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Lizzie, typically, has trouble feeling like she belongs.
It’s easy for people to like her; she’s nice, she’s friendly. It’s that second bit, the part where they look past the cute buildings and pink hair and start viewing her as not just a person, but a person who matters. That’s the bit that she has trouble with.
So, when she builds the Fairy Fort, a place of her very own, she builds it with one goal in mind. Belonging.
The pink tulips match her hair, and the soft grass is comforting beneath her feet, and the boughs of the trees dip in a way that kind of feels like a hug. And she belongs. She makes sure she does.
“Do you have any idea how flammable a base made of the actual forest is?”
Lizzie looks up, shielding the sun from her eyes as she tries to make out the silhouette of a person on the canopy of trees forming the border of the fort.
“Well,” she responds, straightening from the flowers she had been planting, dirt still caked to her hands and under her fingernails, “I’m not planning on starting any fires. Are you?”
The figure jumps, it’s a long way to the ground, but they land in a crouch in front of Lizzie, rendering any fall damage trivial.
They straighten, and Lizzie is met with long red hair tied up on their head and skin stitched together in varying shades of green. The person has a wound at their ribs, though it seems oddly sterile, giving Lizzie a perfect view of a ribcage free of blood.
It’s strangely intimate, being able to see into another person’s very body.
“Who knows?” she says, “I might get the urge.”
They gesture over to the top of the nearby mountain, on which rests a half constructed turret of a cobblestone castle. “That’s my place. Given my position, who knows what could happen? I could wake up the boogeyman and send you a nice, neighbourly river of lava.” She smiles wickedly, lips painted a darker green than her skin, and there’s real happiness there.
Lizzie crosses her arms. “Are you threatening me?”
Her neighbour drops their jaw in a mockery of surprise. “ No, I would never. It’s just a friendly warning, I’m being neighbourly, yeah?”
“Neighbourly. ”
“Hey, hey,” they take a step towards Lizzie, moving awfully smoothly for someone so clearly dead. “Look, hi, I’m Cleo, I live on the hill. You can come running to me if anyone else, far less kind than I, decides to burn your forest to the ground. How about that? We can even build a getaway tunnel and everything.”
“And if you’re the one burning it to the ground?”
“Hey, I’m sure I had a good reason.”
This makes Lizzie smile, “You trust yourself an awful lot more than I do.”
“Who else is there to trust? The only other person I’ve met hasn’t even told me their name.”
“Lizzie.”
Cleo smiles, “Cute, it fits your whole…” she gestures to the general ambience of the fort.
Lizzie’s stomach does a flip. “Thanks, if that was a compliment.”
“Don’t worry, it was.”
***
Look, Lizzie can do manual labour. She’s built houses and planted trees. She’s dismantled those houses, cut down those trees and picked up and moved forty shulkers' worth of materials across the map. She’s mined sand for hours just for one greenhouse. She can do it, she has done it.
It’s just that if one must dig, why can’t it be outside? Why can’t it be done around trees and flowers and with the sun above you? Instead of in a stuffy cave with no breeze to speak of.
At least Cleo is good company.
She’s weird and morbid and strangely sadistic. She has a fascination with fire that seems to surpass their half-formed threat to Lizzie’s home, and has a vengeful streak surpassing that of anyone Lizzie has known. But, they’re funny, and genuinely kind, and right now Lizzie can’t imagine a person she’d rather be digging a disguisingly subterranean escape tunnel with.
Cleo pulls back from the stone wall, swinging her pickaxe back so it rests on her shoulder and running her free hand through her hair, even as it’s pulled back from her face.
Lizzie finds her eyes following a bead of sweat as it traces a path from the back of Cleo’s neck down their back, until it is absorbed into their sports bra.
“Ok, I call lunch time.”
And, well, Lizzie didn’t bring a clock. Who is she to argue?
Cleo situates herself on a stone slab jutting out from the wall, and Lizzie sits on the ground next to her, leaning back against the cold stone behind her.
“Tunnel building is no joke,” Lizzie says. “You’d think it would be a little easier to dig a one by two block gap.”
“You’ll be grateful for it when it saves your butt.”
“Upon my base’s ’inevitable’ demise.”
“I’m telling you,” Cleo says, “it is inevitable.”
Then, they reach into their pocket and pull out a sandwich, which is surprising to Lizzie for some reason.
“Oh, I didn’t know you…”
“Ate?” Cleo finishes.
“I guess so,” Lizzie shrugs.
“Even the dead require sustenance, darling. Zombie’s gotta eat.”
“Not brains?” It’s a joke. Mostly.
Cleo winces, “Yeah, no. Not brains.”
She pulls apart the sandwich to reveal a large slice of pork in it. “I like meat, though, so who knows? Maybe that’s part of it.”
Lizzie didn’t really have the foresight to pack food for the tunnel, but, the benefits of being a gardener, she finds a few carrots in her inventory and decides that they may as well be lunch.
“Do you mind if I ask?”
Cleo looks down at her, “About…?”
“About the whole,” Lizzie tries not to gesture at Cleo’s whole, everything, and then gives in to the impulse.
Cleo shrugs, “Have at it.”
“What happened?”
Cleo sets their sandwich down on their knee, and stretches their hands over their head, cracking their back. “Oh, the typical stuff, you know. You die to zombies in a hardcore world, and when you next wake up, your skin is green and there’s a hole through you.”
“So it was…”
“A glitch, I think.”
“Hardcore worlds suck.”
“Nothing like the fear of death to scare you into lighting up your megabase.”
Lizzie laughs, “So do you get anything out of it? Zombie allies? Properly edible rotten flesh?”
“Nope,” Cleo shakes her head, “as far as I can tell, it’s all cosmetic, baby. All I got was this hot bod.” She gestures to the hole in her abdomen.
“Hey,” Lizzie argues, “it could be worse.”
“Yeah? How so?”
“Not many people could pull off an exposed ribcage.”
Cleo blushes, which is strange. Lizzie has never known them to get embarrassed.
“Thats kind of you, Lizzie.”
Cleo stands up abruptly, diverting the conversation as she brings her pickaxe back into motion. “Come on, let’s get back to it.”
Lizzie follows, but not before making sure to catch another glimpse of those rosy cheeks.
***
Lizzie had thought she was prepared for the boogeyman curse.
She gets the concept. The bloodlust, the anger. Free trial of being on red, see what it feels like to kill.
It’s worse than she imagined, so much worse. The curse has a fist around her heart, and it’s squeezing. It won’t let her go.
If this is what being on red feels like, she doesn’t know how any of them stand it.
It doesn’t really matter which one of them she kills, Pearl or Scott. Either will do.
She tells them she wants the slime chunk, something that Cleo isn’t in on, something they can’t control.
She tells them Cleo scares her, and really, it’s half of the truth. Lizzie is terrified. Of her own thoughts, if not Cleo herself. Cleo seems to have encompassed her life, leaving Lizzie grasping at straws of the things they don’t have their claws in.
Maybe the slime chunk isn’t such a bad idea, even if it is a death trap.
She kills Pearl in the end, drags herself bloody and shaking from the hole in the earth, Scott screaming all the way.
The curse abandons her body, leaving her with nothing at all to keep her standing.
She didn’t tell them. Cleo or BigB or Ren. She lied; they didn't know she was the boogeyman.
They must know now.
Lizzie collapses to the ground the moment she closes the gate of the Fairy Fort behind her, burning her hands in soft grass and willing her head to stop pounding.
She had kind of hoped it would feel better to kill someone. She had thought that maybe she might feel powerful, or scary, or brave. Instead, she just feels cold and scared and alone.
There’s a figure standing on the treetops, a silhouette that gives Lizzie a strong sense of deja vu.
They jump down, landing in that same crouch. No fall damage.
“Hi, Cleo.” Lizzie smiles, she’s pretty sure her teeth are bloody, she bit her tongue in the struggle.
Cleo crouches in front of Lizzie, leaning over her so that her hair slips out from behind her ears to dance in front of her face. “Hey, Liz.”
Their face is open and welcoming, eyes wide and mouth set in a friendly line.
It’s strange. Lizzie had thought that Cleo would be scared, and now that she sees them in front of her, she doesn’t know how the thought crossed her mind. How had she forgotten that Cleo is the bravest person she’s ever met?
“I killed Pearl, Cleo. I didn’t know it would be like this. I don’t know what to do.”
And it’s true. She’s shaking, shivering so hard she’s scared she’ll shed her skin, leaving only blood and bone behind. She’s scared, but she doesn’t know what of, angry but she doesn’t know what at.
The boogey curse had made her feel like an addict, doing anything for the high of killing someone else. Now she’s going through the withdrawals properly, as the curse finally leaves her system. She hadn’t known how much of what kept her going was pure adrenaline.
Cleo’s hands land on Lizzie’s upper arms, and as grateful as she is for the touch, it takes everything in her not to flinch.
“It’s alright,” Cleo says, thumbs rubbing comforting circles into her bare skin. “You don’t need to know. You’re cured, right?”
Lizzie nods.
“And you’re not hurt?”
“Not anymore.”
“Then everything’s ok, yeah? You can rest.”
Lizzie looks up at her, eyes blurring with tears. “I don’t know how.”
Cleo’s strong arms come around her, a rough hand landing on her lower back and pulling her closer until she sits almost in Cleo’s lap. Cleo is soft and warm, big and comforting in a way that lets Lizzie know that she is safe.
Cleo has never been scared. They are the bravest person in the world. (They are also soft and sweet and kind and helpful, but it is their hardness that comforts Lizzie in this moment.)
Cleo would never hurt her. Lizzie trusts them.
She is okay.
***
“Armoursmith, right?” Lizzie says. “I mean, it’s totally obvious.”
Cleo shrugs as much as they can, long limbs splayed out across the grass next to Lizzie’s prone form.
“You’re forgetting you have enchanted diamond, what do we need an armoursmith for? Me and BigB are almost there, too, and Ren’s catching up.”
“Well then, what’s your bright idea? And don’t say a fletcher, we don’t need stick trades that badly.”
“Weaponsmith,” Cleo says simply. “They trade emeralds for coal, which we have plenty of, and you can get a sharpness two iron sword from a novice.”
“I’ve got a diamond sword,” Lizzie protests, “I don't need anything else.”
Cleo rolls their eyes, “A diamond sword with bane of arthropods.”
Lizzie rolls onto her stomach, elbowing Cleo hard. She still kind of doubts it made an impact. “Shut up.”
Cleo rolls over, too, holding their hands up in surrender. “Hey hey hey, I just don’t get your aversion to grindstones.”
“My aversion is that Scar has the enchanter now, and bane of arthropods is better than nothing.”
“Barely,” Cleo mutters.
“What was that?”
“Nothing, nothing! I’m just saying a weaponsmith could do you a bit better than that.”
“Oh yeah, like what? Smite?”
“Oof,” Cleo mines a stab to the chest. “Low blow to the undead, dude.”
Lizzie raises her eyebrows, “Does smite work on you?”
Cleo shakes their head, turning over onto their side to face Lizzie. “Nah, no way. Not that I would tell you if it did.”
Lizzie copies their motion, face to face. “You don’t trust me?”
“You never know when someone could go red,” she raises an eyebrow. “Or be a boogey.”
Lizzie sighs, “I didn’t even think of killing you, I’ll have you know.”
“Better not have. Although I’m not sure I can say the same for Ren.”
Lizzie blinks, “I know he’s boogey, but he told us, didn’t he? He’s not going to kill you.”
“I don’t know, Liz. He’s loyal to you over us.”
“Well, he knows full well I won’t be happy with him if he kills you. Surely it would be another boogey to take you out.”
Cleo raises an eyebrow, smiling. Her green eyes look nice like this, reflecting the sunlight. “Already betting on my demise?”
“You brought it up!”
“I guess you never know if there are other boogeys hanging around.”
“You’re not going to die, Cleo.”
“I might.”
“Please,” Lizzie groans. “It’s sunny. Can’t we just pretend the boogeyman doesn’t exist?”
“Ok,” Cleo says simply, “what should we talk about?”
“I don’t know,” Lizzie says, “something nice. I started planting those cornflowers we found around the Southlands.”
Cleo wedges their elbow under their head, getting comfortable, “Oh yeah? Where’d you do it? I haven’t seen them.”
“They’re over at Ren’s,” Lizzie answers. “His place is more fortified than here, thinking that might be a plan B when this place inevitably goes up in flames.”
“And aren’t you glad I warned you about that?” Cleo jokes.
“If it doesn’t burn, you’ll have hell to pay for making me so paranoid.”
Cleo laughs, flinging her head back and showing her teeth in a wide smile.
Pretty, pretty, pretty.
“Don’t worry, darling. I'll make sure something comes of it.”
“You know I don’t appreciate your threats,” Lizzie says, even as a blush spreads across her cheeks at the endearment.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Cleo reaches out so that their hand rests on Lizzie’s cheek. “You know I don’t mean them.”
Lizzie leans into the hand, tilting her head to press a kiss to Cleo’s wrist. It sends a spike of adrenaline through her system. Brave.
“I know, you’re too nice anyway.”
“There’s another adjective to cross off the list.” Cleo’s hand still hasn’t moved.
“Huh?”
“I don’t think I’ve been described as nice before.”
“Well, you’re plenty nice.”
“To you, maybe.”
“Hey! I’m all that matters. Who cares if you’re nice to anyone else?”
Cleo’s lips quirk. “I certainly don’t.”
“Then it’s sorted.”
“I guess it is.”
And there, there it is. Cleo’s gaze flicks down for just a second, moving from Lizzie’s eyes to her lips.
Bullseye, caught ya.
“The lighting is really nice right now,” Lizzie tells Cleo, “you look beautiful.”
“Oh?” Cleo raises their eyebrows. “And I don’t look beautiful the rest of the time?”
Lizzie’s face is hot.
“Not at all, just especially so this time.”
Cleo smiles, small and secretive.
“Thanks, Lizzie.”
“Anytime.”
“Hey,” Cleo says, “can you do me a favour?”
“Yeah, of course, anything.”
“Can you kiss me?”
She hadn’t expected it would happen like this, but honestly, now that Cleo is so close and her voice is so sweet and her lips look so soft? Lizzie can’t imagine it happening any other way.
“Yeah?” Lizzie asks. “You sure?”
“I wouldn't have asked if I wasn’t.”
So, Lizzie kisses them.
Lizzie kisses them, lying on the grass and feeling the sun on her cheek. Cleo is warm with it.
Cleo’s lips are as soft as they had looked, and they taste like the strawberries the two of them had eaten not ten minutes ago.
And it’s perfect. It’s perfect and it’s perfect and it’s perfect and for a minute Lizzie forgets that this is a death game, that they’re both going to die.
Cleo pulls away, a smile on their lips.
“Thanks for the favour.”
Lizzie kisses them again, “Anytime.”
Cleo sighs, stretching their arms over their head and making a pretty silhouette in the sunlight.
Lizzie hears their back crack.
“Ok, I think that’s enough relaxation time,” Cleo says. “I’m gonna go find BigB, I think.” They pause, “I’ll ask him if he knows anything about boogeys.”
Lizzie groans, playing along with the bit as Cleo pushes herself to her knees. “You and your boogeymen. I can’t believe you’re leaving me.”
Cleo pauses in their motion to lean down towards Lizzie, taking her jaw in their hand and pressing a soft kiss to her lips. “Don’t worry, I’ll be back.”
“You better be.” Lizzie’s heart beats in her chest, stronger, stronger, stronger.
Cleo smiles, “When have I ever lied?”
***
Cleo does not come back.
ZombieCleo was slain by bigbst4tz2
When Lizzie finds BigB, curled over himself in a few inches of river water, he’s crying. The blood hasn’t even been washed away yet.
Lizzie sits down next to him, not caring about the water soaking her skirt.
BigB doesn’t look up.
“What have you done?” She asks him. He doesn’t answer, and she didn’t really expect him to.
“Was it worth it?”
“It was the curse,” his voice is muffled. “You know what it’s like.”
“She's never going to forgive you.”
“I know.”
She might not forgive me either.
***
Lizzie can’t find Cleo anywhere. She looks in their base, in the forest, with BEST and in the Southlands and underneath Magic Mountain.
She walks until her legs collapse underneath her, and Ren finds her curled against his cobblestone wall.
He brings her inside and puts her in his bed, brings her tea, and when she remains unresponsive, dinner.
She doesn’t even say thank you.
***
Lizzie catches Cleo trying to kill the zombie villager. Which she really should have been less surprised about.
Cleo knew where it was; they were mad, obviously they were mad. They were going to do something about it eventually.
Maybe Lizzie just hadn’t expected it to happen so soon.
“Cleo?”
She spins, sword still drawn. It almost grazes Lizzie’s chest in the cramped cave.
“Oh, Lizzie,” she laughs. It’s a mean laugh, a sound Lizzie has never heard from her before. “I hoped I’d run into you.”
There are deep circles under their eyes, and though they remain yellow, Lizzie can’t help but think there’s a red glint to them.
“Oh?” Lizzie struggles not to step away from the blade. “Why? What happened?”
Maybe that wasn’t the best thing to say.
“What happened? ” Cleo says. “BigB killed me, Lizzie. That’s what happened.” They resheath their sword and cross their arms over their chest instead.
“And, as I hear it, you’re still shacking up with him.”
“Look,” Lizzie holds a placating hand out in front of her, “I’m mad at him too, Cleo. But it’s the curse, you don’t know how it is.”
“Yeah, ok,” Cleo huffs, rolling their eyes. “Yeah, ok, sure. I don’t get it. But maybe I don’t need to. We’re on a whole server of green and yellow names, Lizzie. And yet, who did he choose to kill? His ride or die teammate since day one. He knew I wouldn’t forgive him.”
And he had, Lizzie had known it too. And yet she had clung to that thread of hope even as it was just another iron bar in the cage she had trapped herself in, unable to break free of the idea that Cleo would come back.
“So, I’m leaving.” Cleo smiles, white teeth, green lips. She had kissed Lizzie with those lips, so soft she had thought she would melt. “I’ve packed up the castle, taken everything I worked so hard for.”
The unspoken sentence, hidden beneath the forcefulness of their words. And there’s nothing you can do about it.
“That’s it?” Lizzie asks, knowing she sounds sort of pathetic. “You’re just gone?”
“I’m going where I can be appreciated.”
Lizzie wants to scream. Her skin pricked, tiny volcanoes ready to erupt at the slightest provocation.
“Yeah? Where’s that then?”
“Just to some friends, nothing for you to worry about.”
Cleo takes a step forward, making for the door behind Lizzie, but Lizzie sidesteps, blocking it.
Cleo draws her sword, and despite everything, Lizzie is entirely confident they won’t stab her.
“I knew I could never trust you,” she tries to sneer as she says it, haughty and selfish. I don’t care one bit, that’s what her expression is trying to say.
“Awwww,” and she doesn’t think Cleo has frowned once in this conversation, keeping her rage chained beneath a high-pitched voice and wide lips. “You could have trusted me, you know that.”
Cleo elbows her in the ribs, hard, and Lizzie falls, gasping for breath.
Cleo steps over her like she doesn’t mean anything at all.
“Bye, Lizzie.”
***
Every block Lizzie places feels like another one of Cleo’s elbows right to her ribs.
What she’s doing is sensible. Cleo is dangerous; she’s a liability. She all but told BigB to his face that she intended to kill him, and she lives just one secret tunnel away.
They’re a red now, and Lizzie hates to admit how much it hurt to see their death message appear in the chat.
ZombieCleo fell from a high place
So, anyway. BigB is moving into the fort, and Lizzie is blocking the tunnel, no matter how much it hurts.
It was stupid, how convinced she was that despite everything it- they could work. That she and Cleo could skip happily off into the sunset on their yellow lives and live together in peace.
She tries not to blame BigB too much for ruining it. It only works a little.
It was always going to happen anyway. They were never going to work out, and Lizzie should have figured that out earlier.
They dug this tunnel together, and now she’s blocking it up alone. It feels kind of poetic, in a way.
***
They’re on top of Ren’s tower when they see it, the smoke.
A river of lava runs down from Cleo’s mountain, and where it meets the trees, a blaze starts, high and hot, clogging the sky with smoke and sending small animals running for the river.
The forest is burning. Lizzie’s forest is burning, and there’s nothing she can do about it.
Cleo’s eyes are red when they find her, standing on top of the burning trees. It’s a true, ruby red this time, not just the glint Lizzie had seen before.
They still look beautiful, it still matches their hair.
BigB tries to say something, something about Terry and apologies and arson. Cleo cuts him off.
“Don’t, BigB, just don’t. I’ll shoot you, you know I’ll shoot you.”
He closes his mouth, crossing his arms over his chest and taking a step back.
Cleo jumps down, gaze still locked on BigB.
They land in a crouch. No fall damage, just like always.
“And that’s the issue, isn’t it BigB? You betrayed me.”
Cleo advances, one step after another, until BigB is backed against the door to Lizzie’s old cottage.
“You thought you could just kill me, and I’d forgive you, didn’t you? Oh, your good friend Cleo, they’d never hold a grudge .”
Cleo steps forward on the last word, BigB tries to step back, but has nowhere to go.
“But, you know, I think you’re my target now BigB. I’m going to hunt you down to your yellow life, and then your red life, and maybe even after that, you know?” Cleo’s eyes flash. “I’m going to end your life.”
“Hey,” Lizzie holds out a placating hand. “Cleo, stop, give him a break. Can we talk about this? Maybe BigB can-”
Cleo whirls around, advancing on Lizzie instead, closer and closer until her finger jabs into her chest.
“And don’t get me started on you, Lizzie. You’re protecting him! After everything he’s done. You’ve put him up your little tower of cowardice.” She gestures in a wide arc towards REN’s tower.
Despite everything, Lizzie takes a step back. Cleo follows.
“And guess what? Whoever harbours a traitor is a traitor.”
“It’s the curse, Cleo,” Lizzie’s voice comes out soft, almost a whisper. “It does things to you, things you couldn't understand. He was desperate.”
Of all the things, Lizzie doesn’t expect Cleo to throw their head back in a full, hearty belly laugh.
“Oh, Lizzie,” the finger jabbed at her chest has become a hand now, resting full palmed against it, almost tender. “You thought the boogeyman curse was bad? I’m red now, I’m a boogeyman full time.”
“I’m sorry.” She doesn’t really know what she’s apologising for. BigB’s betrayal
“You didn’t think this through, did you, darling?” Cleo asks. “What are you doing? Making amends? You can’t make amends for what you’ve done. It’s over, and I’m red, and you’re living with your very own ticking time bomb of betrayal.”
“BigB isn’t going to betray me.”
There it is, that bitter, twisted smile that hijacks Cleo’s face.
“You know what? Can you do me a favour?” Cleo asks.
They’re so close. As close as they were on the grass just days ago. Lizzie wants to kiss them so badly it feels like a fist gripping her heart.
She nods. She can’t help it.
“Die for me.”
For a moment, a split second really, Lizzie hears it differently.
Kiss me, Cleo says. Kiss me, she says, and despite everything, Lizzie does.
She kisses them exactly how she wants to, with her hands in their hair and her tongue in their mouth and after it all, Cleo stays. Cleo stays here with Lizzie, and everything is ok.
She gets her happily ever after.
Except that that doesn’t happen. Because this is real life, and not some stupid dream of love and belonging and Cleo.
Instead, they shove Lizzie away and turn, walking away without another word.
“Wait, Cleo, please.”
Cleo pauses, not turning around.
“I don’t have anything left to say to you, Lizzie. Do you have anything left to say to me?”
I love you, I want you, I would do anything to make you come back.
But she can’t say any of that, can she?
“I guess not.”
From behind, Lizzie sees Cleo’s sharp nod.
“Have a nice life, Lizzie.”
***
Ren’s tower doesn’t feel the same as the fairy fort.
It’s different, all cobblestone and deepslate. It’s man-made and medieval, and Lizzie doesn’t blend in at all. She doesn’t belong.
She builds herself a cottage in the courtyard, and it doesn’t help anything.
She knows that really, the issue isn’t the tower, it’s her. She doesn’t fit.
BigB and Ren are friends now, better than she had ever been with either of them. They talk and they laugh and she just… sits there.
It’s a her issue. She can’t blame them, her and her thoughts.
The few really, truly good times, when they’re talking and laughing and Lizzie feels awake and present in the moment, it always happens.
A flash, just behind a tree or peeking through a crack in the cobblestone. It’s the orange of hair or the green of skin, or, some few times, the white of an exposed ribcage.
And then, Lizzie is quiet.
She doesn’t know if she’s imagining things, but whatever it is, she can never seem to get Cleo’s claws out from where they’re buried deep within her skin.
She’s not sure she ever will.