(Y/N)'s POV
In said secret passageway, I'm met with a metal door. And next to said metal door is three frames, each containing a different item—an axe, an arrow, and sand. Oh, duh. Trey killed by arrows, Lewis killed by sand, and Trinity killed by an axe. I move the items in this order and with each correctly placed, a lock unhinges, until the doors swing open.

"Sweet! You got it open!" Beezie says, following us in along with the others.

"Yeah, uh, how about Faith and I'll go and check it out? Lukas, Jesse, you stay here with the rest?" I say.

"Sounds good to me," Lukas says.

"Nooo, I totally want to follow you into your boyfriend's creepy secret passageway," Mooncake says sarcastically.

"Are you kidding me?" I ask, a pure moue spreading across my face. "You seriously still think Aiden did it?"

"You haven't proven he didn't yet," Mooncake counters.

"Technically true," Beezie chimes in.

"You know what? We're going to prove his innocence, and so help me I don't care if I die trying," I say, tears brimming my eyes.

"Sure! We'll see you back here at quarter-to-never!" Beezie says, turning away and leading her "posse" away from the passage. {I've never realized how sassy Stampy is until I've been writing this.}

Fish rubs against my legs.

"I don't know, Fish," I say. "It might be too dangerous for you."

But he doesn't leave me.

"Stay here with Lukas and Jesse, okay?" I say.

But he still doesn't move.

"Fine, you can come," I say. "Let's go."

"Yeah. Sorry for not having your back, back there," Faith says.

"It's fine. . . . Let's just get this over with."

Further down in the passage is a deep hole, so deep I can't make out the bottom.

"Gosh, that's deep," Faith says.

"Think it leads to the 'lair' or other?" I ask.

"That's a passageway to a villain's lair, if I've ever seen one," she says.

"But how to get down there is the question," I say.

"For all we know, this person can fly."

"Unlikely . . . Hey, you still have those wooden blocks?" I ask.

"Yeah, a lot of them."

"Sick," I say, "we can build down."

And so we do.

*~*~*~*

Five hours later, here we are.

Okay, that's a bit of an exaggeration.

"Think we'll actually find the White Pumpkin down here?" Faith asks as we start prowling through the tunnel.

"I hope so," I say. "And this time we're going to find out who it is."

As we venture further down, the sound of groaning gets clearer and clearer.

"Hey, do you here . . . ?"

"Lots and lots of zombies?" Faith finishes. "Yeah."

"Get behind me, Fish," I say. We cautiously creep through the tunnel. We come to a wall of iron bars, and bang! A zombie surprises the both of us when it hits against the bars. At least they aren't roaming free.

"That explains the zombie noises," Faith says.

Continuing along down the tunnel, there is multiple cages. At the end is a room with a giant yellow tube at the far end. Within the tube is a conveyer of items. In front of us is a pool, and a few items drop down into it.

"This must be where people's stuff comes when it's sucked up by the hoppers," I think out loud.

"So, this must be Trinity's," Faith says.

Hoppers at the bottom of the pool suck up each item and send them through the tube.

"But where does it go from here?" Faith asks.

"Hopefully to the White Pumpkin," I say.

I look around for a sign of them, and notice something out of the ordinary. "See that tunnel up there?"

"Yeah, it doesn't seem to be blocked off like the zombie-filled ones," Faith says.

"Maybe if we can get up there, we can follow the loot," I say.

"How do we get up there?"

"Get some dirt, I guess," I say. We gather up all the dirt we can get and build a sort of stairway up to the tunnel. We ascend and walk through the tunnel, only to be accompanied by the sound of distant meowing. {#JusticeForMews}

"Um? I have questions?" I say.

"Is that . . . cats?" Faith says. I look at Fish and he's not making any sound, but his eyes are huge.

I peek around the corner and there stands the White Pumpkin. I instinctively punch them and realize it was just another dummy. Thank goodness, or I would've felt awful, villain or not. {I actually was in tears yesterday because I accidentally flipped a housefly onto its back.}

We round the corner and find a small garden growing white pumpkins.

"Some kind of . . . growing station?" I say.

Footsteps approach us and someone—who must be the White Pumpkin—casts an eerie shadow on the wall.

"Shoot, they must've heard us," I whisper, drawing my sword.

Around the corner comes not the White Pumpkin but Beezie.

"Beezie!" I breathe. "You scared me half to death."

"I scared you?" she asks. "What are you doing down here?"

"What are we doing down here?" Faith says.

"Yeah, it looks terribly suspicious, you know," Beezie says.

I pause. "Okay, I'm not the smartest person in the Overworld, but even I know that was slightly hypocritical." I sigh. "Anyway, we're looking for the White Pumpkin."

"Well, I'm glad you haven't run into them yet," Beezie says. She slips by us. "Come on, I can't be the White Pumpkin! I'm just little ol' me! Beezie! I'm no murderer! I needed to find you because I had something to tell you! I have something to confess. Something I haven't told anyone."

"And that is?" I ask.

She reveals a green, glowing flint and steel. "I stole it from Shiner and it was supposed to be a joke, a harmless prank, but then, well, you've seen what happened. I knew people wanted it, but I had no idea that this would happen!"

"Why didn't you tell someone?" I ask.

"I was scared, okay? People started dying and I didn't want them to think I did it," she says. "I may be a thief, but I'm no killer. But the White Pumpkin is! And now they're killing people for it, and now we're down in their lair. I was thinking . . . maybe I should just give it to the White Pumpkin. Maybe that would make it all stop, right?"

"First we find who the White Pumpkin is," I say. "Then we'll figure out what to do from there."

"I guess that's a good strategy," she says.

We walk down through the end of the room and pull a lever to open the doors. In the next room is definitely the lair. Looks pretty lair-y to me.

"Creepy," Faith mutters.

"I would not put this on my top ten places I've ever been," Beezie says.

Fish hisses and I turn to face him and see him looking up at three calico cats.

"Well, that'd be where the meowing's coming from," I say.

I look around the room and find a row of three marked chests—TorqueDawg, CaptainGlitter, and Lone Lunar. A hopper dispenses items into the chest labeled "Lone Lunar".

"Those poor people," Beezie says. I sigh.

In the back of the room is a small pond containing fish. On the opposite wall to the three chests, where the cats are, is another chest. On the chest lies a cat, and a quite annoying one at that. I push it off the chest, but when I try to open the chest, it just gets back on top. I'll need a distraction of some sort. . . . Then I remember: fish.

{So I just managed to drop my iPad down at least five steps and dented the side so the lock and volume-up buttons don't work.}

Next to the cat's chest is a bunch of cobwebs. I pull out a few strings. I find a smaller chest and root through it for some sticks. I also find and pocket a few enderpearls. Next to that chest is a crafting table. I craft a fishing pole and get a couple fish from the pond—one to distract the cats and one as a treat for Fish. I give Fish his first and then lure the cat away. But it's not just that cat.

About fifteen more calicos come out of the hole in the wall.

"Goodness, that's a lot of cats," Faith says.

"This person is like an evil version of me," I say. I open the formerly blocked chest. "Portraits. It's just a bunch of portraits." I take one out and place it on the wall. It's Faith's portrait . . . but with a giant red X painted across it. "Looks like they already had the X-ed out ones." I dig through the rest. "There's Shiner, Mooncake, Beezie, Aiden, Lukas, Ivor, Jesse, and me. . . ."

"What's it mean, though?" Faith asks. "The cats, the portraits . . ."

"Ah, the portraits . . . ," I think aloud. "See, the funny thing about the portraits is that one person is missing. One person who doesn't have a portrait. Someone who—well, aside from myself—is a known cat person."

"Who?" Faith asks.

"Yes! You figured it out?" Beezie asks.

"Isn't it obvious?" I ask. "It's Cassie Rose. Just think about it—she was upset about Mooncake wanting to know where Trey's stuff went, then denied it. She 'tried to escape' but ran into the zombies and was 'too scared' to close the door, probably thinking it might've given the zombies enough time to flood inside and kill us. Later on, she said herself that we were all doomed. She both framed Aiden and attempted to wrongfully punish him, and volunteered to watch over him so she could use that as an alibi. And who besides me would have, like, twenty cats?"

"Oh, my gosh, you're totally right," Faith says.

"I don't believe it," Beezie says.

"Time to go prove Aiden's innocence and expose the White Pumpkin," I say.

*~*~*~*

"I'll go round everyone up," Beezie says and heads downstairs.

"What's going on?" Mooncake asks.

"Yeah, you were gone for an awful long time," Shiner says. "What's going on here?"

"Where's Cassie?" I ask.

"Cassie? Why do you ask?" Shiner asks.

"Yeah, what's going on?" Cassie asks, coming up the staircase. A look of terror flashes across her face when she sees the open door in the secret passageway.

"No sign of Cassie, but—," Beezie starts, coming up the stairs with Ivor and Aiden. "Oh!"

"Are you going to tell them?" I ask Cassie. "Or should I?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," she says.

"Go ahead, Cassie," I say. "Tell them."

"Tell us what, Cass?" Mooncake asks.

"It sounds like (Y/N) is trying to make you think that I'm the White Pumpkin," Cassie panics.

"That's impossible. No way," Shiner says. "No way."

"Yeah, (Y/N). I'm afraid you're going to have to do better than that," Cassie says. "Look at the facts! We caught Aiden with that pumpkin head right after poor Trinity got taken out! I think you're just lying to protect him."

"Cassie's making a lot of sense right now," Shiner says. "Do you have any evidence?"

"You make a compelling argument, Cassie, but I think you should look at the facts," I say. "I'm going to say the same thing I told Faith and Beezie. You were upset that Mooncake was asking about Trey's stuff, then denied it. You 'tried escaping' but ran into the zombies and were 'petrified' so you couldn't close the door, probably thinking it might've given the zombies enough time to get inside to kill us. Later on, you said that we were all doomed. You framed Aiden and tried to punish him. Going to watch over Aiden was a good enough alibi. And there's, like, five million calico cats down there and I can't think of a single person who would have that many cats aside from myself."

"None of the things you just said can be proved true," she says. "Any one of those things you could say to make me seem guilty."

"Okay . . . what about the fact that you were alone with the portraits after Trey's death," I say.

"That doesn't prove anything, either," she says. "Plus, Aiden's way guiltier-looking."

"Well, what about what came afterward?" I ask. "Down in the basement was some items for the White Pumpkin's evening festivities. These items were portraits, pre-X-ed out, ready for the White Pumpkin's next victim. Everyone had one—Ivor, Beezie, Lukas, etcetera—except for one person. That person? Cassie Rose."

"Ooh, that's good," Ivor says. {BETWEEN THE WAY IVOR SAID THIS LINE AND STACY'S WEIRD SHRIEK-GASP THESE ARE THE BEST REACTIONS BY FAR.}

"And I return to my earlier evidence," I say. "The billions of cats downstairs—calico cats, like Winslow."

"An amusing story, (Y/N). But if you saw all these supposed cats just like mine . . . then what color is Winslow?" Cassie asks.

"Cassie, I'm not an idiot; I know that calico cats are black, orange, and white," I say.

"Cassie . . . is this all true?" Moonlight asks.

"All you want is that flint and steel and you're willing to kill anyone in your way," I say.

She glares at me before doing the signature-villain-slow-clap. "How very clever, (Y/N). Well, I guess that's it, then. You caught me." She dramatically turns back-to. "I am the murderer."

{This scene is over dramatic and I can't tell if they're playing on with the murder mystery cliché or making fun of it.}

"But why do you want the portal key so badly?" I ask.

"I've been stuck in this stupid world with its stupid two moons for years with a portal right under my nose but no portal key to open it!" she says. "That is until I finally heard that this world's portal key had been found. I knew it was one of you. So I did my best to earn your friendship, figure out who had it."

{BUT YOU AND DAN SHARED COOKIES, CASSIE! COOKIES!}

"That does sound pretty hard," I say. "Of course, I can't really empathize, because, see, I have a portal key." I pull it out of my inventory. "You really wanted one of these, huh?"

"Why, you little—"

"We need to do something with you, Cassie Rose," Mooncake says.

"We should build an obsidian prison surrounded with lava," Beezie suggests.

"No, no, no, no, I will not let you do that," Cassie says, backing up. "I can't! No!" She points an accusing finger at me. "This is your fault! You did this to me!"

She draws her axe and I draw my sword. "I'll fight all of you! Each and every one of you! I'll—"

She stops talking as her own trap swallows her and covers her with an excessive amount of sand.

"Come on! We have to dig her out!" Beezie says, and begins doing so.

"After everyone she's hurt?" Mooncake says. "She can dig herself out."

No one deserves to die, whether they caused others to or not. I hurriedly dig through the sand, but it's no use. Before we barely get more than one block down, her inventory rises to the surface.

"I can't believe it," Beezie says. "She's gone."

"Hey, it's morning," I say, staring out the window.

"I guess that's it, then," Beezie says.

"Yeah, we're safe," Mooncake says.

"And we're alive," Ivor says. "Let's not waste time standing around. There could still be traps everywhere in here."

*~*~*~*

We walk outside in the morning light.

"So, I guess the last step is finding the portal home?" Aiden says.

"Well, Cassie said it was right under her nose, right?" Beezie says.

"So maybe it's nearby," I say, scanning the area. "Hey, look! It's over there!"

"I guess this is goodbye, then?" Mooncake says.

"Yeah, just let us know if you ever accidentally find yourselves in our world," Lukas says.

"That's nice of you, but I don't think we can really portal hop without a portal key," Shiner says.

"I think Beezie's got you covered," I say.

Shiner looks at Beezie. "You stole the portal key from me?"

"It was just supposed to be a prank!" Beezie says, holding out her flint and steel. "I'm sorry! I really am so, so sorry!" Shiner glares at her.

"How about we all share that, huh?" I say.

"Well, I'm not good at goodbyes, so I'm just going home," Mooncake says.

"Yeah, me too," Shiner says. "Safe travels."

"Bye!" Beezie says, chasing after them.

"What a strange, strange bunch of individuals," Ivor says, and we start toward the portal. "Cassie What's-her-name was talking about being trapped here from another world. What if she was one of the old builders?"

"Dude, that totally makes sense," I say.

"If it's true, I sort of thought the old builders would be taller," Ivor mutters.

We reach the portal and I try to light it, but the ground just goes up in flames. On top of the portal frame appears Winslow. {When you're writing about Winslow that your cat in your bedroom at your grandparents' house in Winslow, Maine.} Before I can totally figure out what's happening, the ground disappears and we fall down the rabbit hole to somewhere I don't think is Wonderland.

*~*~*~*

We land, and it's dark. Very, very dark.

"What happened?"

"I can't see a thing!"

The lights flicker on and we're standing on a small, precarious strip of dirt stretching from one side to another. Lights come on in two more levels like this one.

"That's . . . ominous," Aiden says.

"That's . . . horrifying," I half-heartedly correct.

"Do you hear that?" Ivor asks, and I listen to hear a chirping noise coming from below us. The lights come on down there to reveal a bunch of squirming bugs. Well, great. Bugs and heights. Way to play with my fears, Cassie.

"Endermites!" Ivor cries.

"And there it is, (Y/N)!" comes an echoey voice from above. We look in the direction from which the sound is coming and find Cassie Rose, seemingly alive and well. "You're trapped! Stuck! You walked right into my best and final trap. I don't know how much time you've spent with endermites, but the poor things are eternally hungry. I would throw the flint and steel up here before I drop you down and you found out just how sharp their teeth are."

I check my inventory for the flint and steel, but it's nowhere in sight. "I think I might've dropped it. . . . I have no idea where it is," I say, low enough for only my friends to hear.

"Tick-tock, tick-tock, (Y/N)," Cassie says. "What'll it be—the flint and steel or your lives?"

"Why don't we share?" I ask out of sheer terror, not sure what she'll do to me if I tell her I don't know where it is. "We can, uh . . . We can explore together! And when we find our home, you can go on ahead and keep exploring, yeah? I mean, sharing is caring, right?"

"Share? Share?" she echoes. "What, you want to walk through some portal happily holding hands and stab me in the back later?" She continues talking before I can protest. "Nope. This is taking too long. I'll just let the endermites eat you and fish it out of your inventory." She places her White Pumpkin mask over her head. "It'll be the best fishing trip ever." She starts up a set of steps. "Winslow, my pet! Activate the trap!" Yet Winslow just sits on the lever console, licking his paw contently and Cassie mumbles something. She approaches the lever. "Prepare for your death." She flips the lever and the ground underneath us starts retracting, separating me from my friends.

We all dart to the iron doors on our corresponding side, but they're clearly locked.

"Without a lever or a button, it's no use trying to get these doors open," Ivor says.

That makes me think—lever. I can use the enderpearls I pocketed from Cassie's lair to get to the lever. "I got it!" I heave the enderpearl to the top of the platform and miss it by an inch. It bounces off the edge and I teleport before it falls, grabbing the edge to keep myself from falling. Whew, it feels weird to teleport. It's like I left a couple organs back there. I haul myself up and pull the lever back.

"That just made it go faster!" Lukas shouts.

Goodness, she boobytrapped the boobytraps? That seems so paranoid.

I destroy the lever entirely, breaking it off the console.

"What, you could do it? Just like that?" the White Pumpkin's says. "Trying to get leverage?" I duck out of the way as she lands next to me. {Come on, Cassie, that was such a Trista Joke™.} "Give me that key, (Y/N)!" She swings at me with her diamond axe and I dodge, parrying and knocking her off the edge. She teleports away before she goes down.

I check to see if my friends are safe and panic {at the disco} when I don't see them, but I hear Aiden call my name. They stand underneath me on a ledge in front of the door.

"Oh, my gosh, you're okay," I say, relieved.

"For now," Aiden says.

"Don't worry; I have a lever!" I hold up my lever victoriously.

"Throw it down," he says.

I hesitate, but drop it down to them, hoping with everything I have that my aiming was right.

"Got it!" Aiden cries, to my gigantic relief.

"Get to safety," I say. "I'll get the flint and steel." I run back toward where Cassie was.

"You're not a fast learner, are you?" she asks. She charges at me and I hesitantly jump to another ledge, my heart pounding.

"I grow tired of the game, (Y/N)," she says after enderpearling {is that a word?} to a ledge across from mine. I catch a glimpse of the flint and steel on another ledge a distance from mine, and Cassie notices my staring. "The key! You didn't have it either! Well, now . . ." She pulls out an enderpearl. "It's mine." She enderpearls over to it and I throw an enderpearl at her, pinning her to the ground. We struggle on the ground a few moments and freeze when Winslow approaches the flint and steel. He stands behind it, licking his paw. He starts playing with it like it's a toy.

"No! No, no, Winslow! Don't touch that!" Cassie cries. He's almost knocked it off the edge. "No, no, no! No, Winslow! Bad kitty! Bring it to Master. Bring it to Master!"

"Don't listen to her, Winslow," I say. "Bring me the shiny thing."

He looks at us, almost as if he's smirking, and knocks the flint and steel over the edge. {wINSLOW I CAN'T}

Cassie pushes me off her and enderpearls to where the flint and steel are falling. I tackle her again, but the enderpearl still lands in the right spot and she disappears from my grasp. She catches the flint and steel. "Ah, here you are! After all the time, I'm free! Winslow? We have to go. Where are you?"

I take the time she's distracted to my advantage and hop down to her level, sword drawn. "I think you should give that back, Cassie."

"No, I'm afraid not," and she pulls a lever on the ground next to her. The dirt underneath my starts to crumble and I run to the other side, jumping over to Cassie. I haul myself over the edge.

"I'll give you one thing," she says. "You are incredibly tenacious."

I charge at her and she blocks me with a blow of the flint and steel's fire. She creates a wall of fire in front of me. "That's netherrack, (Y/N). It stays on fire forever."

When all hope is lost, I find the greatest thing in times of need—my friends here to help me. They're each scattered around the place, each having a piece in the rescue. I realize I need to distract Cassie.

"Hey, Cassie!" I shout.

She sighs, annoyed. "What?"

"Aren't you going to say goodbye?" I ask. "Seems pretty rude to leave someone in a death trap and not say goodbye!"

"I don't know what you're playing at, but I'm bored with it," she says, approaching me. When she comes into the open, Jesse and Faith jump down on her, tackling her to the ground. Aiden and Lukas pour water over the fire in front of me.

The flint and steel falls from Cassie's grip. They bounce over to the edge and Ivor catches them. "Ha! I've got it! Excellent! I did it!" he cries.

"You're all dying now!" Cassie says, running to Ivor.

"Uh, no, thank you," he says, tossing the flint and steel to me. I catch it clumsily. Cassie comes at me and I strike the ground with the flint and steel, sending her into the air and over the edge onto a platform in the middle of the air. She pulls off her burning helmet and at falls to the ground with a hollow clunk.

"Well, (Y/N), I bet you're real proud of yourself," she says. "Look at me! Stuck again! Out of enderpearls!

"And that's where she wanted us to end up," Ivor says.

"I'm sorry it had to be this way, Cassie," I say. "I wish it could've gone differently."

"Me too . . . ," she mutters. We start to walk away. "Wait! At least don't leave me here alone. Give me my cat? My dear, sweet Winslow? My best . . . My only friend? Please."

I have to admit, I'm slightly tearing up. I pick up Winslow and toss him down to her. She catches him and goes on and on about how they're going to be together forever, just how it was supposed to be.

"So she kept the real portal down here this whole time," Jesse says as we walk toward it.

"Unless this one is trapped too," Ivor says.

"I don't know if even she'd be that paranoid," Lukas says.

"Only one way to find out," I say, and strike the portal. The promising bright green pool appears in the portal frame.

"Promising so far," Ivor says.

"Yeah, no trick floors or arrows or anything," Faith says.

"Okay, who's going to go first?" Lukas asks.

"I will," Aiden and I both say. We look at each other and smile.

"Or, what do you say we all go together?" I say.

"One . . ."

"Two . . ."

I grab Aiden's hand. "Three!"

It's deja vu, nothing much.

{Cue CaptainSparklez's spiel about becoming part of the floor.}

💕A/N💕

Woohoo! SeCoNd EpIsOdE dOnE!
Here's a long one since I made you wait so long ; )
Oh, and I created an imagine book, so go request some imagines or preferences! I need something to do in study hall. . . .
I'd greatly appreciate it! : )
Word count: 4,508