Day breaks and the sunlight shines on Boys face. His eyes open wide as he scrambles out of bed.
He can play more of the game if it's early enough. No one will be there to bug him. He pops out of bed and froze in place.
Mom
was at the door, "I've got some errands to do today. We're gonna be
gone for a bit. You can play when you get home. Get ready to leave."
Boy gets ready, putting on socks first then putting on his clothes dramatically one at a time.
He strikes a heroic pose and goes outside to play while waiting.
Boy is on the fortress grounds in his sneaking suit checking out the door so he can better get in and claim the treasure.
Boy
realizes that if he could have strong enough companion to hold the door
open he can have the light from outside show him the path plus he can
make a hasty escape if needed. Who knows what dangers lurk inside and
honestly he doesn't want to know...
"Alright! Let's roll!" Mom calls.
Reality snaps in, he books it from across the yard to the car.
"What are you doing over there?" She asks as they get into the car.
He sits there silent.
"Well be careful around there, I don't want you to get yourself hurt." She says sternly.
Boy turns himself to look out the window. "How could I hurt myself?" He thinks to himself.
They pull up on this mega shopping mart.
"I didn't know we were coming here!" Boy says excitedly.
They
walk across the parking lot, past the Super Save Mega Mart. Boy is
dance stepping. Walking excitedly. They continue walking through the
plaza. They arrive at a rundown thrift store.
The thrift store is a
treasure trove of awesome. Boy gets a look of euphoria. His eyes glaze
over with stars and his smile is so huge. He looks around, his head
bobbing around looking left to right trying to figure out where to focus
first. Video games, books, toys, magazines, music cassettes and CDs,
the place was loaded with a lot of stuff to look at.
Mom pats him on the shoulder, "Just go to the video games like you always do."
Boy
bolts it. Not even thinking about where to meet up afterwards or what
she's doing he puts himself against the video game case.
Behind
the glass case is just a horde of video game cartridges. So much stuff
to look at it's like treasure of a pirate piled up. Highlighted video
game titles are propped up on a red cloth.
"Double Dust
Brothers..." He whispers to himself touching the glass. This game is one
of the best games ever made he thinks to himself.
"Space Lord?"
Boy looks up at this title. The box art shows a person in a space suit
with an arm blaster. It shows the hero running, jumping, and shooting.
The space suit person is fighting different alien life. It has an
illustration of the Space Lord fighting against a giant green spiked
monster that breaths fire! Behind that spiky green monster is a blacked
out figure of a skinny winged dragon style monster. "I bet that's the
final boss." Boy thinks to himself.
"Monsters and Goblins." He
mutters. "Save the princess by overcoming impossible challengers!" The
box art shows a knight with a sword running through a series of
gauntlets fighting huge bosses.
A man walks by that smells of
cigarette smoke. Boy shudders. The thought of him even being here puts
Boy on edge. He starts to feel like someone or something is watching
him.
He begins to walk around the store. He walks past a
series of massive bookshelves, past the music area and into a section
with toys and children's items.
There's huge racks of toys and
stuffed animals. It's like a zoo. He feels like something is watching
him. He looks over his shoulder, "Mom?" He says quietly. Nothing is
there.
Boy feels like he's looking at all these caged animals and
creatures. He admires the bears and other animals. He sees toy soldiers
at ease conversing with themselves getting loud and rowdy eyeing the
cute dolls. Cute dolls giggling and laughing with each other looking
over at the manly figures. Down at the end of a caged area is a broken
cage.
Boy cautiously approaches. The cage is busted outwards
from the inside. What ever this thing is could be massive. Something big
got out and that's for sure, but what could it be?
Boys curious
mind tries to look for clues. He thinks about his favorite detective,
what would he look for? On the cage is a small tuft of blue fuzz. He
examines it. It has a coarse texture. This beast must be strong. He
feels like an explorer. He looks down at himself and he's wearing jungle
gear, khaki shorts, a button up shirt with ripped off sleeves. A
survival bag with a canteen and a nice explorers cap. He looks outside
the busted cage and sees a huge massive jungle.
"Let's find
this beast!" He exclaims holding up a clenched fist. He exits the cage
and puts the blue coarse tuft in his satchel. Boy thinks to himself, the
beast broke out, so he must be hungry. I wonder what it would eat.
Maybe he's thirsty.There's no food bowl or dish in the cage. There's
claw marks on the inside of the cage.
Boy assesses his surroundings. He pauses and hears the sound of running water.
He finds a nice little watering hole but it's empty. He decides to drink up his canteen and refill.
As he's drinking a sense of something lurking around hits him again.
He shuffles around his pack, sifting through survival gear.
"Ah,
let's see if this works..." He finds a chocolate bar and breaks off a
small section. He clears out a section of the jungle floor setting up a
clear opening to see what would take the bait. He places the chocolate
square down in the middle of the clearing and takes up a covered hiding
position.
He climbs in and gets comfortable. We might be here for a little wile.
"What are you doing?" A stern voice asks.
Boy,
startled bumps his head on the table he's hiding under. He's in the
book section of the store with the massive bookshelves towering
overhead. The restrooms not too far from there.
An older man with a furrowed brow and thick mustache who's in the chair next to the table is looking at Boy confused.
Boy looks up at him and begins to speak when Mom apologizes.
"Sorry about that, my boy has quite an imagination." She grabs Boys hand and they begin to leave.
Mom's holding a large bag and a couple of other items from the Super Save Mega Mart.
"I
got some groceries while you were looking at the games, I knew you'd be
too busy to come spend time with your Mother. Did you see anything
cool?" Mom asks.
"Yeah! There's a lot of cool games there and I learned about cool new heroes." Boy says excitedly.
"Don't
forget about the one we just got you, you still have a lot of work to
do before we can get you another one." She reminds him nothing in life
is free and stuff must be earned.
They arrive home and mom
unpacks everything. Boy sitting in the kitchen realizes he forgot what
else Mom got while there. The large bag just sitting there on the table.
"You can go play now, but soon I want you to finish up stuff in the yard." Mom smiles.
Boy settles down in his blanket with the controller. Boy clicks the
system on and continues his story. Remembering his failure, the intro
flashes with all the characters he remembers from before. His save loads
up and it's before he left town to go to the dungeon. Let's see about
allies. He wonders around town and hits up the shops. His character has
no money. He finds his merry band of friends in odd places around town.
The frizzled haired mage girl was by a huge oak tree studying. The
cleric boy was at the Temple where people pray. It's also where you save
your game. Not everyone on the title screen could be found so Boy
decides to continue on the adventure. The merry band gets into a few
encounters before the dungeon. They fight against some wild bugs. Boy
learns about some good group tactics through the fights. The mages fire
is great against bugs. Like in real life!
They get into the
dungeon and the Hero gets stuck in the web but this time the cleric
heals him while the mage burns the webbing, freeing him. They are able
to fight the boss with ease as the Hero claims the magical sword. The
Fire mage casts a huge fireball which causes the spider to real back and
get stunned. The Hero uses the opportunity to bring the blade down,
cutting the Spider easily. The band celebrates, they all get XP and the
Hero now has the legendary sword. He saves the game in a tent outside
the dungeon. Satisfied he turns off the game and gets ready to finish up
his duty outside.
Boy cleans up the piles of debris around the
yard. He discovers little tufts of blue coarse fur in each pile. This is
odd, he thinks to himself.
He finishes the task and takes out
all the trash to the dumpster near the street. He has to walk past all
the mobile homes in the park. Boy shuffles the bags around uncomfortably
as he waddles to the dumpster. Boy tosses all the bags in the trash
with some effort and closes the lid to the dumpster.
He bolts back to the yard with the intention of playing.
On the gate to get back into the yard he notices another blue tuft of hair. He picks it off and it blows away in the wind.
-------------------
As he focuses back he sees the fortress in the distance. I don't have
my allies like in the game but I bet I can just get in there and get
out. Boy psyches himself up.
He wedges the door to the fortress open with a stick and a rock. It seems sturdy enough to hold.
Boy cautiously wanders into the fortress. Darkness outlines everything but the shape of the door.
Boys eyes can't adjust as he waits on the edge of the light from the doorway.
He
doesn't have the courage to step forward and as he looks back the door
gives way and slams to a close. Boy stands there startled. Looking
around in the darkness he sees little flecks of light coming through the
walls. Around the corner he sees a pretty bright light and walks slowly
towards it.
Boy feels familiar situation from before.
He's alone without allies, he could be attacked and die like his hero in
the game.Through the fear and darkness he finds that what he's looking
for is easily obtainable.
On a pedestal the items sits with a beam
of light hitting it. We can't make it out. but he reaches for it and
before his hand reaches the light it's tied up with webs. He tries to
pull his hand back but it's met with a lot of resistance. He stumbles
backwards and falls through more webs. He lays there breathing heavily,
panic on his face. How could he be so foolish? He knew it couldn't have
been this easy.
The fear of being attacked reminds him to be
alert. He looks at himself and see's that he's pretty tied up in the
webs. He looks up at he pedestal. The light beam gets blocked and it's
now completely dark. He hears a chittering sound. His ears perk up
behind him. Something shuffling in front of him. He's not sure where to
focus his attention. He can't calm his breath as he realizes it's game
over like in the game. An unseen beast is going to attack me while I
can't do anything. How do I fight? He thinks to himself. I have no way.
He can't accept this fate. He feels a prick on his leg which causes him
to jump. He tries to brush off his pant legs. He's really limited in his
range of movement.
That feeling of something watching him sends tingles down his spine.
The
beam of light shines again as there's a shift in movement. A giant
spider lifts up its front legs as it begins to walk towards the tied up
Boy. He can barely make out the shape of the giant spider because of the
darkness but he knows he's stuck. He accepts his fate and winces.
A
loud crash and a roar as the beast in blue fur uses its long arms to
subdue the spider. Through the shuffle Boy can move. He quickly thinks
to snag the magical item from the pedestal.
The beast wrestles the spider down and gets bit in the arm. Ooze pouring from the bite, Boy can't tell if it's blood or poison.
The
boy raises the magical item into the air and the light hits it. It's a
magical sword. With a heroic roar he brings the sword down on the spider
cutting it. The spider flings the beast off into the darkness and the
spiders head slams down in the light. The beast let's out a weird sound
as it dies.
Boy kneels down breathing heavily. Resting his head on his hands holding the sword.
That was close, if it wasn't for that blue beast he would have been toast.
He looks around in the darkness, nothing rustling around. Nothing obviously standing out. Where'd the beast go?
He gets up, "Hello?" Boy calls out. "I know you're in here." He says, holding up the sword.
"I don't want to hurt you, I want to thank you for your help!"
The
beast comes down from high up, crawling slowly towards him. The beasts
arm cradled close to his body. The boy looks at the monster.
A
round body, with coarse blue fur. He's got long arms with these strong
leathery hands. The nails are like talons. They are short but they look
like they could scratch really hard.
He looks up at the monster
and his eyes are big and yellow with a black iris. The monster looking
intensely at him. Underneath it's eyes is a giant green nose. A giant
sharp tooth pokes out from his lip.
"You're pretty intimidating." Boy says to Monster, nonchalantly.
The monsters mouth curls into a smile.
"Let's look at your arm." Boy reaches for the beasts arm.
Monster pulls back aggressively. his wound does seem bad.
Boy
addresses his leg. Rolling up his pant leg he sees that there's a huge
mark where it looks like something bit him. There are some faded bruises
that were there from a time before. He tries to not think about those
as he rolls up a piece of cloth to wrap around his leg.
The Monster watches. Monster wraps up his arm, mimicking Boy.
The shoddy bandage around Monster's arm makes Boy laugh. The Monster let's out an angry snort.
"OK,
let's get outta here." The boy begins to hold the door to the fortress
open. Light shines in as they cover their eyes. The monster crawls out
and easily holds the fortress door open, letting Boy out.
Boy
cheers, "Woo! That was crazy! Did you see that, how did we even
survive!?" He's excitedly running around Monster who's holding his arm
close to him.
Monster holds his arm out and Boy runs into it with a thud and an "Ooof!"
Boy sits on the ground next to Monster. Monster sits down and boy rests his head on him, still chattering about the adventure.
"Oh! I see you found him!" Mom says hanging outside of the sliding glass door.
Boy
grabs a blue stuffed monster with long arms, hugs him close and runs
inside the trailer. The sliding glass door shuts and we fade to black.
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