worry about it. If it happens then we'll deal with okay?" He reassuringly shakes my shoulder, smiling at me.

I send fake a smile back at him. "Thanks Kent."

"What are friends for? And hey, I think I smell Hilda cooking up something good. Want to go get a taste?"

I move away from him and shake my head, still faking that smile. "Maybe later... I'm not up to it right now."

"Oh... uh, okay then." His face falls for a moment and he turns away. I feel slightly bad, but I'm not really in the mood for anything right now.

I sit down on the steps to his house and gaze at the sky. For a moment, all I do is relax my body and watch the clouds move across the sky. Deep down, I know why I'm so worried about Fred leaving to go see his friends.

It's because of Romeo, or the Red Admin. He's been doing some really terrifying stuff lately. He made these red slimes that have much tougher skin and been toying with some of the more dangerous mobs. He seems to be getting reckless and irresponsible, and because he's an Admin, that frightens us all.

I know Xara, the Purple Admin, will stand with Fred. So at least he isn't approaching Romeo alone. Two Admins against one, I shouldn't be concerned with those odds. Fred will be back here before I know it.

The glorious event will be so happy. Fred will pop right back in here, and tell us we won't have to worry about Romeo anymore. He'll say that Romeo will destroy his unnatural mobs and even make us our own specialized golem as an apology.

Hilda will probably go all out in sheer joy. She'll make all the best treats. Her mouth-watering apple pie, the heavenly watermelon cake, and probably more cookies than we can handle. And, of course, there will be lots and lots of bread.

Wanda will probably go nuts and make a special painting just for that moment. It will be her biggest and greatest one yet. She'll even use that gorgeous purple flower she found the other day to add Xara in it too. Although her seemingly endless supply of lapis might run dry.

Everyone will be so happy and we'll all dance around the campfire. With no worries on our shoulders and a full belly. Fred will be with us and the moon will shine down upon us. It will truly be great.

Yet, despite my vivid fantasy, my heart is hammering in my chest. Now I even have this burning regret screaming at me. It keeps raging about, scolding me that I should've hugged Fred because now I'll never be able to again.

Suddenly, everything freezes. To me at least. I can't feel my heartbeat and I'm no longer quivering. I'm ice cold, but I break out into a nervous sweat as chills run down my back.

With worried eyes, I take a look around. Nothing has changed. People are just being people. The only difference I notice now is a simple light breeze ruffling my hair. But there's nothing unordinary going on. 

Then the sky rumbles. The sky though is nothing except a beautiful blue, a few clouds playing way up there. There's not even an thunder cloud anywhere in between the horizons. Just a nice sunny day as far as the eye can see.

The rumble goes out again, and other people are looking around confused. I get up and start to walk over to Kent, he might have an idea about this. He knows a lot of strange little details.

But something catches my eye, and my body stiffens up. It looks like a black cloud forming and coming towards us, but... not. It's almost like the time I spilt some ink in water. The ink spreading across the water until it was all black.

This is the sky though! This doesn't just happen and clouds definitely don't wok like that. Yet that doesn't seem to stop it. It just keeps growing and growing, casting a huge shadow over the land.

This isn't natural, it's Romeo. It has to be. Only the work of an Admin can do this and I know Fred and Xara would never do something like this. But I can't tell what it is. Maybe it's suppose to be a thunder cloud and Romeo warped it into something else.

I'm excepting for it to stop soon though, I'm excepting that Fred or Xara will stop Romeo. They are the only ones who can keep him in check. Anyone else who simply looks at him wrong can find themselves teleported miles away from their home.

But that inky blackness keeps growing, sucking up the beautiful blue sky. My worry turns to fear as it gets closer and closer to us. And that fear turns into horror as it gets close enough for me to see what Romeo is using to block out the sun.

Bedrock. The indestructible bedrock. Romeo isn't blocking the sky until his rage dies down. He's making a cage around us. A cage that will never let us see the sun again. A cage no one will ever be able to escape from.

"Binta!" Wanda comes running up to me. "What's happening?! Why isn't Fred doing anything!?"

I gulp, it does nothing to help me down, and look into the trembling girl's brown eyes. My own heart hammering. "Frr- Fred-d-d, he-he- uh.... I-I think Romeo, err... That Romeo k-k-k-killed Fr-Fred."

Not a word is said as the shadow passes over us. We'll never see the sun again. Hilda will only ever be able to grow mushrooms. Wanda won't be able to find flowers for her paintings. It will never rain. No one will see the clouds when they look up. Night and day don't exist here anymore.  

"N-no... Fred s-said he would-d be ba-back..." The poor girl's eyes are just a river of tears, everyone's are.

"I'm sorry." Still no one says anything as the last parts of the sky slowly get covered up by the bedrock. Sealing us in here alone and cold, we don't have Fred's smile anymore to warm us up when we're feeling down.

Now, because of that accursed Romeo, our futures have been stamped out! Our lives will be us just trying to survive. Sure we still might be able to smile, but none of us will be truly happy anymore.

Romeo, not only has he cast a darkness all over our beautiful land, but he infected our minds with a permanent darkness.

****

See what I mean with unusual topics?

I bet you were excepting something about the Wither Storm or a mental thing, but no, I refuse to be predictable. Okay... maybe a few (or more) exceptions.

As happy as I am about how it turned out... it was weird writing. I don't know much about, well, any of these characters and what I do know is after they've gone through this traumatic experience, so I filled in a few details about characters.

But that's all for today! The second oneshot is Grief!