Chapter Text
Z had been spending several weeks on a secret project.
At all costs, he had been making sure that no one else found out about it. Sure, the buildings and small projects were fun to keep quiet for a day, maybe as a little surprise for later for Moe, or something that Regect would eventually end up running into.
But this time. He was so far deep into this, he had to keep committing to this.
Z had to have been about ten thousand blocks away from the spawn at this point. The air was bitter and cold, and he buried his nose in his sweater as he slowly hobbled through the snow and dark pine leaves, with a hurried pace and keeping his head on a swivel.
After a good hundred blocks or so, he came across an unassuming dirt wall with a singular stone button, placed right on the floor and tucked neatly behind some spruce leaves.
Z gave the button a quick tap. And within a few seconds, he heard the mechanical clicks and whirrs of pistons pulling on stone. He flinched at the creaking and scraping, his gaze darting behind and around him, but he tried to assure himself that he wasn’t followed.
A few minutes passed. Then, a single 2 x 1 passageway opened up into the wall, with a steep stone staircase spiraling downwards. With haste, he ducked inside, allowing the piston gate to click shut behind him.
The staircase opened up to a large hall of oak wood and deep slate brick, decorated nicely with rooms full of double chests, diamond armor stands, decorative foliage, and some nice-looking paintings that lined the walls. Glass windows lined each side of the hall, revealing that the structure sat neatly in a luminous, lush green cave biome.
And in one of these rooms, near the end of the hall, Z quietly approached, peeling open the door.
Axolotls.
Hundreds, upon hundreds of axolotls.
The hallways, rooms, and loot had been a nice bonus. But this was the real project.
Ever since he heard about the rare chance of a dark blue axolotl, he had been constantly thinking about getting his hands on one. Sure, they were nice to look at, but once he got more than one, he could bring it back and show it to Moe.
Just a few hours ago, he had bred all the pairs he had enough fish for, once again. But after Regect and Moe were starting to wonder where he was, he had to stop to quickly rush back to where their base was, or else he would arouse suspicion. But as soon as he could, Z scurried right back over to his little hidden base.
Part of him felt a little bad for hiding this away. But at least here, he knew that no one else would interfere with his project.
With a sigh, Z reached into another double chest, pulling up another handful of buckets with lively, stinking, floppy fish to feed these guys. Right back to the routine.
But as he got ready to start breeding them again, he caught a glimpse, a flutter of color.
He thought it was the water, or maybe the sky. But as he scurried forward, pushing through mounds of happy flopping axolotls, he found his tiny little prize, scurrying and flopping on the floor.
A baby blue axolotl.
And despite the sleep deprivation wracking his brain, Z felt excitement light up in his chest.
With haste, he quickly yanked the bright tropical fish out of the bucket, flinging it at the axolotls. The little creatures piled on top of each other, tearing into the unassuming fish as Z quickly scooped up the fragile little creature in a bucket. And in just minutes, he made a mad dash out of the farm to a different room in his little underground castle.
A small bedroom with a water tank. Quickly, he dropped the axolotl into the water. And with big, wide eyes and a faint smile, he admired his prize. Weeks of non-stop fish gathering and axolotl breeding. Worst of all, everything he wore stank of rancid fish every time he left the room.
Suddenly, a familiar voice piped up behind him.
“Don’t think you could make a good sushi out of that-”
Z jumped, hollering out as he immediately whipped around, sword out and pointed straight out. He hadn’t even registered who it was as he swung his sword wildly, with Regect jumping back to dodge.
“CHILL OUT DUDE-” Regect yelled out, “IT’S ME.”
“YOU?” Z spoke aloud, almost in disbelief, “What are YOU doing here?”
“I was just trying to find you earlier, and you weren’t responding to my texts!” Regect whined, “So I just teleported to you!”
Z scoffed. “I told you I was gonna be busy and NOT to bother me.”
“What else was I supposed to do?”
“NOT BOTHER ME?!”
Regect groaned out. “Oh my GOD, you are such a baby,"
“Whatever, I’m not doing this today,” Z exclaimed, throwing his hands up and turning away from Regect. “GO HOME.”
Despite his angry protests, Regect continued ignoring him, looking around and wandering through the giant underground base.
“So you had all of this here, the whole time?” Regect asked aloud, then sharply cut in with delight, “What’s this?”
Z whirled around, immediately turning to see Regect rummaging through his chests of resources and rare items that he’d been saving up. Immediate alarmed panic flared through his chest as he hurtled towards Regect, quickly shutting the chest.
“DON’T TOUCH THAT!”
“Are those totems? Can I have one?”
“NO.”
Z slammed the chest lid. But by the time he had already got the lid shut and locked, Regect was already in his armor stands, with a set of diamond armor jammed on top of him.
“You had diamond armor the whole time?” Regect snickered, “You never even WEAR armor,"
“Because I know you blow shit up, dude. PUT THAT BACK,"
“Makes no sense, but sure, why not?”
He immediately ripped the chestplate and helmet from Regect, carefully setting them right back onto where the armor stand was. But worry flared up again as he heard the pitter-patter of footsteps leaving behind him, and he desperately shuffled the armor in place as fast as he could.
“Stop touching my SHIT-” Z hollered out.
As soon as he could, Z ran off in the direction of where the noise was. And to his dismay, he found him in the bedroom, right next to the dark blue axolotl tank. He eyed it curiously, and Z’s face immediately dropped as he froze in the doorway.
The rest of the stuff, sure, he could lose. But this was nearly a month-long investment.
“Get away from the tank, dude,” he commanded, pulling out his sword.
Regect only chuckled, poking at the glass and watching the creature swim back and forth. “It’s just a fish, chill out. Why do you have it cooped up here? We could bring it back to the house and-”
Regect pulled out a bucket of water from one of the nearby chests, immediately scooping it up. Z’s stomach practically dropped in his chest.
“Nah, I’m just kidding, dude. I wouldn’t do that to you,” Regect chuffed, putting the axolotl back into the tank.
Z felt his body sink in relief once he finally put it back. “Yeah, haha, you really had me worried there-”
“But I did rig this entire place with 250 blocks of TNT when you weren’t looking,” Regect pointed out, “Pretty smooth, right?”
Suddenly, there was a sharp, mechanical click.
The two froze and slowly lowered their gaze to the floor. Regect’s foot had accidentally landed right on a stone pressure plate. One that would normally open a trapdoor.
There was the soft pop and hiss of one of the TNT blocks below them. Z could only offer a sharp glare at the guy in front of him.
“ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?”
The two sat, staring at the burning, blown remains of his underground base. Only a few stray slabs and oak logs remained floating in the air, still ablaze from the chaos, with an enormous crater cleared in the ground.
The only sound in the air was the crackling of fire.
And all he could do was stare at it.
Then that annoying, grating voice piped up.
“You think the axolotl survived?”
This
Fucking
Dumbass.
Z immediately curled his fingers into a fist, slamming them right against Regect’s chest with a sharp thud. He heard the sharp exhale of air as Regect stumbled back, letting out a pained huff as he clenched his chest.
“What the hell, man?” Regect blubbered out.
“I SPENT WEEKS ON THAT! WEEKS!” Z shouted, “THIS IS WHY I DON’T SHOW YOU MY STUFF!”
“God, it was an accident, okay? Jeez-” Regect coughed, dramatically, sputtering out, “Jesus, I think you broke a rib-”
“YEAH, SUCKS, DOESN’T IT?”
“Fuck you, man!”
“Fuck me? Oh FUCK ME?!” Z yelled, “YOU JUST BLEW UP THE AXOLOTL! AND MY BASE!”
Regect hunched over, holding himself up with his hands on his knees, still breathing hard from the hit.
Part of Z felt a little bit sorry.
But then Regect continued.
“Dude, calm down,” Regect interrupted in almost a mocking tone, “It isn’t even that big of a deal, I can just remake it-”
Z wished he had punched him harder.
His callous, almost patronizing tone is what drove Z over the edge. He immediately shot up from where he was sitting and marched right in front of Regect as he continued shouting at him.
“THIS! THIS IS THE PROBLEM!” Z shouted out. “YOU DO THIS! YOU ALWAYS DO THIS! YOU KEEP DOING THIS SHIT, AND KEEP EXPECTING EVERYTHING TO BE OKAY AFTER!”
“Dude, chill out! Let me just-”
“NO, I’M NOT DONE!” Z sharply interrupted, “I’M SICK OF YOU PULLING THIS SHIT! I JUST WANT TO HAVE A GOOD TIME, I JUST WANT ONE THING FOR MYSELF, AND YOU KEEP FUCKING IT UP!”
“You’re being SO dramatic right now,” Regect retorted, “Dude, I’ll just fix it! I can just spawn it in, and-”
“No. NO. I’m not doing this. You’re a dick! You fuck up everything because you think it's funny, and you leave EVERYONE ELSE to deal with it. Because you don’t give a shit about anyone else!” Z spat.
“That isn’t true at all! I’ve done so much for you-”
“Because it’s only when YOU get in trouble after. But you keep doing this shit!” Z spat, feeling a nasty retort build up in his mouth.
Z let it spill out.
“You realize that THIS is why no one else puts up with you, right?” Z spat out, “You think you’re some super scary villain guy thing. But you’re just some stupid bully that no one likes to be around, because he doesn’t give a shit about anyone else,"
“Hey, don’t forget that I can send you to superhell again-”
“Yeah, just because you can, right?” Z snarled, “Because you have power, and I don’t, and all you do with it is be an asshole!”
Z let it sit for a moment, watching Regect for any sort of reaction. It was always hard to read him, being just a few slivers of limbs and a chest, but maybe there was something there that could make him feel vindicated.
There was a short pause, with just the heavy breathing coming from Z after that shouting. But he was only greeted with a snort and (what he presumed) was a roll of the eyes.
Regect simply muttered out, “At least I don’t get all whiny over a stupid axolotl.”
That was it. He was done.
Z hit him again, in the side. Hard. And before he even finished falling to the ground, Z turned away and threw out an ender pearl towards the staircase, far, far away from the damn entity.
If Regect knew any better, he’d take a hint not to follow him.
And as he stalked away, hot anger still burned in his chest, flaring up behind his eyes, threatening to pull tears. Z stiffened his face, swearing curses and muttering out insults as he retreated to the open air of the woods.