So here's a helpful fact:

In this book, the main currency is gold, but the dollar sign ($) is still used to describe the amount.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Prolly mistakes

K bye

•    •    •

~ Lily ~

I was really impressed with myself. I didn't think I could actually hit someone with a rock, let alone say something witty after it. I hoped I looked cool, and they didn't notice that I was trembling slightly.

After Cole disarmed the guy he called Ernie (which I admit was pretty cool as well), he held him and the GATU member at gunpoint. I was worried that he was going to shoot them.

However, after a while of silence, he spoke. "I'm going to ask you a few questions, and you're going to answer them."

Ernie simply chuckled. "Why do ya think I'd do that?"

"I have three of you right in front of me. I only need one to give me answers. If you don't want to, I simply pull the trigger and move on."

I was surprised after he said that. I didn't think he was that cruel. He sounded serious enough to actually do it.

"You don't have the guts to do it." Ernie spat on the ground.

Cole narrowed his eyes. He pointed the gun to the standing GATU member.

"Cole," I said quietly.

He glanced at me, then back to the creeper mask. "Step forward."

The man hesitated, but walked forward. He didn't halt until Cole said, "Stop" when he was just a block away.

Without warning, Cole raised the gun and smacked the guy on his forehead with it. I gasped as he crumbled to the ground unconscious.

"First warning." Cole aimed back at Ernie. "To show that I can indeed harm someone. The next use of the gun will be fatal."

Ernie looked at his companion on the ground, not saying anything.

"Why is GATU so interested in us?" I asked, taking a few steps forward.

He laughed. "Big plans... very big plans..."

"What are the plans?!" Cole demanded. He was getting impatient.

"How should I know?" Ernie shrugged. "I'm not a high enough rank to get filled in on that fancy information. All I'm aware of is that you all need to be brought in alive at any cost."

"You all," I repeated, "the other two people. Do you know who they are?"

He just smiled at me.

"Who ordered you to bring us in?" Cole tried another question.

Ernie looked up and pointed at the sky. "The very top."

"God?" The upside-down guy, who was still behind Cole, gasped.

"No, you idiot. The Prime Five." The cowboy sighed in exasperation.

"The leaders of GATU." Cole muttered in thought.

"Most wanted criminals in the world." Ernie grinned. "Still think you're safe? Still think that you can change this? Still think-"

He was cut off by Cole charging forward and hitting him across the face with the gun. Ernie fell to the ground, knocked out.

"We weren't going to get a lot out of him. He was just being annoying." Cole defended his actions.

I looked at the two bodies on the ground. Even though they were bad people, I couldn't help but feel that it wasn't necessary to knock them out.

"So..." The upside-down guy said, "You gonna let me hang here?"

Cole looked at him, then at the GATU member on the ground. Then, his eyes brightened as if he had an idea. "Give me your hoodie."

All of a sudden, I felt a giant exhale of warm air on the back of my head. I whipped around to see the source.

"Oh. Hi Shoelace. How'd you find us?"

•    •    •

"Why did we need their hoodies and masks again?" I asked Cole.

He waited for Shoelace to step over some leaves, tugging on the lead. "Disguises. Just in case."

"Wouldn't they notice that it's me? I mean, I'm wearing a dress, and I haven't seen a GATU member wearing a dress yet."

He sighed. "That's why I wanted to grab the pants, too."

"Really?" I looked down. "I just thought it was this weird ki-"

"Here we go." Cole interrupted me.

We had reached a large pond, with the water only a block deep. In the middle of the pond was a jungle temple. It was a tiered structure made of cobblestone and mossy cobblestone. Vines covered the walls. It looked abandoned.

"Come on." Cole jumped into the water. He coaxed Shoelace to step into it, which took a little bit. After we all were hip-deep in water, we started wading toward the temple.

"Do you think they'll find us?" I asked.

"We'll only be in there for a few minutes. The cowboy will be knocked out for longer than that."

I tried to carefully word what I was going to say next. "Why... why didn't you grill him longer?"

'Grill him longer'? Way to go, Lily.

"Like I said before, he was just wasting our time. Plus, I'm worried that the other two GATU members down in the ravine will find their way up soon."

"Would you have really shot them if they didn't say anything at all?"

He took longer to respond than I would have liked. "No. It was just a scare tactic."

We reached the temple. I climbed onto the cobblestone platform, and grabbed Shoelace's lead from Cole. I pulled the horse up as he climbed up.

"Hang on." Cole said as I was about to walk into the entrance. He walked forward a few steps, carefully scanning the ground. He found what he was looking for; a tripwire in the doorway. He broke it. "Okay, we won't blow up now."

"That's good." I was more wary of the place.

We walked inside. The floor was empty except for staircases going up and down. The floor above us was visible, but it was also empty.

"We're going down." Cole blocked up the entrance. "You can let go of him now."

I released my grip on Shoelace's lead. I then followed Cole down the dark stairs.

When we reached the bottom, he flicked on a lever, letting a red stone lamp turn on. The room we were in was a square about ten by ten, made of stone. It had a few double chests in it, a crafting table, two furnaces, and an anvil. The only light was the lamp above us.

"I hope I didn't get robbed, he muttered, and went over to the chests.

"I think the kaboom trap would stop some people." I glanced up.

He opened a chest, and exhaled. "Good. It's all here."

I peeked in one, and saw three sets of iron armor with iron swords. "Woah."

"Suit up." Cole pulled out an iron pickaxe from his chest, and put it in his inventory.

Soon, we were both geared up. Cole had some diamond armor on (jealous), and the rest of our pieces were iron. We both had diamond swords, plenty of extra food, tools, and blocks. I had a bow and arrow, but Cole didn't want one. He said he wasn't a good shot.

"I think we're good." He said after we finished armoring up. "We should leave now."

"Where are we going?" I asked.

"Wenechenca. Like we originally planned."

"Like I planned." I crossed my arms. "You planned on coming here and leaving me to go on my own, didn't you? You just wanted to protect your treehouse."

He winced. "Lily, I—"

Suddenly, he stopped talking as we both heard something from upstairs. Blocks were being broken. Then, someone spoke.

"Dude, there's a horse in here!"

•    •    •

~ Amber ~

I stared at the pictures of us. My mouth was slightly open from shock. My photo seemed familiar, like I remembered taking it. But I didn't know where or when.

"We're wanted?" I asked in disbelief.

"Yep." The criminal popped the 'p'. "Pretty hefty bounty, if I do say so myself."

Sky said from next to me, "Why would we have a bounty? We didn't do anything!"

At first I was worried that we got caught looking at the train footage on Rae's laptop. However, I realized that it wasn't really a good enough reason to have bounty hunters after us.

"Who are you?" Skye asked the masked fedora man.

He grinned— something he liked to do a lot apparently. "Matthew Pierce. Swashbuckling hero of the shadows. Number seven on the 'Most Wanted' list. Call me Pierce."

"How are you a hero?" I sneered. "Robbing people on trains isn't heroic."

"Maybe not to you." He shrugged. "But I help my boys. I make us rich, I come up with cool outfits... they respect me because of that. Right, boys?"

"Right!" His henchmen called out simultaneously.

Pierce sighed. "But the thing is, my underground empire is growing. I have a family to feed. I need the money to support everyone. So when a paper slipped under the door with your information on it, it was our ticket to paradise. We could always use $200,000 flooding in."

"We're worth $200,000?" Sky blinked.

"I would've thought I'm at least $500,000." I crossed my arms.

Pierce laughed. "You're funny. I like you. But I'm afraid you two will have to come with me."

Neither of us moved.

"Listen, I don't want to be forced to hurt people. I like to wave around guns and look intimidating, but I'm actually trying to be a pacifist-" To that, I snorted. "- However, I will use force if necessary." He held his pistol up.

I looked around at the other civilians on the train. If it were just us, I would stand up to the guy. However, he could hurt the innocent people. He still had the explosives. We had to cooperate.

I reluctantly stood up.

"That's it." He stepped aside for us, and pointed down the aisle. "Make your way down there."

I slowly walked down, trying not to make eye contact with anyone. I could still tell that they were all staring at us. When we made it to the door, the one guy stationed there opened it up and let us go through. I realized that we were heading toward the caboose.

We went through three other corridors before we finally reached the last car. It was made of gray clay, with chests lining the walls and two rows in the middle of the room. There seemed to be an abundance of them which was completely unnecessary. I'm pretty sure half the chests were empty.

"Now you two stay here and be good children while the adults do their work." Pierce waved two of his men in. They stationed themselves on both sides of the door. "Watch those two. But under no circumstances are you to cause permanent injuries to them or kill them. Knock them out if you want."

The two guys nodded, and traded their guns for batons.

"You're so nice." I sarcastically retorted.

Pierce shrugged with a smirk, and walked out. "Deep down, I really do care." He shut the door.

•    •    •

"Who do you think sent him after us?" I whispered to Sky. We were both sitting on the ground, leaning against some chests. The guys were about ten blocks away. They were talking to each other, but did glance at us often.

"I don't know. Must be someone powerful."

"Maybe GATU." I muttered.

"GATU?"

I forgot that Sky didn't know about them. "They're these bad guys. A big unit of criminals that troll and grief."

He frowned. "Do you really think they could be behind this?"

"It's a possibility. But they have plenty of their own operatives. Not sure why they'd need the extra help and spend $200,000 doing it."

"Who else could be after us?"

I searched my brain for the answer, but came up with nothing. "I don't know."

"The guy we're following?"

"We don't even know who he..." I faltered.

"What?" Sky looked concerned.

"Our guy had a fedora. Do you... do you think it's Pierce?"

"I thought he said he was trying to be a pacifist."

I stared at him. "Are you seriously believing that? He's a criminal; he constantly lies. Plus, in case you forgot, he strapped bombs to the train. That involves a lot of killing with a click of a button."

"Fair enough. Although I'm not sure why he wouldn't have caught us earlier in the city or on our journey there. If he knew our town, and knew where we were going, shouldn't he have met up with us while we were in the wilderness on our own? It would have been much easier. I have a feeling he started going after us after we made it to Marstamian."

"Fine, but what's the deal with the other guy then? Why did he do what he did? Assuming he's a bounty hunter as well."

"To scare us. Or make us follow him. But why?"

"To get us on this train." I realized. "So he could rob people and catch us. Kill two mobs with one arrow. It has to be Pierce."

"I still don't think he'd do something like that."

"I didn't know you two were so close." I rolled my eyes. "Did you have brunch with him before we left?"

"No need to be rude." He muttered.

I frowned at the ground. "I'm sorry. I'm just furious about what's happening."

Sky didn't say anything for a little bit. Finally, he exhaled. "Then I guess we're going to have to change the circumstances."

"How?" I was surprised that he wanted to do something instead of lie low.

He glanced around at all the chests. "Let's see what we got for Christmas."

•    •    •

I hear it *wink*

K that was weird

Why do the GATU people want Lily and Cole? Will Lily forgive Cole? Who found the temple?
Who sent Pierce after Amber and Sky? Is he the same guy they've been following? What do the two plan on doing? (nothing inappropriate, Tood)

¸,ؤº°'°º¤Ø,¸¸,ؤº° ⓡⓞⓒⓚ ⓞⓝ, ⓜⓨ   ⓛⓘⓣⓣⓛⓔ ⓡⓔⓑⓔⓛⓢ °º¤Ø,¸¸,ؤº°'°º¤Ø,¸