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Enter the Nomicon - Chapter 3: Awkward is the Word of the Day

“H-hey Howard. Our friend Nomi came by and we wanted you to come over and, uh, try out that new online version of Grave Puncher! You said the graphics were the cheese, so Nomi wants to play with us!" In a quick and desperate attempt for Howard not to raise any questions, Randy looped an arm around Nomi's neck and pulled him closer with a large nervous grin.

Of course, Nomi had to bite back the instinct to pull away, twist his arm behind his back and pin him to the ground like he had been taught to. He felt that they looked extremely stupid like this.

Fortunately, Howard had gotten the hint.

"Oh—yeah! I completely forgot! Heidi, I'm gonna go. Have fun cleaning the house while I bounce!"

Without waiting for her response, the three dashed out of the house in a blur while Heidi threw a tantrum.

...

"Alright Cunningham, who is this guy?"

The three slowed to a walk. Randy panted, trying to catch his breath as he replied in between inhales and exhales.

"It's...a really long...story...wait...my...room."

As they quietly walked to Randy's house, Howard stole glances at the red haired teen. He had to admit, the guy was pretty damn handsome.

Well, maybe not like Cunningham—

There he was again, thinking those strange, forbidden thoughts. He couldn't help it though. Love was a strange, morbid thing that blinded those with its sweet alluring song. And this was certainly no exception, as Howard found himself slowing just enough so he could stare at his friend's butt. When he looked up he realized he had been caught by their apparent new friend. His cheeks heated up, but the male simply looked away as if in deep thought.

There has never been a time where Randy was ever quiet. He was always chatting with Howard. He felt awkward, standing between the other boys, for some unknown reason, and it bugged Randy, so he decided to break the ice.

"So, Nomi, do you play any instruments? I m-mean, besides the flute?"

Howard turned to the other male who gave him a dark look, which unsettled him.

"Yes. My father taught us that music was as important as education. I learned on my own how to play most of the common instruments like the piano, violin, guitar, clarinet, and even the drums. I know a few pieces of certain songs, but the instrument I play most commonly, as you would have guessed, is the flute."

With that, the male pulled out the flute from his pocket and began to play the sweet, familiar melody. It created a calm, almost lazy atmosphere.

Howard felt an oddly natural sense of comfort.

Suddenly, Nomi stopped.

"Sorry. Got a little carried away." He muttered, but Randy stopped him.

"Nah dude, that was totally Bruce!!"

Howard simply nodded, still unsure of the stranger that walked with them. The redhead smiled before continuing to play the rest of the way to Randy's house.

...

As soon as Randy shut and locked the door to his room, he was almost literally mauled by Howard's questions.

"Okay Cunningham, who is this guy?!" The short chubby teen pointed at Nomi, who didn’t seem to care about what was going on.

"Howard, this is the Nomicon."

There was a moment of silence, before,

“WHAT?!”

"Yeah, it’s a long story. But apparently the Sorcerer is going to escape, which is why Nomi revealed his human persona to me and you. I guess it’s because he's going to fight the Sorcerer, while I take on Mcfist!" Randy had repeated the whole conversation between him and the human Nomicon in a single breath and was breathing heavily under his friend's stern look.

"Wow, you really are in deep now."

Randy groaned, flopping exhaustedly onto his bed and burying his face in his pillow. He screamed into it.

"Well, now that we're done with introducing each other, I'm going to meditate." With that, Nomi began to disappear into a smoky red mist before a book appeared where he had once been standing.

"Whoa-ho ho! That is the cheese!"

...

Time flew by and before the boys even realized it, the sun had gone down.

"Crud. Heidi is going to tell Mom that I’ve been out too late and get me grounded."

Randy barely heard his friend as he concentrated hard on the game in front of him. "Uh-huh. Have fun."

Howard grinned. "So, do you like ketchup and peanut butter sandwiches?"

"Duh."

"Are you in a porno?"

"I made it."

"Are you gay?"

"WHAT THE JUICE!?"

Howard nearly fell backwards as Randy stood up still, staring at the computer screen. "That’s not fair! I punched that grave to bits!" Randy turned to see his friend staring at him. "What?"

"Nothing."

"Okay then...oh, hey dude, it's almost nine. You better go or Heidi is going to get you grounded again."

Howard face palmed.

...

As Randy came back upstairs after walking Howard to the front door, he found the Nomicon was back to his human form. He was meditating in the middle of his room.

"Hey Nomi, my mom's gonna be here any minute, so you better hide again."

The redhead opened one eye lazily. "Okay. I guess I've done enough for today." He stood and stretched, but was cut off by the sound of Randy's stomach rumbling. He raised a brow.

"You haven't eaten?"

"Nope. I usually just eat an apple or something. Maybe chips I guess. My mom doesn't have time to cook. And I don’t know how to cook." Randy simply shrugged.

"Well then, I guess I can make you something really quick."

...

Randy watched in awe as Nomi sliced and diced a few vegetables in less than ten seconds, cook rice in record time, and slice a small salmon fillets into perfect slices.

Randy realized he was preparing him a small dish of sushi.

Suddenly, a small plate was pushed to him. On top was six salmon rolls sprinkled with sesame seeds. Nomi leaned casually against the opposite side of the kitchen counter from Randy. He watched him expectantly, almost eager to see what Randy thought of his cooking.

Realizing this, he picked up a roll and popped it into his mouth.

It tasted...amazing! Delicious! Flavorful! There was an endless amount of words that Randy could use to describe the little salmon rolls, but didn't care to say them aloud as he happily stuffed them into his mouth, barely remembering to swallow and thank the redhead.

"Wow! Thanks dude! It's really good!"

Nomi gave him a small smile. He was internally jumping up and down with pride. He smirked.

"Your first lesson is to close your mouth when eating." He gestured to his open mouth. The purple haired teen rolled his eyes before doing as his teacher had said.

Suddenly the sound of the doorknob jiggling caught both of their attentions. Nomi was just about to turn back into his book form when the front door slammed open to reveal an exhausted looking Ms. Cunningham.

"Oh! I had no idea you were spending the night, er—Nomi!"

Instantly he relaxed and gave a respectful bow. "Y-yes, I am, if that isn't too much trouble."

"Oh none at all! Hey, how come Howard isn't here, Randy?"

"Uh, he had to go home. Heidi busted him." It wasn't a complete lie at the very least.

"Hm. That's too bad." Just then, her green eyes landed on the single roll that sat innocently on the plate in front of Randy. Without question, she picked it up and put it in her mouth.

"Mmm. You’re not a bad cook, Nomi,” said Ms. Cunningham. “Well, I'm going to bed. Randy, you two better not stay up later than twelve or I swear I'll skin you alive, mister!" Ms. Cunningham made her way to her room.

The two looked at each other, even Nomi being alarmed, before darting upstairs. Unbeknownst to them, the woman poked her head out of her room and smirked before going back inside.

...

"That was inhuman dude, inhuman!"

Nomi nodded with wide eyes. How could she have known that he had made those rolls? He shook his head.

"That was...inhuman."

Randy laughed as he pulled out a blanket, pillow, and a large mattress. Nomi raised a curious brow.

"Uh Randy, you do realize I don't need a bed, right? I can just make myself a book again."

"No! I mean, no, you don't have to, dude. You made me food, so I wanted to return the favor. And besides, sometimes Mom checks in on me at night. She'll grow suspicious if she doesn't see you here asleep."

"Ah, I see."

Once again, Randy found himself searching in the sea of clothes for some comfortable pajamas for his teacher. He found a pair of shorts. He was about to continue searching for a shirt when Nomi stopped him.

"That's fine Randy. I usually sleep without a shirt."

"Oh. Okay." He handed Nomi the black pair of shorts.

...

Once again it was morning, and the powerful rays of the sun sliced through, hitting Randy's eyes. He groaned.

“I really need to get new curtains...”

He blinked and found that the extra mattress was gone, and only Nomi was left. He was sitting in the middle of his room...meditating.

A sly grin came upon Randy's face as he hopped to his feet with great stealth, marker in hand, but just as he was about to draw on him, Nomi spoke.

"Don't even think about it, Randy. Unless you want to be missing a few limbs."

Startled, Randy jumped and tossed the marker away. "What? I was just going to see if you were awake!"

"Well I am. Now let's get started on training."

Randy groaned. "Aw, come on Nomi, it's the weekend!"

"A ninja's duty is never not done just because it's the weekend, and besides, this will be fun. We're going to the woods to practice your stealth skills. Right now, you’re as stealthy as an elephant with four left feet."

"Hey! I have awesome stealth skills! I just haven't warmed up yet!"

"Alright then. Let's go to the woods and see just how ‘awesome’ your skills are."

"Fine."

...

The sweet scent of pine hit their noses the second they took a step into the small woods.

Randy dropped his gym bag, which was filled with bottles of water, a first aid kit, and his ninja mask. He reached inside, grabbing the said mask and briskly put it on, turning into the famous Norrisville High Ninja.

"Alright. So what are we doing first?"

In swift and quick movements, Nomi removed his casual clothing to reveal his ninja like suit. He pulled the strange black cape out of his gym bag and placed it on. The small green clip that rested on his chest glowed in the dim light of the forest. Randy was in awe.

"For one thing, we need to meditate for one hour—"

"Aw, that's so wonk, Nomicon!"

"It's necessary! You have to learn to be patient. A direct attack will only get you attacked—"

"Can you please stop using riddles? It's kind of unnecessary."

Nomi face palmed, pinching the bridge of his nose. Was this kid really that dumb? "Honestly Randy, are you seriously questioning me? I’m your teacher, you’re my student. I may be biologically your age, but that doesn't mean I’m a child like you. You have to listen to me. Now, I'm very patient, luckily for you. If not, I would have twisted you into a pretzel, or whatever it is you call it. So, without anymore interruptions, let us get on with the lesson, yes?"

“I’m not a child,” Randy muttered, before agreeing to let the lesson start.

They began to meditate. Sort of. Most of the time, Randy wouldn’t keep his mouth shut.

"Are we done yet?"

"No."

"How about now?"

"No."

"What about now?"

"No."

"Now?”

"Dammit, Randy! NO!" Nomi finally stood up. "You know what? Fine. Yes, we’re done.”

“YES!”

Nomi shook his head. “Let's begin with the warm ups."

Randy grinned. “So what are we—"

Suddenly a fist flew towards Randy. He managed to dodge it just in time. He snapped his head towards his teacher, who held a sly smirk.

"Now the real fun begins."

Randy gulped. Uh-oh. "Uh, hey Nomi, w-what are we doing?"

"Warm ups. When you successfully land a punch on me, we will begin the true lesson."

Randy's eyes widened in sudden fear as a barrage of fists came flying at him. The fists barely missed their target. Randy tried to desperately dodge, duck, and zip past each and every one of them.

"Oof!"

Randy fell on his butt. As he got punched in the stomach, he quickly got up and jumped away, barely escaping Nomi's deadly left hook. Finally, Randy boldly ducked and threw a punch, only for it to get blocked and thrown right back at his face. "Ouch!"

He looked up to see the deep concentration written all over his teacher's face.

“I have to break that concentration!”

With renewed energy, he bobbed and weaved under and over.

"You look like you're getting tired there." Randy teased. The two kept aiming and dodging punches. "Tired!?"

For a brief second, Nomi’s concentration seemed to drop so much that the left hook that was certain to have hit Randy missed and punched the tree behind him. Their noses were so close they could feel each other's heavy breathing.

Realization hit the two as Nomi had pinned Randy against the tree. It took Nomi a second too late before suddenly Randy's fist hit him hard in the chest, knocking him off balance.

"Gah!"

Nomi fell on his butt. He stared up in surprise before it melted into a smirk.

"Well, you caught me off guard. I guess you win. Now on with—"

"Ahaha! I got you! I just punched the ninja book! Haha! Wow!"

"That maybe true, but I did get you at least a dozen times."

Instantly, Randy's boasting ceased, and a pout replaced the victorious grin upon his face. Nomi chuckled at the quick change of demeanor on his student's face.

"Shall we begin the stealth lesson, Ninja?"

The mocking tone did not go unnoticed by Randy.

He bitterly replied, "Yes."

...

"Uh, where exactly am I?" Randy had been blindfolded.

"You see, Ninja, stealth has different aspects to it. Today we're going to practice sight and hearing. You will be blocking my attacks without knowing where I'll be coming from. After you, it will be I who will be blocking your attacks. Understood?"

"Yup."

Unknown to Randy, they were standing in a small clearing hidden and surrounded by tall pine trees. Nomi smirked as he pulled out his bamboo flute. He placed his hands on each end before pulling it, causing it to extend into a long wooden staff. Oh yes, this was going to be so Bruce.

There was a rustling sound in the bushes. A pause, then the sound rejuvenated in another area. Randy's left hand shot out, ready to block the oncoming attack, only to be hit on his right side.

"Ah!"

Suddenly, a barrage of attacks came out of nowhere. He successfully blocked some of them, but most of the time he was getting smacked around like a ragdoll.

"Gah! Okay, time out! Time out!"

"There are no time outs, Cunningham. The Sorcerer is a relentless enemy and will be hell bent on killing you. Be happy that this is just training and not an actual battle."

"I don't care! Timeout!"

Nomi huffed as he finally ceased fire. Randy removed the blindfold.

"C'mon, I know the Sorcerer is all tough and shit, but seriously, do you have to beat me with a stick?!" He gestured to the long bamboo staff in Nomi’s hand.

"Well, what would you like me to do then? Throw rocks and boulders at your head? Because if you want—"

"NO! No way! I think I prefer the stick!" He snatched the staff from Nomi's hand. "Anyway, it's my turn!"

An entire hour passed with Randy swinging and flailing the stick at the other male. With ease, Nomi dodged each slow and exhausted swing.

"I...I almost got you that time..." Randy said, panting pathetically. "Almost..."

Finally, out of pure luck, and the fact that Nomi was getting bored, the end of the bamboo staff tapped his arm rather softly. Randy collapsed onto the forest floor with Nomi hovering over him with an amused and concerned look.

"Are you okay?" He almost felt guilty for tiring him out this much. Almost.

"Y-yeah..." Randy moaned pitifully.

Nomi sighed, almost relieved. "Well, that's enough training for one day."

"Wait, how are you not tired!?"

"I have a lot of endurance, something you human beings don’t have. Even with the ninja suit, it doesn't mean you have the endurance to go on forever. I guess we're going to have to fix that. Tomorrow we're going jogging around the entire block. Also, I'm technically a book. I don't need all the necessities you need."

"Like going to the bathroom?" Randy got up with the help of Nomi. Nomi gave him a curious look. It was obviously a question that has been on his mind for a while.

"Yes...I don't really need to go. I can hold it for...a hundred or so years."

Randy stared at him. Nomi shrugged as he picked up the gym bag, pulling out a bottle of water and tossing it to Randy, who barely managed to catch it. Nomi pulled out one for himself and began to chug it down. He wiped his mouth and let out a small sigh.

"But, there are things I still need. Like water."

Suddenly, a small rumble was heard. Both Randy and Nomi looked down at Nomi's stomach.

"And food...I don't really need it like going to the bathroom. I can go almost an entire one hundred years without a bite to eat."

"When was the last time you ate exactly?"

"Err, 1920? Yes, somewhere along that time."

"What the juice Nomi! Yeah, no shit you're hungry! C'mon, maybe Mom's home so she can make you something to eat!"

In truth, Nomi hadn't eaten since 1816, but he felt it wasn’t important to bring it up. Nomi was, however, surprised by Randy's concern for him. After all, the past ninjas who he had revealed himself to simply shrugged it off and didn't seem to care after he said he didn't need food or any of the other necessities. That didn't seem to matter to Randy as he pulled off the ninja mask, placing it in the old gym bag along with the bottle of water.

Nomi was actually touched by Randy's kindness.

Randy grasped Nomi's hand as they took off in a brisk jog and in less than a couple minutes they arrived back at his home.

"Crud! If my mom sees you in your ninja suit she's going to ask about it. You think you can take it off?"

But of course Randy wasn’t perfect.

Nomi rolled his eyes. “Why didn't you tell me in the forest?"

"Err, brain fart?"

"I can tell."

Sighing, Nomi dug out his casual clothes from his bag in Randy's other hand before going into some bushes to change. Randy rubbed his neck and turned away. About a minute later, Nomi came out of the large green shrubs, sporting his casual clothing and his ninja clothing in his arm. Leaves and twigs were poking out of his now messy hair. Randy stifled a laugh.

"What?"

"Your hair...” Randy said in between laughs. “...dude...your hair..."

Nomi blinked. With his free arm, he felt his hair, realizing the mess that was now in his hair. He furrowed his brow and plucked them all out of his hair. He walked past Randy, who couldn’t stop laughing.

"Oh god...I'm sorry!...Haha! Okay, okay I'll stop...” Randy snickered loudly. He was trying very hard to stop laughing, but it took a minute to get himself together again. “Okay, now I'm done." Randy wiped at a stray tear as he let out a sigh before opening the door and letting Nomi in.

As fate would have it, Randy's mom wasn't home.

"Hehe, whoops." He gave Nomi a small nervous shrug. Nomi gave him a dark look before plopping down onto a chair by the counter. His stomach growled, reminding the two why they had left the woods in the first place. Randy looked through the wooden cabinets before pulling out two Mcfist's Cup-O-Noodles. Nomi raised a brow before remembering that Mcfist owned literally everything besides the city and the people themselves in Norrisville.

He watched with curiosity as Randy opened one cup and poured water in from the distilled water machine. When he was done, he opened the black microwave and placed the cup in the center, typed on the control pad three minutes, and closed it shut. Instantly, the microwave came to life and began cooking the noodles, rotating it. Nomi watched in silent awe, but was caught off by Randy.

"So uh, Nomi?"

The redhead blinked and turned to Randy, who was eyeing something on his cape. It was the green ninja head shaped relic.

"Yes?" He watched as he rubbed his finger over it. He would never tell Randy, but as he rubbed the relic, Nomi felt it was soothing and strange, very strange.

"What is that thing?" He was oblivious to his teacher's emotions, never taking his eyes off the relic.

"It's my life essence. It binds me to the book and my other belongings, so when I turn into my human form I come out wearing clothes."

Randy nearly dropped the said relic, but before he could reply back a ding was heard, interrupting their suddenly awkward conversation.

"Uh, your soup is ready." Randy pulled out the cup, which was hot. The smell of the cooked noodles filled their nostrils. He placed the cup in front of Nomi before grabbing a fork and handing it to him.

Randy quickly went to work on his own soup, putting it into the microwave.

"Oh, careful with the soup, Nomi. It’s really hot."

Nomi could sense that Randy was slightly uncomfortable, but he didn’t say anything about it. "Thank you." He focused on the noodles, taking a hesitant bite, but soon finding that it was at least good and edible.

Silence. The two didn't say a word as Nomi silently ate his meal.

Ding!

The silence was over as the chime-like sound cut through the deep awkward silence. Randy walked over and pulled out his own noodles and began to eat it, not caring that it was burning his tongue. He paused and went to the fridge, pulling out some juice boxes, handing one to Nomi and one for himself before continuing to eat.

Nomi finally paused in his eating, swallowing before talking.

"You know, I understand why you were curious, and I apologize for not telling you in a more appropriate manner." His accent made his apology sound so formal.

"No, it’s fine."

The two looked at each other briefly before going into a fit of laughter. They were cut off by the familiar sound of the door knob jiggling slightly. Randy's mother stepped in, humming.

"Oh Randy, you won't believe it! I got promoted, and I got a raise! I'll be working less hours now too! I'm officially second-in-charge of Mcfist and Weinerman Industries! Isn't that great?" The tall woman opened her eyes and was surprised to see that Randy was not alone. "Oh, why hello again, Nomi! I think I'm going to have to make more cookies! Where's Howard, hon?"

"Uh he's at home. He got in trouble."

"Ah, I see. Heidi?"

"Yeah. And congrats on the promotion, Mom! That’s great!"

The woman smiled, blushing lightly. "Well, I don't mean to brag, but I'm just so happy! Now if you’ll excuse, me I have to finish some important paperwork. See you boys later!"

With that, she walked past them and darted into her room.

Once again they were left alone.

...

The night came and the two sat tiredly on the couch long after Randy convinced Nomi to go to the bathroom. I mean c'mon the guy holds his bathroom for up to a hundred years the poor guy probably needs to go.

"I'm going to call Howard to see if he's still alive. I haven't talked to him all day."

Nomi nodded as he turned his attention back to the TV. The movie was about zombies. Although Nomi thought it was a stupid idea for humans to come back to life after death, he still found the movie rather intriguing. Well, at least the characters were. Back then the tough, buff males were usually the heroes, and yet here was this movie. The hero was a scrawny male, and then there was this rather feisty female, and they were both fine on their own. They were looking for survivors, forming a large group, or family as they called it, thriving despite their slim chances of survival.

Nomi couldn't help but smile. “That's how life should be. That’s how it should always be.”

While Nomi continued to watch the movie, Randy chatted with Howard on the phone.

"So, Heidi didn't tell on you then?"

"Yeah. She said if I helped her with her stupid online show then she wouldn't say a word."

"What did she make you do exactly?"

Howard grumbled.

"I'm sorry, what?"

More grumbling.

"What?"

Another series of grumbles.

"Howard, c'mon dude, I can't—"

"I SAID SHE MADE ME WEAR A STUPID DIAPER FOR HER PARENTAL SEGMENT! GEEZ!"

By then, Randy had burst into laughter, dropping his phone before picking it back up. "Haha, okay. So can you come over, dude?"

Howard grumbled. "Yes. I'll be there in ten minutes."

Randy grinned. "Alright. Don't forget to change your diaper—"

"CUNNINGHAM!"

Randy burst into another fit of laughter as he hung up on Howard, who was yelling a loud string of swears. Nomi turned to him, having heard only fragments of the conversation.

"May I ask what is so funny?"

Randy finally calmed down enough to tell him. "Heh, Howard's sister made him wear a diaper on her online show."

"Oh, you mean that hideous creature you two call a girl?"

"Yep." Randy didn't even bother to hide the grin on his face.

After about ten minutes, Howard came in without even bothering to knock, startling the two and causing Nomi to nearly karate chop him in half. After a heated argument between Nomi and Howard, they finally sat back down onto the couch and enjoyed the rest of the movie.

"So, the book told me you got pwned in training," said Howard.

"I didn't get pwned!" Randy shot a glare at the redhead, who gave him an innocent look. "When did he tell you this!?"

"When you were in the bathroom. Dude, it took you an hour and a half to punch him? And two hours just to poke him with a stick? While he was blindfolded!"

"Hey, you try it and you tell me if it's easy!" Randy slumped in between the two with a pout on his face.

The night had carried on and soon the movie was over. Howard left, leaving Randy and Nomi asleep on the couch.

At around ten, Randy’s mother came in the living room to wake up the boys and to tell them to go to bed. They quietly obliged.

….

It was night again. That meant tomorrow they would be going to school.

It would be Nomi's first day of school in over eight hundred years.

Nomi sighed, staring at the ceiling. He was only a little uneasy. He knew school had changed a lot since the last time he went to one. But how much different could it be? He basically knew everything they were teaching in the school, since when he had nothing better to do, he snuck into libraries of the school and the school itself to read as many of the subjects as he could. School definitely wasn’t going to be that hard.

Nomi looked over the sleeping figure of Randy.

Nomi didn't need sleep. He could go weeks without it. Yet as he watched Randy sleep, he couldn’t help but think that it looked almost fun to sleep, or something.

Nomi felt an odd ache in his heart. Most of the time his situation just didn’t hit him. He had been so busy being the Nomicon, being the teacher of several teenage ninjas, and nothing more, that he was too busy to even think about his life.

Sometimes Nomi wished he could have everything back. His family, his friends, his home, just everything. At times like these, Nomi wished he wasn't the Nomicon. He wished he was his normal self again, Nomi Conikos Norisu, the middle child of the famous Norisu Nine. With his five other siblings, Mei the little butterfly, his youngest sister, Ming, his clever also his youngest brother, they were the troublesome twins as his family would say. His brother Naru, who was a year younger than him, was bold and was his best friend, sister Yui, who was one year older than him, was the caring and motherly one of them all, and his eldest brother Daiku, the brave warrior and the more loved and respected of his siblings.

“And I the pathetic excuse of a brother, ninja, and Norisu.”

He recalled the events that had destroyed his family. He had been arguing with his grandparents a lot before the fire. Their parents had died, making them the Norisu seven.

Daiki had argued that Nomi wasn't fit to be a true ninja. He claimed that he was too immature, lazy, stupid...the list went on.

The scene became even clearer to Nomi. His brother, who looked like an older version of him, with the exception of his ponytail and golden eyes, arguing with their grandfather, and him tearing up and running off. Then there was the fire that had engulfed the entire village. The one that had wiped out his entire family. There was also his struggle to find the ninja suit and the original Nomicon. Then he had found his grandfather, dying, his last words a request to defeat the Sorcerer and to not put on the Ninja suit and to instead keep on the one he had on.

Back then he had not known why, but now he understood.

After the whole battle and becoming immortalized (and kept alive because his family gave a piece of their soul to bind him together), he had tried to search for his family until he was told by the surviving villagers that they had all perished.

He had made it his mission to find a ninja to defend the new village, which later became what it is now.

Norrisville.

Nomi blinked away the tears and soon realized it was early morning. He sat up. He was covered in a thin layer of sweat. He got up, putting away his blankets, pillow and mattress back where they belonged before going to the bathroom to shower. Randy had showed him how it worked, since he wasn't all too familiar with the modern method of bathing. He stripped himself of the pair of shorts and boxers before stepping into the shower. Instantly, the warm water made him feel refreshed.

When he was done showering, he realized he hadn't grabbed his clothes for the day. Nomi stepped into Randy’s room.

The day before, Randy had washed his clothes for him in the washing machine and had left them neatly folded by his dresser. Nomi felt slightly self conscious, walking around in Randy’s room naked. At least he had thought to grab a towel so he had something to cover himself with.

The purple-haired teen was still asleep. Nomi eyed the alarm clock next to the computer. It read 6:59 AM.

"Oh shit."

#Enter the Nomicon #ETN #Chapter 3 #story repost

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kathyprior4200 · 4 years

Text

So...It’s A Deal Then?

Chapter One: Alastor’s Game

The year was nineteen thirty three. A tall man with short brown hair, medium brown skin and round glasses was running for his life, his feet making boot tracks in the snow, spotted with red. He wore dark pants and a white and brown shirt with a black bow-tie, all stained with blood from another victim he had butchered and eaten. The sounds of footsteps and barking dogs came from behind him. The police were chasing Alastor Moreau, a serial killer and Louisiana’s most famous radio host. Alastor ran with a crazed look of terror in his eyes…and a wide grin he kept on his face despite the situation. The man maneuvered through the trees, racing at full speed in the direction of his cabin. He felt like his lungs would burst out of his sore chest but he didn’t dare stop.

During the chase, Alastor had been bitten by a rabid dog in an alleyway. His arm and hand throbbed where the punctures were and his head felt inflamed. It was like someone was taking a hot knife and bashing repeatedly against his skull. Black spots danced across his vision as he ran. Several times, he felt maggots and bugs crawling in and out of his skin, always staying there no matter how hard he shook them off. The frozen lake seemed to be chasing after him as well. Alastor saw waves of water threatening to pull him under to drown.

With loud growls and barks, two of the police dogs bit hard into his leg. Alastor yelled out, shaking his leg frantically to get the German Shepard and Black Labrador off him. A gaping wound from his leg and torn pants splashed crimson blood as Alastor ran and wobbled along, gradually getting ahead of the officers.

Not too far away, he spotted a hunter dressed in deer skins, rifle at the ready. Alastor glanced down at the dead doe that the hunter had recently shot. Alastor wailed in sudden despair, for the doe had his mother’s face. He gave the hunter a murderous look and charged forward. The hunter gasped in fear as the madman raced toward him, his pupils constricted, eyes devoid of sanity.

The hunter raised his rifle in fear. “Don’t come any closer!”

But there was nothing left for Alastor now. He wasn’t going to let himself get arrested. He was going to feast on this hunter or die trying. He kept running right into the hunter’s line of fire. Through the pain and agony, his face yelled, “Do it!”

An ear-piercing gunshot rang out, echoing off the bare trees in the snowy woods. The bullet pierced straight between Alastor’s eyes. Alastor crashed to the snowy ground, the dogs mauling him with their paws on top. The police soon arrived and the dogs moved aside. They turned him over and there was Alastor’s mauled body and cold dead face. The hole in his head made the surrounding snow stain red with blood. His brown eyes were glazed over, and even in death, there was a strange smile on his face.

The hunter looked shaken at what he had done. “He’s gone,” he said. “He was going to kill me…”

Alastor’s body was promptly burned, his belongings destroyed or, in the case of his old radios…given away. His obituary was announced in the newspaper and at his own radio station, ironically enough. It was the last broadcast before his station, too, was destroyed. Although his fans were devastated, the majority of New Orleans were relieved that the Louisiana Lunatic was dead.

Alastor saw black nothingness for a while, until he could feel hard ground below his back. He slowly opened his eyes, staring at a red sky. Wasn’t he supposed to be dead?

He slowly sat up and stared at his hands and legs. Before his very eyes, his brown hands grew longer into a hideous shade of tan-gray colored palms, the fingernails turning into sharp unkempt claws. Strangely, there were four digits instead of five on each hand, the ring and pinkie fingers fusing together. His unnaturally proportioned bare feet were also an ugly tan-gray, with four long toes and claws extended.

Stretching pain coursed through him and he grit his teeth. Alastor slowly stood up on shaky legs and looked into a nearby window. His face was now pale gray, his eye glowing red and bigger than his previous eyes had been. The short brown hair on his head crept down to end near his chin, the hair turning red with black at the ends. A red and black deer tail grew from his lower back. Small black antlers grew from his head as well as fluffy red and black tuffs shaped like deer ears. He opened his mouth in shock, watching as his white teeth yellowed and grew into sharp pointed fangs. His tongue became long and lavender, the gums black. Within his groin, Alastor’s grey member was still the same as it was in the living world. Beneath his blood-stained white and brown shirt, his pale gray skin was laced with scars along his back and chest. They were scars from his father’s whippings, ritual cuttings and from attackers. Just like during the Great Depression, his new body was unnaturally bony and thin.

He snapped his fingers absentmindedly and nothing happened.

But after a few minutes, something appeared in his hands…a red vintage microphone staff.

“What the…?”

He tapped it a few times. “Hello? Is this thing on? Testing, testing…”

A red glowing eye appeared beneath the speaker. “I heard you loud and clear!” the voice said. ”In fact, all of Hell can hear you now! You’re live on the air!”

How was that possible?

Alastor gasped and threw the staff in front of him like it was cursed. The staff vanished before it could hit the ground and reappeared in his hands.

He soon realized that the staff was a part of him.

He gasped out loud and swore in French Creole. He tapped the staff and it blinked off before vanishing. He stared around, his eyes frantic. “Where am I? What is this place?”

He clutched at his throat, his radio voice sounding strange to him. This was what he must’ve sounded like to his listeners back in New Orleans.

“You’re in Hell, buddy,” said an evil looking demon flanked by a gang of goons. With a flick of his ears, Alastor froze in place like a deer caught in the headlights. The leader had green skin and scales. “And you’re about to become fresh meat!” The trolls held spiked bloodstained clubs and snickered.

Having no powers, save for his radio voice, Alastor promptly fled.

“Get him!” yelled the lead demon as his goons followed. Alastor wasn’t about to die again, not even in this nightmare of a world. He remembered his mother telling him that smiling was a show of strength, so he did. Out of all the forms he could take, he was stuck as a demon deer hybrid. It briefly brought back memories of him hunting deer in the woods. What a way for a former predator to become the prey.

On the plus side, he had better strength and enhanced hearing, sight and smell. With the glowing eyes, Alastor knew he could also see perfectly in the dark.

Alastor evaded his pursuers by dashing into an alleyway and hiding behind a dumpster. The footsteps faded away. Alastor looked around, then crept out. A red skinned girl wearing provocative black clothing winked at him. “Ready to have a good time?” she drawled. Alastor yelped in fear and disgust, pushing the prostitute away before heading back out into the streets.

Above him in the sky was a giant glowing red pentagram that took up most of the red sky. Beside it was a brown planet with a black and red pentagram on it. He felt like an alien being forced to adapt to a new planet. Forget New Orleans…this place was New Horror-leans.

The city was huge, the population greatly topping New Orleans…and all of Earth. It was sort of like New York and Tokyo, but more chaotic. At every corner were drug stores, strip clubs, malls and in shady areas, black markets. And the denizens themselves looked very bizarre. A majority of them took the form of colorful bi-pedal animals, though a few looked more humanoid. Alastor saw snake demons, dragon demons, demons with many eyes or some with just one eye. The human ones had similar features to when they were alive. Alastor’s eyes widened when he saw the Axeman talking to Attila the Hun and Dr. Facilier. Alastor was lucky to have avoided the Axeman during his killing sprees.

A group of demons sneered at Alastor, taunting “deer boy newbie,” as he walked. An arrow narrowly missed Alastor’s head as a bull demon cheered “bull’s eye!” Alastor promptly took the arrow from the wall and threw it right into the demon’s right eye. The bull roared in pain, covering his eye as he stomped off.

“That’s how you really make a bull’s eye,” Alastor smirked before moving on. He briefly spotted a bi pedal wolf smoking on a balcony of his apartment. “What’cha lookin’ at, punk?” the wolf yelled, spitting on the street before continuing his smoking. Signs nearby read “drugz,” “smoking,” and “endless spam” in bold letters on brick walls. The putrid smells of odor and garbage reached Alastor’s nostrils.

Then another thought came to him: where was he going to live? Just the thought of him becoming homeless after living a luxurious life in the nineteen twenties both stunned and infuriated him.

On the news, a black and white screen showed Tom Trench sitting at a desk, talking about weather and turf wars. He wore a suit with a neck tie and his face was a face mask below short blonde hair. Below him was the 666 News logo in the right hand corner.

“…and then I died in a trench by a gas attack in the nineteen hundreds,” he said, pointing to his gas mask face. “Hence why I look like this. Now no gas can get me…as I’m already dead. Take that, you toxic producing demons out there.”

Demons were smoking, fighting, raping, killing and just generally being cruel to each other. Those of similar species hung out more often, excluding others. A group of Hell born elite wearing velvet clothes and top hats with eyes and teeth whispered to each other while glaring at Alastor.

“Sinner scum,” Helsa spat, giving off an aura of superiority in her glowing orbs. Her skin was dark grey and her hair was shaped like octopus tentacles. She wore a bright pink dress with fur trim and carried an expensive white purse.

One of the elite joined in, a pink creature with punk clothing, wild colorful hair, and an overall dinosaur-like appearance. “They do nothing but add to the population and chaos of this dump.”

“Those native to Hell have a hard enough time as it is without catering to those common pre human fools,” another added. It was a man dressed in green wearing a top hat with eyes and teeth. Seviathan. “They can’t even reproduce, let alone keep proper jobs. Immigrants need to stay out of our realm and go back to the void where they were spat out. If only my royal girlfriend could see that.”

Helsa scoffed, “That spoiled bitch is oblivious to everything that goes on around her. She should’ve been blind decades ago.”

“You make Charlotte blind, Hels, you’re gonna pay.”

“Make me, Sevia. I already have enough money.”

A growl rumbled in Alastor’s throat as he felt those burning critical eyes on him. Alastor had first-hand experience with discrimination as a man of mixed heritage back on Earth. Now in Hell, it appeared to be less about skin color and gender than it was about class and nationality. Alastor was reminded of the different forms of discrimination that Blacks, Native Americans, Irish and Italians dealt with as he had learned about in history.

His ears flicked on their own, taking in the sounds and sometimes the distant screams of this new place.

“I miss my mama,” he thought.

In the distance, Alastor heard loud evil laughter as Sir Pentious blasted at buildings from a metal blaster gun, the man looking like a well-dressed black and yellow snake. “Bow before my mechanical might, cowards!”

He stood on a podium carried by metal propellers, while a bunch of Egg Bois followed him on the street below. Thankfully, he was far enough away from Alastor to notice him. Running behind the egg minions was a blue scientist fish dressed in a lab coat carrying a vial of liquid in his hands.

“Hurry up, Baxter!” Sir Pentious yelled, looking behind him. “That clone serum won’t get used by itself. More minions at once!”

“Coming, sir,” Baxter said in a German accent, trying not to slip in egg yolk and step on egg shells.

“This place is a mad circus for lost causes!” Alastor thought, almost saying it out loud. Then another thought came to him. “If we’re all mad here, then why can’t I be the maddest of all?”

And mad he was.

Alastor was mad that he somehow ended up in Hell, despite killing all those rapists and racist men in life. He should be in Heaven with his mother, not down in Hell with his asshole of a father, wherever he was. He was mad that even in the afterlife, he and so many others were treated like shit by ignorant folk too stuck in their ways and beliefs.

Alastor glanced up and saw a billboard which read “66.6 FM, brought to you by Muse the Demon Radio!” The picture showed a man dressed in a brown suit with a bright red necktie decorated with cris-crossing lines shaped like the metal beams of radio towers. His head was an old fashioned radio, his eyes white triangular shaped dials, his teeth metallic.

“Amusing, Muse,” Alastor himself mused. He clenched his fists. No way was he going to let this piece of clunky junk run Hell’s radio station. If Alastor could broadcast through his microphone, then he might as well make a goal to become Hell’s only broadcaster. “Demon Radio, you’ll meet the Radio Demon soon enough.” Mentally, he put Muse as the first on his hit list.

Although it was Alastor’s first day in Hell, his drive to kill grew stronger by the minute. And his desire for flesh made him even hungrier than he had been during the Great Depression. He wished he had more power. Just being able to broadcast what was going on anywhere wasn’t enough for him.

As if reading his thoughts, the microphone spoke up in a radio voice. “I believe there is a way to get power, power beyond even your wildest dreams. You remember your voodoo rituals, yes?”

Alastor nodded.

“Then there should be a book that’ll allow you to do all sorts of things. Now we just need to find one.”

But where?

Alastor made his way into a bar where he met one of the Overlords, a deer with a flaming blue head and a deer skull for a face. He wore a suit with a black bow tie and buttons.

“Excuse me sir,” Alastor asked.

The deer turned around. “Yes?”

“You don’t happen to know where I can find a powerful spell book do you?”

He didn’t expect the Overlord to answer to some stranger.

Surprisingly the Overlord did answer. “Sure. There’s one that Lord Stolas keeps in his palace. It’s not too far from Imp City.”

“Thank you kindly,” Alastor said before making his way there.

“Why’d you tell him the location of such an object, Furfur?” asked a bird demon with two heads wearing comedy and tragedy theater masks.

“Comodia. Malum,” Furfur addressed the fellow bird Overlord with a laugh. “He’s a sinner. Stolas loves killing off foolish ones like him! Ha! He’s gonna die!”

Nearby, a grey skinned woman wearing a pink hat with black roses on it, eavesdropped on their conversation. She shook her head as she daintily sipped her tea.

Alastor soon reached the palace, narrowly avoiding killer imps roaming the streets. It was a great brick building covered with yellow sigils of Stolas along the high walls. Several windows had white and pink stained glass designs. A balcony had banners sowing the family crest and white and pink double doors with a silver crown design on it. Two bird guards holding glaives and wearing armor stood by the front doors, their feathers white with black spots, their yellow becks shaped like those of eagles. Out near the garden, the white owl queen sat with other owls drinking tea with a pink layered cake in front of them. There was a water fountain with blood on the bottom basin. The statue consisted of a crown and a posing Stolas in the center.

Alastor spotted some green vines off to the side. Checking to see that no one was watching, Alastor grabbed onto the vines and climbed up. The vines ended not too far from a stained glass window. But the window was too high up for him to reach. Alastor tried not to look down. Just because he was already dead, didn’t mean that being so high up was comforting. The vine began to snap under his weight and a bird guard patrolled along the lawn, nearly looking in his direction. The vine snapped and he almost yelled out and fell. Thankfully, he had extended his long claws, which dug into the small crevices of the wall, briefly keeping him in place. Wasting no time, he clawed his way up to the window, lifting himself up. He was surprisingly strong, despite his lanky body. He raised his fist, getting ready to break the window, but then he stopped. What if he had a little bit of magic in him as a demon? A little bit of natural magic he could use?

Alastor concentrated and found that he could turn into a full demon form. A form he quickly grew to appreciate. His black antlers branched out from his head and his eyes turned into red radio dials. He knew that if he transformed further into a wendigo, all Hell would break loose. He stared at himself in the reflective surface of the glass and smiled. The window promptly shattered into pieces on the marble floor inside. He quickly swung himself inside just as the bird guard glanced up toward the window. Avoiding the shards on the floor, Alastor reverted back to his base form and looked around. Nothing much in the room except old furniture, candles, and tree branches decorated with feathers. No sign of books anywhere.

Alastor knew all about Voodoo and rituals because he had practiced them with his mother on Earth. He found out that he had a spiritual connection to Kalfu and an affinity to fire. It was only natural for the microphone to remind him of what he had learned in the past. Alastor made his way down the hallways, curved steps leading down to the lower levels. The rugs were red and decorated with symbols and wings. Decorating the walls were small black emblems of the Gnostic demon family crest, a crown flanked by wings and an owl head underneath.

Alastor entered another room, this one decorated in pink drapes and a queen size bed. There was a large vanity area with bottles of makeup by the mirror. An old fashioned white dresser was by a wall. On a bedside table were several pictures: Octavia playing with Charlie and Helsa when they were little at the ash beach and Blood Red Sea. Octavia and Charlie going to Loo-Loo World together, posing by a Disney looking castle eating apple shaped popsicles. Octavia with a grumpy expression on her face, her father doing a goofy face and pose next to her.

The microphone appeared and the glowing eye scanned for books at a distance. The eye read the tiles and saw the book covers while the books were still lined up.

“Anything?” Alastor asked.

“Just books on the Lessor and Greater Keys of Solomon, owl history, herbs, astronomy, Chinese festivals and some romance novels.”

“Urgh, where is it? You said it’d be here.”

“Technically the Overlord did.”

“He wanted me killed, didn’t he?”

“Welcome to Hell, deer face.”

“What did you just call…”

Both of them paused when some humming was heard. The bathroom door was ajar and a book was on the floor. Ever so silently, Alastor crept to the door and slowly opened it wider. The microphone buzzed in warning but Alastor ignored it. The book had a symbol on the back cover with the name “Octavia” written on it. Alastor picked it up and looked at the front cover. It was black and had an eye in the center. Instead of voodoo symbols, the book title read: “Living with a hyperactive dad and a distant mother.” In smaller letters it said, “Cheating parents 101.” It appeared to be some sort of diary.

“Wow that’s deep,” the microphone muttered as Alastor gently put down the book. Princess Octavia was humming to herself in the shower, a combination of hoots and a British tone. She turned the water off and fluffed up her white and grey feathery chest, sending droplets everywhere. Her pink dress hung on a hanger by the door, her golden crown by the sink.

Octavia opened the shower curtains and Alastor froze. Octavia’s eyes widened.

“Hello,” said an embarrassed Alastor.

Octavia took one look at the tall smiling demon staring at her, and screamed. Alastor’s hand was over her mouth in seconds. The guards would surely be alerted of his presence by now.

“Sorry darling,” Alastor whispered.

He reached forward with his other hand and pinched her throat with two of his fingers. Octavia gasped a few times, then went limp. Alastor wrapped her up in a white towel, picked her up and gently placed her on her bed.

“Ever the idiotic gentleman I see,” said the microphone.

“Close your head,” Alastor seethed. “She’ll be fine, she’s only knocked out.”

“I don’t have a head.”

‘You know that’s not what I…never mind, let’s go.”

Outside, the guards were already searching the grounds and some were flapping their wings in the air. A few hurried down the halls inside. Time was running out.

Alastor glanced at a big room with double doors: the master bedroom. Alastor made his way over to the doors and opened them. Inside was a master bed with several pillows, a white head board and banners above the curtains. A royal portrait showed Stolas, his wife Melodia and their daughter Octavia, dressed in red robes. Not too far from a diamond chandelier, was another portrait of Stolas on his red throne and a detailed picture of a king’s crown.

The Gnostic owl king was currently talking on a white rotary phone with a few wings on it. He was wearing a red robe with white furs and had a gold crown on his head. His black top hat had eyes that matched his own.

“Hello Donner,” he said. “How’s your son, Blitzy doing? Still looking for work and being a rebel?”

Alastor looked around and then he saw it. Right next to a Satanic ritual book, cover facing forward was a grimoire with Voodoo and Satanic symbols on it.

“So what if you want Blitzy to be a boring killer and trickster? If he’s pursuing musical theater, just let him have at it. You don’t want to crush his musical theater dreams do you? Oh wait, you already did. Some asshole father you are.”

Alastor inched his way closer toward the book.

“Do you know what happens when I’m angry, Donner? When I’m angry, I become hungry and when I’m hungry, I want to…Hey!”

Stolas gasped as he spotted Alastor grabbing the book.

“Intruder!” he yelled. ”Kill him!”

In an instant, several guards burst into the room, holding deadly spears.

“I’m gonna have to call you back,” Stolas said before slamming the phone hard.

Alastor looked down below the window, the ground was many feet below. The guards rushed at him, Alastor not wanting to jump out the window from such a height.

Just then, a forceful wind, blew back the guards, sending them toward Stolas. One crashed into his lap, the other into the wall.

“Get off, get off!” he squawked, pushing the guard off. Octavia rushed into the room, now in her pink dress. “What happened?” she asked.

“Bastard’s stealing my book!” Stolas cried.

Alastor couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw something strange and amazing. An elegantly dressed woman was floating in the air, one hand holding a pink umbrella in it. Her other hand was the one that caused the wind blasts. She held out her hand to Alastor with a stern look.

“Let’s go, foolish fawn.”

Alastor took her hand and the two of them flew away from the window and farther from the palace. Stolas yelled in anger as they left. Melodia and her family watched the two flying individuals with puzzled looks on their faces. Then they went back to their tea.

“I’m Alastor, pleasure to be meeting you, sweetheart.”

“Rosie,” she responded. “Don’t go thinking that I’ll save you again.”

The two of them landed by Franklin and Rosie’s Emporium. They had discussed musicals and kill counts along the way. The shop was currently closed but it had clothing and antiques displayed in the windows.

“Thank you for that,” Alastor said. “Why’d you save me anyway?”

“I overheard my fellow Overlords mentioning a sinner going to risk his life for some magic book. Figured it wouldn’t be fair to let a newcomer die, even in this place. You’re not from around here, are you?”

“No, mam’.”

“Just be careful out there,” she said. Despite being new to Hell, Alastor’s charming personality had already gotten to Rosie. She jabbed a claw against Alastor’s chest, “And if I ever find you doing stupid stuff like that again…”

Alastor held up his hands. “You have my word that I won’t.”

“Good. Tea and a massacre singalong in a week?”

“That would be splendid!”

Alastor didn’t bother to mention that he only liked black coffee and hard liquor.

“Goodbye for now.” She eyed his clothes distastefully. “And do change into some better clothing.”

Alastor kissed her knuckles and the two of them parted ways.

With the book finally in his possession, Alastor began the ritual in a wood full of dead trees. He drew Kalfu’s veve on the ground, surrounding the symbol within a larger pentagram. Several black and red candles surrounded the circle…Rosie had let him borrow some of her own after he had claimed he was practicing a Satanic ritual dance. He then invoked Kalfu. The Loa appeared as a man with black skin and flaming bull horns from his head. He wore a red suit with a top hat to match. His mischievous eyes glowed red. Shadow demons with glowing eyes appeared in the surrounding darkness from the black portal.

“Greetings Alastor,” Kalfu said with a smile of sharp teeth. “As you are a person who’s faithful to us and one who has witnessed death and loss, I hereby bestow a portion of my power onto you. You will be able to control the shadows, teleport, conjure fire, make portals, possess others and many more. Remember, your shadow form will be separated from your body and take a form of its own. My demons will get ten percent of your full power to use as they please. And along the way…you’ll have to learn some harsh lessons, experiences that can break even the strongest demon.”

Alastor nodded in understanding.

Kalfu cut his hand, handing Alastor a black bladed knife etched in both angelic and demonic symbols. Kalfu then held out his palm for Alastor to shake. Alastor cut his own palm and their blood intermingled as they shook hands.

“Why does this feel too easy?” Alastor asked himself before shrugging it off.

The Loa extended his palm. Red electricity raced out and consumed Alastor.

It all happened before Alastor had the chance to blink. Through his high pitched screams and deer barks, Alastor felt something being ripped from him, the pain almost making him black out. Moments later, a grinning look-a-like shadow hovered by him. The dark subconscious thoughts that Alastor had in his previous life was now in shadow form. Shadow creatures rapidly circled around him and black tentacles enveloped his entire body like a macabre cocoon. His body curled up like a fetus in the darkness.

Tingling hot red electricity spread into his head, then moved down his body, much of it resting in his hands and fingers. He snapped his fingers on instinct and a burst of red magic sparked to life like a firework. Voodoo symbols and static filled the air as power coursed through him, magic merging with every nerve and fiber of his being until it became part of him.

Then knowledge of magic and voodoo spells entered into his brain. The new information faded into the back of his head, staying there like he had it within him all his life. The tentacles moved away, allowing him to move. His body glowed with a red aura. Alastor briefly shape-shifted into a red stag before turning back again.

Alastor snapped his fingers again, this time changing his outfit. His old clothes were replaced with a tattered red dress coat with vermillion vertical light red stripes going down it. His undershirt was bright red with an upside down black cross design. His pants were long and wine colored. Black tap dancing shoes were on his feet, bright red deer prints were underneath his soles. A wine colored bow tie was under his long gray neck. His clawed hands were soon covered by dark wine colored gloves with red spots on the tips and knuckles. He waved his right hand and a monocle appeared under his right eye. His deer tail was now hidden underneath the tail end of his dress coat.

Alastor took in his new appearance, his body glowing with a red aura.

"HEHEHEHEHAHAHAHA!"

Alastor let out a maniacal laugh that rose higher into hysterical giggles. All this supernatural power was coursing through his veins, and he loved every second of it.

Finally the magic quietly faded with a humming sound.

“Good luck,” Kalfu said before he and the demons vanished.

Alastor soon toppled many Overlords, including Muse. He had barged into the radio studio, interrupting Muse’s show.

“What is the meaning of this?!” Muse Marconi exclaimed.

Muse fired electricity at Alastor but he blocked it with a tentacle.

“There can only be one Radio Demon in Hell,” Alastor said, grabbing onto Muse’s suit. “And that won’t be you.” Muse tried to fight back but to no avail. Alastor ripped off his metal radio head and tossed the screaming contraption out the window. He snapped his fingers and in a haze of neon colors and static, the studio transformed into a large cabin with radio towers nearby. The new studio was by the woods as well. Alastor snapped his fingers and Muse’s body and head burst into flames.

Who knew that finding a place to live would be so easy? Private and rent-free as well.

Alastor grinned and spoke into his microphone, the red light blinking on.

“Greetings denizens of Hell. Your former radio host has fallen from grace…quite literally. Now, it’s time to welcome your one and only new host, Alastor on 66.6 FM!”

It wasn’t long before sinners called him the Radio Demon, a name Alastor embraced as evidence of his increasing influence. Even the most fearsome of monsters were scared, for good reason, at the demon who could shatter reality, if not their souls.

Now that Alastor had his powers, he could also summon his shadow and dark minions to do his chaotic work. His microphone staff could now play jazz music, hypnotize demons and send out destructive radio waves that blew out brains and destroyed nearby buildings. His minions looted stores, slaughtered demons and feasted on deer carcasses in the streets. Several voodoo imps carried demon heads on spikes as they jumped around wearing top hats and pinstriped suits to fit their small sizes. Skeletal deer and shadowy deer watched with evil grins at the burning carnage. Laughing tracks emitted from the staff as Alastor admired his gruesome handiwork.

Alastor met flapper woman Mimzy Hannigan at her jazz club and they bonded over songs, drinks, and the occasional murder. They also talked about their memories from New Orleans. Alastor eventually became an Overlord, bonding with hell born Overlord Rosie Poppins who became his friend and mother-figure. Overlords Valentino, Vox, and Velvet would arrive in later decades.

Alastor had overthrown several Overlords, including Overlords of the Telephone, Telegraph, Textile, Cars, Books, and even a demon with a grandfather clock face. He made a truce with the demon of Film and the demon of theater. Alastor also learned the Hell names of his parents: Neleus for his father and Poena for his mother. He didn’t know where they were or if his mother was even in Hell. He had assumed that she had gone to Heaven, but maybe she was just waiting for permission. They said his father was a demonic black stag and his mother was an angel doe humanoid.

Hopefully, he would find them in the future.

Alastor became one of the most feared Overlords, even getting into king Lucifer’s good graces. Both men were goofy and enjoyed having fun…and both had powerful dark sides that were not to be trifled with. In fact, Lucifer didn’t mind that Alastor went off and slaughtered many demons. Alastor was almost like an executioner for him. Less souls equaled less trouble. As long as Alastor obeyed the rules and didn’t cause too much trouble, Lucifer was content to let the Radio Demon do his thing. Though, they did disagree on a few things: Lucifer liked polka music while Alastor preferred jazz. Alastor was also stunned that Lucifer could only make somewhat decent carnival food, but he didn’t dare mention it out loud. If Alastor was a dapper man, Lucifer was a ringmaster. Lucifer and Alastor even bonded over drinks while watching Lucifer’s wife, Lilith perform on stage in a gorgeous blue and purple dress and a hat with pink flowers that had moving eyes in them. Her band, Resist, played in the background as she sang her heart out on stage (quite literally, as a witch doctor had to rush over to put the organ back into place before the show continued). Lilith sang many classics: “God spelled Backwards Is Dog,” “The Apple of My Eye,” “Fall From Grace,” “Adam the Asshole,” and “Grieve For Eve.”

Later in his cabin, Alastor looked through the spell book to find anything interesting. A sketch book lay next to him on a table, with well detailed drawings of crocodiles, deer, and radios in it. Not too far away was Alastor’s grander lair underground in the shadow world. The above ground cabin near the woods was more of a casual hideout and studio. The radio towers from his roof and nearby watched the area with all seeing eyes at the very top. Any intruder who came near the place would be forced to the ground by the radio waves and consumed by shadowy monsters. Even those who wore ear plugs would be at the mercy of the waves.

Toward the end of the book, Alastor stumbled across a Satanic pentagram drawing and spell that would allow him to briefly enter the living world. It was the same spell that I.M.P. would use to enter Earth and kill humans for their clients. It would be a great opportunity to build his army and recruit allies to work for him. He knew that there would be powerful enemies around to hinder his broader goal of someday taking over Hell and the hierarchy system. Plus, it got boring working alone at times.

Everyone would be equal in a chaotic world, all of those hopeless denizens tumbling into death and failure while Alastor watched. No more oppression from anyone else, only fear and respect. Even the more powerful rulers would eventually be at his mercy. Everyone would be puppets for his grand act…those who disobeyed wouldn’t live to see the finale. Hell would be the first world stage, then maybe Heaven and Earth. If the world was a stage, then the stage was a world of entertainment for Alastor.

Alastor grinned sinisterly. This was going to be very entertaining.

Chapter Two: The Chipper Cleaner

Niffty lives her life as a Japanese American woman and teenager in the 1950s. She is little, with short black hair and pale skin. She is born in the 1920s…on March 22 (VA birthdate), 1929! Being the same age as Vaggie when she died at age 22, Niffty died in 1951. She is a human named Nerissa Nifuti (after the maid. Her last name is Niffty in Japanese). She works as a maid for a white adoptive family after her parents are taken to an internment camp for being Japanese. Niffty faces taunts and hate for being Japanese at her school and by her family. Niffty lives in West Virginia. Pearl Harbor bombing in 1941 traumatizes everyone. During World War Two from 1939 -1945, Niffty is in her early teens.

Alastor appears to Niffty between 1933 and 1950. 1946. Niffty is 17.

Niffty wishes for true love and her fanfiction and cooking and cleaning to be appreciated. Then she encounters Alastor. Alastor gifts Niffty with three things: a new boyfriend, appreciation for her work, romance mangas and, as a bonus: a radio. The radio has a smiling grin on it, one of many versions that Alastor made. Niffty calls Alastor “senpai,” already charmed by him. Niffty signs a contract, agreeing to help him out.

But Niffty gets more than what she bargained for. Her boyfriend is abusive. Her fanfictions gets attention from her friends and attracts ugly horny males to her. Her adoptive family appreciates her cleaning and cooking so much, they make her do more. Niffty looks for the strange demon’s guidance, remembering him saying, “If you ever need my advice, just turn on the radio and call out my name.” She does, the radio seeming to appear when she needs it. The radio blinks on and jazz music plays, along with an alluring voice. Hypnotized by the radio and tired of her boyfriend, Niffty goes and kills him. She also sets his house on fire, with a crazed laugh. “He took my virginity, so I took his life.” She then goes and kills her racist adoptive family (something she wouldn’t normally do) and cleans up the area very well.

Niffty’s actions draw attention to the police. They break into her house in 1951 when she is 22. Niffty gets stabbed several times near her thighs by the racist officers. One officer is a relative of Niffty’s former boyfriend. Before anyone can stop him, he throws her into a burning fireplace for revenge, where she dies. The radio vanishes from Earth.

Chapter Three: The Grumpy Gambler

Husk lives his life as an Irish American man in the 1900s to 1970s. Husk is born on December 10 (VA birthdate) 1896, the same year as Alastor’s birth! He is a human named Hilario Foley (name meaning happy in contrast to his grumpy personality in Hell, surname meaning plunderer in Irish). Husk is born in Las Vegas to his parents. In his youth, he enjoys being around children, singing and putting on magic shows. He adores cats. Husk faces discrimination for being Irish, soon having to work in second class jobs. He is bullied in school and his family loses their jobs. In addition, his father is a heavy drinker, which encourages Husk to get into his addiction as a teen. Husk eventually makes a living by working at a casino, having previously been exposed to the heavy gambling culture and the thrill of chance games. He plays many games, Solitaire, Poker, Blackjack, among others. Husk enters World War Two in 1940 until its end in 1945. Husk endures PTSD from the war, ending up with nowhere to go.

Alastor appears to Husk between 1933 and 1970s. 1946. Husk is 25.

Husk wishes for money, a comfortable life, booze and a chance to find true love. Then he encounters Alastor. Alastor gifts Husk with three things: several stacks of booze, enough money to start a career in the gambling business, increased luck in all things, and, as a bonus: a radio. Husk signs a contract, agreeing to help him out.

Husk becomes lucky in gambling and soon, he becomes wealthy. He kills many people in the war and he also wins bar brawls. He also gets a wife and the two have a child. But he gets more than what he bargained for as time went on. His drinking addiction gets worse, and so does his gambling and reckless spending. It becomes so bad that his wife files for divorce, taking his child with her. Sometime between 1955 and 1975, Husk leaves to fight in the Vietnam War and survives, but at a great cost. When he comes back, he is traumatized, having nearly died eight times. With nothing left to live for as an old man, Husk drinks himself to death in 1971 at age 75. The radio vanishes from Earth.

Chapter Four: A Hellish Mess

Niffty ends up in Hell in her cyclops form in 1951. She discovers that she can move very fast, which helps her evade attacks from predatory demons who target the young. An evil dragon breathes fire at her and she flinches…only to find that she is immune. Niffty conjures a large sewing needle and stabs the evil attackers. But one giant creature picks her up and tosses her into the burning lake of fire. She plunges to the bottom of the lake, unable to breach the surface as sinners sink to the bottom instead of floating like in regular water. Though Niffty can survive in hot places, the heat and pressure becomes uncomfortable. There are also fiery underwater monsters to avoid. There is no way for her to interact with the world, make friends and no one to fall in love with.

Until one demon is alerted by her presence…

After having signed the contract on Earth, Niffty’s presence is sensed by Alastor’s shadow. The shadow reaches in and picks up Niffty, the little demon gasping for breath. Then, she meets Alastor. Alastor reminds Niffty of the deal she had made in the living world and invites her to shake his hand to seal it. Niffty is eager to do so, already enamored by the Radio Demon’s charm. Niffty soon works for Alastor, making his meals, cleaning his cabin-like lair underground (Deer’s Den), sewing voodoo dolls and tailoring his suits. She also is handy in fighting as she is immune to fire, speedy, skillful with her hands and can fit into small places. In exchange, Alastor gives her a place to stay, money, some journals and clothing for her hobbies, plus voodoo creatures for her to eat and play with. Niffty is soon summoned from the fireplace and gets to work cleaning the hotel rooms and helping make meals for the hotel residents. Niffty writes erotic fanfiction and sews in her spare time. Niffty calls herself Niffty.

Niffty’s true intentions would eventually be revealed. Niffty seeks to be doted on by lots of men, and she lives in a fantasy world of her own. And she’ll use any means necessary to make the world of Hell her own.

Chapter Five: Cat’s Out Of The Bag

Husk ends up in his black and white cat form with red car suit wings in 1971. He gets into more bar fights and shoots at demons who try and steal his gambling money. Husk hisses and his cornered and chased by Hellhounds.

Until one demon is alerted by his presence…

After having signed the contract on Earth, Husk’s presence is sensed by Alastor’s shadow. Alastor’s shadow swoops in and finishes off the hellhounds, saving Husk. Then he meets Alastor. Alastor reminds Husk of the deal he had made in the living world and invites him to shake his hand to seal it. Husk refuses at first but Alastor reminds him that he saved his life…now Husk must work for him. Alastor grins and threatens Husk with the thing cats fear most. Husk concedes before Alastor can enact on throwing him into the burning lake. Husk groans out loud and, having no other choice, shakes it. Husk calls himself Husk, but Alastor likes calling him Husker, much to his frustration. Husk soon protects Alastor in battle, flying through the air, scratching and killing enemy demons and even former Overlords. Husk uses blade cards, his claws and teeth to attack and his wings to defend himself and Alastor. Husk also provides Alastor with hard liquor. Alastor gives Husk money, booze, and a place to stay. He also promises that Husk will find love, though neither one believes it. Husk had lost the ability to love years ago due to the wars, drinking, and his self-interests…plus being influenced by Alastor’s deal. Alastor summons Husk from the Blackjack casino, just as he was about to win the pot. Husk soon works at the front desk and as a bartender at the hotel, swearing at everyone, gambling and drinking booze.

Eventually Husk would bond with his new friends, and grow closer to Angel Dust.

#hazbinhotel #alastor #husk #niffty

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promisedangel · 6 years

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Cedar Point Vs. Kings Island- Haunt

This year, as my group’s last hurrah of our spring/summer of coasters (we went to a total of five parks throughout the year), we attended the Haunts at both Kings Island and Cedar Point in back to back weekends. Time to see which of Cedar Fair’s Ohio parks has the superior spooks.

First Impressions/Park Front

Kings Island: The first thing you’re bound to see is that the fountains have turned red and occasionally spout fire. Then you see the Eifle Tower have giant red eyes staring down at you. Then you realize the entire park is filled with creepy music and deep fog effects. Fantastic

Cedar Point: You see a bunch of pumpkins at the top of the main entrance. You see they turned the water in Ocean Motion (called Ocean Potion during this time) a green color. You can see some fog effects but it never becomes as thick. While you walk down the midway, you see a lot of skeleton and tomb decorations, while some are awesome, they don’t particularly scare. There is some music, but it’s more spookish songs than creepy music.

Winner: Kings Island. Better theming hands down to get you into the spooks. Cedar Point is probably the more kid-friendly of the two parks, as the spooks are more inclined for kids.

Scare Zones

Kings Island: Spread throughout the park were four scare zones; Coney Maul, Wasteland, Dance of the Macabre, and Pumpkin Eater. Macabre was small and not as interactive this year, as there wer actors in only corners of the tower. Wasteland wasn’t as good this year, too. However, Coney Maul and Pumpkin Eater helped ALL of that. These two zones had awesome theming and the number of props for Pumpkin Eater alone was astonishing. It really gave off this vibe of a great pumpkin patch with scares hiding in its depths. Meanwhile Coney Maul is a haunted carnival, excellent in its execution and even the props got a scare from us. Because these zones were all spread out, though mostly around the left side of the park, you can go around most of them. However, you needed to go through at least one to get to a couple of rides.

Cedar Point: The scare zones are; Harvest Fear, Trail of the Forsaken, and Tombstone Terror-tory. The lack of scare zones is made up by the fact there are more outdoor confined haunted houses my friends and I like to call ‘Scare Trails’, but I’m grouping those in with the haunted houses. All outdoor scare zones are pushed to the back of the park. You absolutely cannot reach Maverick or Steel Vengence without going through a scare zone or two, especially on Friday because the train wasn’t running. This puts the major spooks in the back of the park, meaning you have to walk at least ten minutes to reach the first area. Sadly because of the rain and our group’s timing, we never got to see how Harvest Fear was. Despite this, actors in the other zones proved to catch us off guard once or twice with some things to hide behind, including fog. Not as many props as Kings Island, but it’s probably just so they don’t crowd the walkways.

Winner: Kings Island. Cedar Points scare zones feel all claustrophobic with barely any room to breathe since they’re all in the back of the park. While the ones in Kings Island felt stretched out despite three of them being relatively small in size. Yet, what they lack in size they make up in theming and good actors. My absolute favorite would have to be Pumpkin Eater.

Haunted Houses

Kings Island: The houses here are; Kill Mart, Backwoods Bayou, Blackout, Field of Screams, Madame Fatale’s Cavern of Terror, Chaos, Slaughter House, Urgent Scare, and Wolf Pack. Some were meh, but some were very good. Shout out to Urgent Scare and Slaughter House for upping their game this year. Field of Screams is CONSISTENTLY good, but try to get there early as the line can get VERY long for it. Chaos was new this year and while I felt it was good, felt like something was missing to push it into great.

Cedar Point: The houses here are; Deprivation, Fearground Freakshow, G.A. Boeckling’s Eerie Estate, Hexed: Light’s Out, Slaughter House, Zombie High School, Blood on the Bayou, Cornstalkers, and Cut Throat Cove. Shout out to Deprivation and Hexed for doing some very interesting things. Also, I should mention that Hexed, Zombie High School, and one other one (can’t remember) all have daytime versions for the kids and those with less scare tolerance to enjoy. This is a REALLY great idea to get kids aclimatted to such an envrionment, and my group and I were talking about such an idea while exploring Kings Island. This should be implemented in every Cedar Fair park.

Winner: This time I’m giving it to a single attraction, rather than a park. Cedar Point’s Deprivation. We only got to experience it once throughout our two days, but every single actor got us on our way through. We even ran into another group near the end. And for some reason, they had a chainsaw dude at the end WHO ENDED UP CHASING ME! T.T Why do the chainsaw guys always go after me?

Actors

Kings Island: This year Kinds Island upped their game with its actors. They brought in more actors to man the attractions. I remember last year Field of Screams had this room where you could have 3 actors and yet there was only one. This year there were FOUR actors and most of them got us. Some of them seemed tired as we got to them (Backwoods Bayou), although some attractions that were meh last year were made great by the actors going all out (Slaughterhouse). There was also this guy in Coney Maul with a ventriloquist dummy that we had fun watching and interacting with. We watched as he climbed up on one of the ledges of the flower beds and sneak behind these three girls who were on their phones. He got them so well, one of them almost dropped her phone. There was also this woman in Dance of the Macabre sitting at a table. Four 12 or 13 year olds were trolling her, so she just screamed at them and they ran away. It was great.

Cedar Point: Special mention here to the actors who were skulking through the LONG line for Fearground Freakshow. My tall brony friend decided to troll the actors with this lovely exchange:

Friend: Sorry guys, but you’re not the biggest freak here (Proudly display his Rainbow Dash t-shirt under his jacket) I’m a brony. I belong in there.

Actor: (gives a look) Wow... I feel sorry for you.

My friends and I busted up laughing. We actually did a lot more trolling with the actors at Cedar Point, but we ended up getting comeuppance for the trolling a number of times. Actors in the manor were also good at misdirection and got us good. While the actors in Zombie High School didn’t go for us, they did go for the group of teenage girls behind us (prime scare targets) and gave me a good bit of entertainment.

Winner: Unfortunately, I have to give this one a tie. The actors at both parks were a lot of fun so I can’t decide.

Miscellaneous (annoyances)

Kings Island- I don’t know why, but barely any drink refill station was open. I remember my friends and I walked around the entire park just to find the one near the Coney Maul was the only standalone station open that we could find. We COULD have gone to a restaurant, but many of them had long lines and we only wanted a drink.

Cedar Point- The drink problem followed to an extent, but with arguably more food placed, the drink situation wasn’t as dire.

No winner here.

And by a 2-0-1, the overall winner is none other than Kings Island! If you still have time and you can make the drive, I’d recommend Kings Island for your spooks and thrills in an amusement park this year!

#cedar point #kings island #haunt #halloweekends #promised reacts #long post

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ace-pidge · 7 years

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Continuing from my previous post, have some Paladin Road Trip headcanons (with input from @kcgane <3)

Keith insists on being the principal driver cause sitting still and not doing anything for so long makes him antsy

Also because everyone else drives too slow, no matter how fast they’re actually driving

Hunk takes on the job of navigator because being in charge of the maps and GPS and having a task to focus on helps with his anxiety

Pidge ends up sitting in the middle in the back cause she’s the smallest, with Shiro and Lance on either side

At some point Shiro and Lance both fall asleep on her and she’s Suffering

Lance initiates games like I Spy and Punch Buggy, and when he’s not doing that he’s singing along to the music or pointing out cool sights along the road. It’s harmless but the constant chatter can get distracting

Keith when Lance falls asleep: thank god

Shiro sometimes joins in on the car karaoke when he knows the songs, he and Lance can get some sweet harmonies going

Pidge claims ownership of the aux cable

It’s a Rule that Hunk and Shiro aren’t allowed in the back at the same time. This stems from one time when Keith was driving and Pidge called shotgun and Lance ended up smushed in the back between the two biggest team members

Lance: Guys you know I love you but I literally can’t breathe

Keith is an AWFUL back seat driver. No one is safe

When someone else is driving Shiro will make sure to sit next to Keith in the back so he can cover his mouth as needed and otherwise keep him distracted

Lance when Keith falls asleep: thank god

There’s always a mad dash/fight to claim shotgun

Shiro once accidentally scratched Pidge when they were grappling for the front seat. Not a serious scratch by any means but ever since Pidge ruthlessly takes advantage of Shiro’s guilt to get her way (”Pidge you were shotgun earlier” “Remember that time you mauled my arm?”)

When Hunk is taking a turn driving he likes taking the scenic route, even if it takes longer, and he loves stopping at small local bakeries and restaurants

When Lance is driving it’s the only time he gets quiet as he’s concentrating on the road

Everyone was real disconcerted the first time it happened

Pidge can go entire trips without a single bathroom break

Shiro loves rolling his window down when he’s in the passenger seat and dangling his hand outside and feeling the wind on his face

The person sitting behind him, hair whipping everywhere: This is fine

#voltron #keith #hunk #shiro #lance #pidge #paladins #vld #headcanon #mine #road trip

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gilgamemesh · 7 years

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I saw this long and super elaborate dream and I’ll try to write it down fast before I forget!!

The dream took place in this medieval-ish castle but the time period was honestly closer to like Renaissance than medieval times, perhaps even later times but it was supposed to be a fictional universe I think?

Basically there was some sort of coup going on in the castle but the exact type is a mystery to me as I spent majority of the dream just kind of running around for some reason and trying to avoid getting killed? The part where I was physically in the dream was fun in the dream but boring if I were to write it down so I’ll skip this directly to when I disappeared from the dream.

There was this young man who was probably around 16-17 in the castle, dark-ish skin, dark hair and he was some sort of squire I think and also a talented tactician? And he realized the coup would happen and everyone in the castle would get killed if they didn’t run away, but all the doors were blocked. While he was running around trying to find an escape he ran into a small boy (probably around 10) he pulled with him as a way to save both himself and the boy once they just find a way out.

Then suddenly one of the walls of the castle opened to them and there was a group of men inside wearing dark capes and matching clothes and they were some sort of secret society and they were willing to let the boys in for a reason that was totally explained but I forgot, and so they went in. They could hear how the castle rumbled and how people were slaughtered outside but they were safe there. The young boy got super attached to the older one, and while he didn’t speak much at all he was always following the older boy around.

I think they lived within the walls of the castle for some time but then it became clear they would soon be attacked too and they had to prepare for a fight, and they started planning how to attack the opponent and the older boy worked as a tactician and became some sort of unit leader as a result?

They then went outside through a tunnel with all their men and the older boy told the younger to stay on the charts they had prepared somehow and that he should try his best to stay alive and run and hide if push came to shove. Then the battle started, I think they were ambushed and were met with archers and fiery cannonballs, and in the heat of the battle the older boy was killed by the archers. It was an instant death and came as a plot twist surprise even to ME. The younger boy then jumped out of the chart and ran to the older boy’s corpse and tried to hold him and see his face and nudge him back awake but it was useless, he was dead and wouldn’t wake up anymore.

And then the young boy got mad and his form changed into this weird smoke like creature, like humanoid enough but definitely some fantasy race and every one of he secret society members gasped and the young boy started MAULING their opponents and brutally murdering them by turning into like invisible gas when dashing and thus avoiding arrows, and would materialize only to like kill the men in one strike.

At this point the dream stopped but I was still asleep and then I was in the real world and apparently the whole thing had been a video game??? And I had this guide book with me detailing the fictional races and species of the game series (it was supposed to be like game of thrones somehow) and I remember looking up what that boy was supposed to be and apparently he was part of a species that instictively think they’re human and try to live as humans in the human world? And they don’t talk much, they mentally mature faster than humans (so even though the boy looked 10 he was mentally around 15-16 already) and get attached to one person they usually follow around until their death, and if harm falls on this person they reveal their real form and just go on a rampage sdfg

I’M MAKING THIS SOUND REALLY BORING but it was good in the dream I loved the unity the two boys had and the death plot twist was honestly a surprise even to me even though it was my dream and I’m :(

#castra's dream diary #I want to make those two into ocs they deserve it #they'd fit taros so well too

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mutatiio · 7 months

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which tarot card are you??

justice. what would you do to ensure justice? you know full well i don’t speak of lofty ideals and courts and magistrates, dearest. what would you do to those that hurt you? if i dropped them in your lap, what would you do? what kind of pain could you possibly inflict upon them? you are right to do so. you are right to want to do so. ignore the screaming, dearest, you are the hand of justice now, and they hurt you. do not look too closely at their faces, dearest. you are within your rights. you spell out your own rights, now. are you happy about it? are you certain that this is the right person you hold by the hair? does your anger hurt less now?

tagged by: @thirdsght ( thanks even tho this hurts!! ) tagging: @rottingkiss ( misa ) / @ecopoison / @mayxthexforce ( garen ) / @alootus / @jeditrash / @monstarousmythos ( thistle?? ) / @misfittcd ( kian )

#⸢ dash game ⤑ maul ⸥ always remember.#i ask this from the heart... WHAT THE FUCK??

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themurphyzone · 7 years

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Double Team Ch 2

Ch 2: Infiltrate the Castle

They covered the plane in a large tarp, leaving it behind in the clearing. While Perry would’ve liked to land closer to the castle, doing so was ill-advised with a large group. He wouldn’t be surprised if the castle was equipped with sensors too. Now they had to walk through the woods and hope no witches or wood trolls found them. Not that Perry believed in them, of course.

Spooky forests did funny things to people’s brains.

“He chose a bad location for an evil lair,” Heinz said. “It is a little cliche. I don’t know why some people enjoy choosing isolated places. Personally I’d rather be in the middle of civilization so it wouldn’t be painful to pick groceries. Speaking of which, what do you think I should make for dinner this weekend, Perry the Platypus?”

Perry pointed to Heinz. It was only fair that he should choose the course for the evening.

“Aw, you’re letting me choose?” Heinz asked, wiping an invisible tear from his eye. “Do you like stir fry? Or sausages? I’m just tossing out suggestions right now. You have a few days to decide what you want, so no rush.”

Balthazar cursed in frustration, extracting himself from a thorn bush. “Do you ever know when to keep your mouth shut? You’re worse than Dakota on anesthesia.”

“Hey, that was one time,” Vinnie complained. “In my defense, you really shouldn’t have locked us in the broom closet. That’s what started the gossip in the first place.”

“You didn’t give me a choice, you dolt,” Balthazar muttered. “Not when you were about to unleash the laboratory’s squirrels on Blockhead’s mixed nut supply.”

As they argued, Perry heard a small growl from his left. A pair of slitted eyes peeked out from the undergrowth. Just his luck they’d have to deal with a predator. He assumed a fighting stance, his tail poised to slap whatever was planning to eat him.

“Perry the Platypus, hold on,” Heinz said, holding his hands in a time out gesture. “Let me have a look.”

He crouched in front of the bush, trying to see what was hiding behind it. Then a tiny ball of fluff flew out and landed on Heinz’s face, covering his eyes. Heinz yelped and fell on his rear. Perry jumped on his shoulder, using his tail to pry the fluff off. It fell with a barely audible mew.

“Do I have any marks on my face?” Heinz asked. Perry wasn’t surprised he’d recovered so quickly. He’d seen Heinz survive much worse. “Man, not bad for a kitten.”

“And I have no desire to be mauled by wild cats when the parents show up,” Balthazar said. “Let us continue with the mission.”

“‘Let us continue with the mission,’” Heinz mimicked. Balthazar stiffened at Heinz’s mockery of his British accent. “Come on. An ocelot kitten won’t hurt you.”

“Aw, so cute!” Vinnie exclaimed, holding out his hand for the kitten to sniff. “We should name her!”

Not even a minute and they were already attached. This wasn’t going to bode well for the mission. Perry was more surprised her parents hadn’t shown up yet. This kitten was clearly too young to be by herself.

“You come up with a name,” Heinz said. “I’m terrible with them. I’d probably wind up calling her Kitten-inator or something.”

Balthazar rolled his eyes. “I can’t believe you two have decided the kitten’s a girl based on one look.”

“Perry the Platypus, can you tell?” Heinz asked. “Thought I’d ask, since you’re also an animal. Well, you act more human. But in terms of DNA, you’re an animal.”

The kitten lost interest in Vinnie, curiously sniffing Perry instead. He nudged the feline with his bill. Then he nodded at Heinz.

“Okay, so we were right,” Heinz confirmed. “It’s strange that this kitten is all alone. The ocelots here have better familial instincts than people. I should know. I lived with them for a while.”

“We’ll help Oatmeal find her parents then!” Vinnie said. Balthazar groaned. “Hey, you know I always name stuff after food.”

Oatmeal rubbed her head against Heinz’s hand, purring. “She likes me,” Heinz grinned. “I guess I’m still popular with ocelots after all this time. Not a bad thing at all. Oatmeal, we’re on a mission to defeat this Lord Doom guy, but we’ll help find your parents afterwards. And if it turns out that you had the rare kind of ocelot parents that were heartless enough to abandon you, I’m taking you home. I think Vanessa would like you. She’s a cat person.”

No. Heinz was not removing a wild animal from its natural habitat and domesticating it. If necessary, Perry would try to locate a wildlife refuge, but even that would take some time.

His tail flicked in annoyance. Why did being around Heinz always put weird thoughts in his head?

“Fine,” Balthazar grunted. “But I’m not handling the little runt.”

The best place for Oatmeal turned out to be the inside of Vinnie’s jacket. He zipped it up all the way and left her head poking out under his chin. “She’s so fuzzy and soft,” Vinnie said. “It’s like having a stuffed animal strapped to my chest.” She rubbed the top of her head against him, purring softly. “You should try it sometime, Balthy. It might take off some stress.”

“Unlike you and the clumsy oafs we’re currently working with, I have some dignity,” Balthazar retorted. He immediately slammed into a tree, stumbling away in a daze.

Heinz burst into laughter. “That’s karma. Man, I wish I brought a camera for these moments!” Perry hid a smile beneath his hand.

Balthazar straightened his hat, doing his best to appear dignified. “You’ve all had your laugh at my expense. Let’s get on with it.”

After walking for ten minutes, they came face to face with a giant stone wall. Perry shot a grappling line above the wall as an experiment. However, there wasn’t anything at the top for the hook to grip, and the entire line fell uselessly to the ground.

“Did you bring a bazooka by any chance?” Heinz asked. “We would’ve brought one, but OWCA ordered all the agents to turn in theirs for some tweaking. The original model was kinda touchy. I offered to help with the design, but Monobrow was all, ‘Doofenshmirtz, I don’t trust you to handle a bazooka without blowing something up and you still owe me a car’. He needs to let that go.”

“I don’t think I’d trust you with a bazooka either,” Balthazar said, folding his arms. “Your file mentioned you had a penchant for blowing things up.”

“None of those were intentional though. It’s an occupational hazard of putting self-destruct buttons on my things,” Heinz retorted. “You didn’t exactly have the best track record either.”

Balthazar huffed. “I mastered twenty different forms of martial arts. I had a 4.0 GPA in Time Traveler’s College. It took me a long time to get this position in the Bureau.”

Vinnie tapped him on the shoulder. “Calm down. We want this mission to be a success, remember? And besides, we really shouldn’t be drawing attention to ourselves by arguing.”

Perry agreed. He didn’t see any security cameras at the moment, but Lord Doom’s file didn’t go into a lot of detail about the technology he employed. Maybe all his security was concentrated on the interior.

Oatmeal jumped out of Vinnie’s jacket and scampered to the end of the wall, disappearing around a corner. “Oatmeal! Wait up!” Vinnie shouted, running after her. “Don’t run off like that! I’m not in the best shape for chase games! Agh!”

A spotted paw caught Vinnie by the torso and dragged him behind the corner. Perry, Heinz, and Balthazar quickly dashed towards him. A spotted blur caught Perry by surprise, and his tail lashed out in defense. It slammed into something solid, a yowl of pain coming from the creature.

An ocelot, to be exact.

The ocelot called out, and at least fifty others slunk out of the bushes, growling fiercely.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many ocelots in one place,” Heinz said, barely dodging an ocelot that tried to swipe at his legs. “Not that I’m complaining. But they’re usually friendlier than this!” Perry kicked one that tried to jump on Heinz, then punched another in the shoulder.

“Any idea how we can fend them off?” Balthazar and Vinnie were positioned back to back, each armed with a large stick. They were completely surrounded by a pack of snarling felines.

Oatmeal rubbed herself against the largest ocelot, purring. “Oatmeal,” Vinnie singsonged, tapping his leg. “Come here, kitty. Papa doesn’t want you getting mauled.”

She paid no attention.

The lead ocelot growled, and the others began roughly pushing the group towards the drawbridge. Oatmeal mewed, walking towards Vinnie. Before he could pick her up, another ocelot placed herself between them and snapped at Vinnie’s hands.

“Well, at least we get to take the direct route,” Heinz commented as the drawbridge lowered. “I’m terrible at stealth.”

None of them were eyeing Perry for a meal. He was thankful for that. But Lord Doom had to be doing something to these ocelots. There weren’t any fedoras, so they couldn’t be OWCA agents. He didn’t see any mind controlling flea collars either. There had to be a device inside somewhere. That was the only explanation Perry could think of.

“When all is said and done, I’m fabricating the report,” Balthazar said. “Our cover shall be that Heinz got knocked out by an ocelot and the rest of us heroically stormed the castle to save him.”

“Wait, why am I the guy that gets knocked out?” Heinz scowled, stopping to glare at him. An ocelot hissed. “Okay, I’m moving. Happy?”

They were not fabricating any reports. Did Balthazar always have to do things that would land them in more hot water? And Perry definitely didn’t appreciate Heinz being the designated knocked out guy either. He was a better fighter than most people gave him credit for.

The ocelots herded them towards a spiral staircase, then left to guard the entrance. Perry looked up, then regretted it. Just looking at the staircase made his head spin.

“On second thought, maybe I’ll just stay here,” Vinnie said “Stairs don’t agree with me.” Balthazar grabbed Vinnie’s gold chain and hauled up him the stairs.

“Come, Dakota,” Balthazar said. “You are not becoming cat food.”

“Do you need a lift, Perry the Platypus?” Heinz asked. “I never understood the obsession castles have with stairs. Sure, elevators weren’t invented at the time they built these things, But they could at least make the steps not so high.”

Perry shook his head, taking his first step up. However, the step was so high that Perry’s legs and tails hung in the air before he was able to haul himself up.

“Well, go ahead and struggle then,” Heinz smirked. “We’ll defeat Lord Doom without you. But no worries, we’ll fill you in.”

Sighing in defeat, Perry climbed up Heinz and sat piggyback style on his shoulders. It wouldn’t hurt to conserve his strength, he supposed.

Heinz laughed. Perry grabbed his hair so he didn’t fall off as his shoulders rocked up and down. “Thought so.”

#milo murphy's law #balthazar cavendish #vinnie dakota #perry the platypus #heinz doofenshmirtz #phineas and ferb #double team

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filligan-universe · 7 years

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Game Review: CRASH BANDICOOT: THE N. SANE TRILOGY (2017)

Whoa! [Translation: Click “Keep Reading”]

Oh, how I have waited for this day...

The year is 1998, or something. My mom bought me a PS1 and, what was probably recommended to her by the Futureshop employee on shift at the time, Crash Bandicoot. The original. The first. The beginning. The hardest fucking thing I’d never played.

8-year-old me was dumb, though. I sunk around twenty hours into Jersey Devil without ever understanding its mechanics or how to progress (a couple years back I thought, “How did you progress in that game?” and found out that you progress like any other free-roam platform and 8-year-old me was just an idiot who liked the game’s spooky aesthetic). I played the shit out of Beast Wars and could rarely progress (in fairness, that game was tough). It took me maybe a year to get to Darth Maul in the Phantom Menace game, but I could never beat him. Then I lost the save file, tried again, and got stuck in a Rancor pit halfway through the game, inexplicably decided to save my game there, and from then on insta-died every time I loaded it back up.

But Crash is a fairly linear platformer, and those I understood from my SNES days. What Crash beat into me and thousands of kids around the world was that the hand-holding days of cute dinosaurs was over. See that fish? That innocent little fish flopping around? IT JUST MURDERED YOU. Oh, you fell in the water? Haha -- NOW YOU’RE DROWNING AND DEAD LOOK AT YOUR FLOATING CORPSE.

1998 was also in the era of cheat code books and passwords. I made it, impressively I think, to Road to Nowhere before I gave up and found myself copying these codes down. Once I unlocked free movement across all levels, most of my time in Crash Bandicoot was spent fighting all of the bosses in succession (the hardest is N. Brio by the way). Levels like Road to Nowhere, Slippery Climb, The Lab -- these never got touched. I beat the system so I didn’t have to beat the levels.

Then Crash 2 came out. And I beat it from start to finished. Ditto Crash 3. So enough down memory lane; how does the remade trilogy stand up?

The answer is: pretty goddamn perfectly. There are some things I’ll address, but the overall package is sharp and faithful. It feels like re-living the games of my single-digit years and that was the biggest box Vicarious Visions had to check. They’ve tszujed up that bandicoot sheen while recapturing the fun of Naughty Dog’s original gameplay. Were this a remaster instead of a remake using assets from the PS1 classics, it wouldn’t be so remarkable, but VV built this from scratch and still managed to nail everything. Huge kudos to them on this. Not sure anything of this magnitude has been achieved -- remake-wise -- in the industry before.

When the game released, the Crash Bandicoot subreddit exploded. Highest among the complaints were: jumping is off, hitboxes are off, and Crash’s shoes have been coated with bacon grease. And they weren’t technically wrong: these things are changed from the original games. Jumps are not as high as they were and I don’t remember having to hold X in the first one to gain distance. Hitboxes can be wacky and drastically different from what they were in the originals, making veteran players misjudge when to spin. And Crash doesn’t land flat on surface edges anymore -- with today’s scary technology, he can realistically slip off instead of standing on 85% thin air. Creepy! Wrong! Worst game ever! Back to the PS1 classics that look like ass on my 70″ 4K HDTV!

I was in the same camp when I first booted up The N. Sane Trilogy. My first death was on the very first game on the very first level on the very first enemy. One of those giant fuckin’ crabs that you only see in level one because they’re huge and slow and the training wheels are still on. It killed me because I spun when I always used to spin in the original, and that was wrong. The hitbox for them changed. This probably caused most of my frustration with all three games for the first several hours, but I’m what the baby boomers call a “video-machine gamer,” all right? I’m adaptable. I can alter my approach to things. I can learn from errors. And a changed hitbox, as it turns out, is not the same thing as a broken hitbox. You just re-learn when to spin stuff. Now I’m not bothered by it.

Same goes for the jump. Mastering this again took time and patience, especially with certain parts of the game that don’t function properly like the ice physics in Crash 2. However, after nailing when to hold X for greater height and understanding that now Crash needs a more precise landing to avoid slipping, I’ve gotten adept at this as well. All of this is to say that those players who initially flipped out at these tweaks were hopefully just following their gut reactions like me but have now adjusted and are now having fun -- like me.

The slipping, though, man. It makes Crash 1 even harder than it was, but I still won’t call it a mistake. From what I’ve ascertained, Crash’s character model is now pill-shaped, meaning he’s gonna slip, all right? It’s just gonna happen. BONUS: watch me, in the Twitch chat room for my friend’s first play-through of this game, try to offer this advice and him taking it the wrong way.

So what are the biggest criticisms I can levy against the trilogy? Well, the music stands out as subpar, especially in direct comparison to the louder, more interesting original score. The new music feels timid -- like it’s afraid to be the bombastic presence it was in the classics. A more faithful approach to the music’s original sounds would’ve been appreciated. I’m still listening to the original score because the new one is too orchestral. It’s not as video-gamey -- not as wacky, and so that charm and atmosphere are lacking in the new trilogy. Here are some comparisons:

Temple Ruins [Original]

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Temple Ruins [Remastered]

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Crash Dash [Original]

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Crash Dash [Remastered]

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This isn’t to say the music is bad or that every remastered track is worse than its original counterpart (see: Hang Eight, Toad Village, Toxic Waste, & Future Frenzy for just a few examples of excellent new takes), but even when the music is worthy of the original score it often fades into the background and gets lost in the sound effects. I know you can adjust the volume settings to make the music louder, but I shouldn’t have to, nor do I want to -- I like all the noises in Crash Bandicoot (except the goddamn didgeridoo Crash-angel plays). This is just an area where the flame doesn’t burn as brightly as it ought to.

Also? I don’t like Cortex’s design or voice. Or most of the voice acting in general. I don’t mind how Crash sounds, but I’ve been hearing John DiMaggio voice every character in existence since 2006 and now when I hear him I can’t unhear him -- I know it’s him. Kind of like when you know Tom Kenny voices Spongebob, you’ll always know when Tom Kenny shows up in something. I know the original actor for Dingodile died 12 years ago but come on. I blame Twinsanity for this, which was the first time the series saw a massive design shift and Cortex became the weird cartoon he is now. He’s lost his menace.

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I think it’s the gums. I miss Cortex’s gums.

Cutscenes are particularly bad in Crash 2 whenever Cortex addresses you in the warp room. There are no effects to show Coco taking over the broadcast. Seems kinda lazy.

These complaints are superficial to a quality game, though. I did something 8-year-old me couldn’t do the other day: beat Crash Bandicoot without any cheat codes. I sweat and swore through The High Road and Slippery Climb, came out of it, and climbed the tower to kick Cortex off it. That feeling of accomplishment has been missed in most games these days. And now I find myself obsessing over gems. Those clear sparklies that 8-year-old me never sought because I’d shrugged them off as “way too hard” to get. I’m over halfway to nabbing them all in each game and I’m going -- oh yes, I’m going to get that motherfucking red gem on Slippery Climb. I spent 45 minutes trying to get the yellow gem on The Lab, you think I’m gonna stop now? I’ve got a collectible mind, motherfucker. I can’t pass that shit up. I’ll probably snap my controller but that’s all right because you know what? I’m a fucking adult now and I can just buy a new one. Fucking red gem!!

...Yeah, so, I love this game.

#Crash Bandicoot #Crash Bandicoot N Sane Trilogy #Crash Bandicoot 2 #Crash Bandicoot Warped #Crash Bandicoot N Sane Trilogy review #Crash Bandicoot remastered #Crash Bandicoot comparison #Crash Bandicoot Cortex #Crash Bandicoot soundtrack #Crash Bandicoot music #Crash Bandicoot gameplay #Crash Bandicoot remake #N Sane Trilogy review

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operationrainfall · 5 years

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Although oprainfall has reviewed Way of the Passive Fist and its DLC before, it’s been a long time since I personally covered it. In fact, the last time I got to play it firsthand was at PAX West way back in 2017. I thoroughly enjoyed it then, and I’ve been eager ever since to play it on a Nintendo console. Well, now that it has made its way to the Nintendo Switch, I finally got my chance. The question is, was it worth the wait?