Taken || Book 2 of 2 in the Sam's Back series

5

Xisuma was the admin of the server, and with that job he considered himself responsible for the hermits' safety. That didn't mean he thought they needed protecting from every single little danger, no, it meant that when there was a serious threat he would keep them away from it and/or would investigate and stop the danger using whatever means necessary.

He couldn't ignore what little information he had about Sam, even if Grian seemed to want him to. So he looked into the communicator systems and tried searching for hacks.

There were a few blocked messages from every other hermit's communicator apart from Grian's; messages, death announcements and setting change announcements involving Mumbo and Scar. Sam certainly knew how to hack. He switched his communicator perspective to Grian's, so that he could see what Grian saw.

His eyes widened beneath his helmet at the most recent messages.

MumboJumbo was set to hardcore mode

GoodTimesWithScar was set to hardcore mode

This was more serious than he thought. Mumbo and Scar were in serious danger now. Before he tried to fix that problem, he needed to make sure everyone else would be safe. He switched back to his own communicator perspective, blocked Grian, Mumbo and Scar from being able to see any messages in case Sam saw them, and typed.

<Xisuma> Everyone come to town hall right now. Put everything on hold and get there as quickly as possible.

<Keralis1> Everything okay?

<FalseSymmetry> whats going on?

<Xisuma> Just get here quickly, I'll explain later.

He put his communicator in his pocket and ran over to town hall, awaiting everyone's arrival. He didn't think they were in any danger, but needed to keep an eye on them, just in case. He sat on the stairs outside the building and opened up the main codings page, looking for things that could help, starting off with location. Mumbo, Grian and Scar's communicators were all in the same place as far as he could tell, thousands of blocks away and in the middle of a mountains biome.

"What's up?" Beef asked as he arrived.

"I'll explain when everyone's here, could you get everyone to go to the safe room when they arrive please?" Xisuma said. In every season, they set up a hidden safe room in the shopping district or an accessible area in case anything like this happened. They'd never had to use it before.

"Okay." Beef said, seemingly catching on to the severity of the situation. Xisuma turned off death messages for everyone but himself - he didn't want anyone panicking. Then he opened the tab list and checked for any hacks. There was one, hiding someone. He clicked into the coding and tried to undo it but the words were fixed in place. They weren't budging. He'd never seen anything like it before. He kept trying while people started to arrive. He glanced up at everyone as they landed, registering everyone in his head.

When xB arrived, everyone he was expecting was there, so he followed him in, down a hidden doorway and into the double obsidian lined room. It was decorated with oak plank floorboards and white concrete walls. There were a couple of plants, enough beds for every hermit and a few tables and chairs, in which most hermits were sat. It was a large room and was prepared to be lived in for two months if need be.

A flurry of 'what's going on's were asked. His communicator vibrated.

Grian experienced kinetic energy

"Shit," he muttered, guessing he hadn't simply flown into a wall somewhere, then he realised everyone was still looking at him expecting an explanation. "Uh, I don't have a lot of time to explain, but Mumbo, Scar and Grian are in a lot of danger from what I can tell, and I just wanted to have you all in one place."

"What kind of danger?" Cub asked.

"Not completely sure, Scar and Mumbo have been switched to permadeath though and Grian went looking for them. He said it's something to do with someone he knows, but wouldn't tell me any more." X said.

"Permadeath?" Iskall asked. X nodded.

"By any chance, does the name Sam ring any bells for anyone?" The admin asked, it was worth asking. Everyone shook their heads.

"Wait," Stress said, everyone looked at her, "it might be unrelated, but about 3 months ago Mumbo said Grian had seen a bunny in the shopping district called Sam and had run away. Then I think they, uh, Grian, Mumbo and Scar, went missing for a few days, then came back and they were completely inseparable for a couple of weeks." She said.

"A bunny?" Cub asked as though it were stupid.

"Yeah, Mumbo thought I'd put it there, but I hadn't." Stress said.

"Hold on, who did put it there then?" Xisuma asked, just in case it had anything to do with the situation. The room was silent.

"Oh, come on, someone must've done." Iskall said, but a low murmur of 'no's and 'I didn't's followed.

"That might've had something to do with it then, I don't know if it'll help though." X said.

"Why'd you ask for that name?" Bdubs asked.

"Grian mentioned it, I think it's the name of the person putting them in danger." Xisuma said, glancing around to see if there were any more questions, but everyone seemed to have gone quiet.

The admin sighed and sat down, opening up his communicator to try and get Mumbo and Scar off of hardcore mode.

***

"Set your spawn." Sam ordered as he opened the heavy metal door of the dark room Grian was in and placed a bed down. Grian stood up and walked over to the object, doing as he was told out of fear. "I'm not in a good mood Gree-on, your little friend has tried to hack me." He approached Grian who tried to back away but was stopped by the wall. "I thought you knew what happened if you told anyone about me." Xisuma.

"I didn't, I swear I didn't." He said as Sam grabbed his shoulders and pinned him against the wall.

"Don't lie to me," Sam said in a low voice.

"I'm not lying, please, I didn't tell him anything." Grian replied. Sam punched him in the ribs and grabbed him by the shoulders again to keep him in place.

"Are you sure?" He asked.

"Yes, yes I am." Grian's voice was broken with sobs, and Sam punched him again, and again, before pushing him to another wall. He hit his head and everything seemed to go blurry for a few seconds, before he regained himself and Sam was grabbing him again, this time throwing him to the ground. He stomped his foot down on his chest and there were multiple cracks. Grian yelled in pain. Then Sam picked him up again and flung him against another wall, this time a lot more powerfully.

Grian experienced kinetic energy

The short hermit woke up in his bed, breathless and panicking, and Sam was waiting for him. He pulled out something from his pocket and they jangled like keys, then grabbed Grian's wrists and put something cold and hard around them.

Handcuffs.