Spoonerville: Page 5

By the time the Pizza was ready Derek and Rodney were deep into a Grand Prix on Mario Kart. They paused long enough to get the pizza out of the oven and refill sodas but then it was back to the intense rivalry that had become very important in the last twenty minutes.

Well into their eleventh race the counter bell rang. “Derek quit playing your stupid games! I’m hungry!” A woman’s voice forced its way into the back room.

Derek paused the game and got out of his ancient bean bag chair. Rodney got up as well and followed him out. “About time lazy. How do you afford this place? I never see anyone in here other than me.” She asked as Derek made his way into the back. “Is this a mob front?” She asked.

Derek laughed as he worked the dough for her pizza. Rodney looked up from the soda he had just finished. He and the girl noticed each other for the first time. She pointed at him. “I’m your only friend and amazon doesn’t sell people so who the hell is this?” She asked Derek.

Normally Rodney wouldn’t have been able to utter a word, girls were not his strong suit. The counselor he had been seeing at his previous school said he was painfully shy. Rodney felt more like he was painfully a dumbass. So he was as surprised as anyone when he stuck his hand out and introduced himself. “Rodney, actual human resident of Spoonerville.” He said with a dopey smile.

She took his hand and tried not to laugh. “Vivian Brooks.” She said with a smile. “And just because you live here doesn’t mean he didn’t order you out of a Russian catalog.” She pulled a straw out of its paper wrapper. “You know you’re free to leave at any time right? You’re in America now.” She said as she threw the crumpled up straw wrapper into the kitchen. “He can’t keep you here against your will!” She yelled so Derek could hear her as he worked.

Rodney shook his head. “I don’t think Russian mail order does husbands.” He said laughing. He walked around the counter and filled his cup. “You want?” he asked.

She shook her head and pulled a flask out of her tiny purse. “So Rodney, actual human resident.” She took a drink. “What brings you to Spoonerville?” She raised an eyebrow.

He shrugged. “You’d think with all the free time I’ve had the last week, I would have come up with a better story than the real one.” He said with a smile.

She shook her head. “Nah, stick with the truth, even if it sucks.” She replied.

He shrugged again. “Parent’s died in a car crash and I got shipped here to live with my grandmother.” He admitted quickly.

She nodded. “So you’re old lady Edgar’s grandson.” She said.

He nodded. There was silence for a moment. Vivian stuffed her flask back into her purse. “Bummer about your parents.” She said finally. Rodney nodded and fidgeted with his cup.

Derek stuck his head out of the kitchen. “Jalapeno’s or no?” he asked.

She looked at Rodney. “Are we interested in hot and spicy this evening?” She asked bluntly.

Rodney’s chin dropped an inch and no sound came out of his mouth.

Derek threw a towel at Vivian. “Leave him alone Viv, thanks to him I’m one more customer closer to my millionth customer celebration!” He said ducking back into the kitchen.

She caught and folded the towel nicely. “Yeah, only nine hundred thousand nine hundred and ninety eight more to go!” She yelled back.

Shades of Justice: Page 37

Mark walked over to an empty section of the command center wall. He reached out and pressed his hand against the wall and waited for a second. Nothing happened. “That’s what I was afraid of.” He grumbled. “Computer, voice recognition Quicksilver, access storage facility.” He asked the command center computer.

The others waited with baited breath. “The storage facility mainframe is not responding.” The machine replied.

Gordon threw his hands up. “Of course it’s not. How long until power is restored to the storage facility?” He asked.

“The storage facility power level status is unknown, the mainframe is not responding.” The computer replied.

Warren ran his hands through is hair in frustration. “Ok so now what?” He asked.

Mark shrugged. “We break through the wall.” He offered.

Gordon pointed at the wall section. “Any idea what we’re going to need to break through that?” he asked.

Kelly threw her glasses on. “Blacklight Sabers!” She held out her hands as she spoke the command and the hilts to her swords materialized. She turned one on and sunk the blade in the wall. It went slowly but she was able to bury the blade in the wall. She slowly began to pull the blade upwards beginning the tedious process of cutting a door for the team to get through. She tossed her second sword to Warren and he started on the other side of the door.

Blood and Profit: Page 60

The game console they found was in much better shape than the one Mew remembered Toll constantly playing with, which made sense considering this device had likely been in storage for generations.

They took the console back into the main lab and treated it like a legendary piece of history, which it very likely was. They made sure it was still fully functional, replaced some parts that were failing due to age and turned it on.

The console booted perfectly. The professor turned it back off and plugged the ring controller into the game console. He turned the console on again and after the introductory screen a menu came up that referenced the ring controller. Ling, Cory, and the professor all shouted in excitement. The professor accessed the button for the ring console and they were dismayed to see a never ending list of options come up. Each entry was nothing more than a string of numbers.

The professor sat down hard in his chair. “Solve one problem, and a whole butt load more present.” He sighed as Cory pressed the button to go back to the top of the screen. The screen showed a total of two hundred and forty five files they had discovered.

Mew was totally lost. “What do those numbers mean?” She asked.

Ling shrugged. “That’s the problem. We don’t know.” She admitted as cory opened the first file and found more files that seemed to be named with random strings of numbers and letters. “And it’s going to take us a decent amount of time to decipher them.” She said.

The thin guard and the fat guard came through the lab doors with the pizza that the professor had ordered. “Here’s your lunch. From now on you get delivery from actual pizza delivery, this crap is below our pay grade.” The thin one dropped the pizza on an only partially filled lab table, turned and walked out as the fat one followed him.

Lidarion: Page 32

Dean was the first to speak. “All right squints, do your thing.” He said a huge smile on his face.

Squints pointed at the scrolls. “Oh sure, only two problems, even if I could unroll scrolls the size of a house, I can’t read Titan!” He said in shock.

“I can.” Haruff offered.

Trent gestured to Haruff. “There we go! I knew you were going to be good for somethi – You’re Blind!” He finally caught on.

Haruff’s mouth dropped open in mock shock. “Since when?” He asked sarcastically.

Trent stuck his tongue out. “Very funny.” He spat.

Dean had been inspecting the locks on the lowest scroll. “Can we even open these? They look incredibly old.” He said.

Squints looked at Obla’reth. “So can we even open the scrolls and if so do you know anyone that can legitimately read Titan?” He asked.

Obla’reth shook his head with a smile. “No we cannot, and no I do not. No one had read or spoken Titian for more than ten lifetimes.”

Brooke sighed heavily. “So we came all this way for nothing.” She said.

Obla’reth walked over to an ancient wooden pedestal that had a wooden cover closed over the top of it that was split down the middle. He flipped the wooden cover open to reveal a large book. “I wouldn’t say nothing, before the locks rusted and the language of the Titians had faded from memory, one of the librarians translated the scrolls into Mer.” He explained.

Squints scurried over to the podium. “You can read the language of the Merfolk?” He asked with a huge smile on his face. The weirdness of the book being written in Mer struck him. “Why Mer?” he asked.

Obla’reth nodded. “Yes I can speak and read Mer. I do not know exactly why the book is written in Mer. The Rumors passed from librarian to librarian say that the underwater kingdoms were the last place the Titans were welcome before their race passed beyond the veil. Strangely enough, I have yet to find anything old enough to corroborate that.” He opened the book. “Now what are you looking for?” He asked.

Trent stepped up to the podium. “Where each of the Paragon’s are located, how to contact them, and the best way to earn their favors.” He said with all seriousness.

Obla’reth blinked. “Oh, is that all?” He asked as he turned back to the book on the pedestal and turned to the first page. “The Scrolls of the paragon’s, a comprehensive translation in five parts.” He turned to the second page.

Melody and Harmony: Page 6

Aaron’s set at the Shadow Church was over, and discounting the guards chasing out a lone pirate infiltrator it had been a good set. The dance floor stayed full, the color patterns and the dancer’s enthusiasm seem to be generally upbeat and he had received no complaints.

 He had a three song transition set to give him and the replacement DJ time to trade off. He thumbed a control on his glove and the lights in the back of his white trench coat shut off. The cords that plugged him into the club’s sound system unhooked and recoiled back into his jacket. The next DJ stepped and started to get himself plugged in and set up.

Aaron stepped off the stage and was met by the booker for the club. The booker gestured to his earphones and Aaron turned the dial on his to filter out the club music. “Good set.” The booker complimented. “We’ve got an opening on Thursday nights, you want it?” He asked. Aaron nodded excitedly. The synthesizer mask he was wearing covered the huge smile on his face. The booker nodded and handed him a business card. “I’ll give you a call on Monday and we’ll get the specifics worked out.” He said before he walked away to handed another crisis.

Aaron was in a Daze. He had covered the ninety minute set as a favor to a friend who was too sick to get out of bed and had gotten a job out of it. Not that one set a week was much of a job but it was one set a week at the Shadow Church which was easily the fanciest club in the district.

He was deep in his thoughts and almost walked by a table full of his friends, he would have walked by them but Freya snagged his wrist. He stopped and looked down at her brilliant smile. “Where you off to in such a daze?” She asked.

He saw that her headphones where filtering the club music out as well and he pulled up a seat next to her. “I just got a job.” He explained, still in a daze.

Frey hugged him in excitement. “That’s great!” She let go of him. “I’m not surprised though that set was incredible. We were on the floor for almost an hour.” She confirmed.

Aaron looked around the table and noticed several empty chairs. “I’ve been off stage for almost fifteen minutes, you’d think everyone would want to come congratulate me.” He commented sarcastically.

As if he himself summoned them the rest of the gang left the dance floor and took their seats. Freya smiled at him. “Look at that, Power you didn’t even know you had.” She laughed at his shock.

Spoonerville: Page 4

Rodney had been living in Spoonerville for exactly seven days. And in the week that he had been there he had learned a lot. He had learned that he could leisurely walk from one side of town to the other in exactly thirty two minutes. Less if he caught both stop lights on green. He had learned more that the town had taken the popularity of the Blood Night series to heart and the stores that were still open were geared towards, hunting, fishing, and Blood Night. He had never paid attention to Blood Night before he moved in with his Grandmother and now that he was here everywhere he looked was Black and Red, fur and fangs, Spoons and Forks.

The local Library had a reading group where they discussed each chapter of each book and when they finished all three books they started over again often with the same people in the reading groups. There was a tiny local theater that had done so many different stage adaptations of all three Blood Night Books that their wall of past shows was nothing but Blood Night performances. Every shop, every restaurant, every gas station had signs declaring their allegiance. Team Alphonse or Team Spencer. He had even seen that in the previous years of the high school the fictional characters had been voted prom king and prom queen.

He Hated Spoonerville with a passion and he had only been there for seven days. He had tried to get a job but no one in spoonerville was hiring, he didn’t have a car of his own so traveling to the nearest town wasn’t an option and his Grandmother didn’t have cable, even worse she didn’t have internet, so he had resorted to spending his time wandering through town hoping against hope to find someplace that didn’t suck.

That place turned out to be Joe’s Pizza. He had stopped there on his second day in town in the middle of his third timed walk across town. He gave up on beating his record of twenty nine minutes and walked across the empty street to check the place out. It instantly became his favorite place when he got close enough to the front door to see the index card taped to the door that said [Free Wifi with the purchase of…anything really, PSW: #BN5UKS].

The place was deserted but he had pretty much decided that unless the owner was a creepy pervert that it had become his new favorite place. There was a colorful sign taped to a bell that said [I can’t hear you over the N64. Ring Bell Loudly] So he did, twice.

The door behind the counter opened up and an unshaven guy in his mid to late twenties stuck his head out. “Oven’s not even on man, you in a rush?” he asked.

Rodney shook his head. “If I was then I wouldn’t be in Spoonerville.” He answered.

The guy gave a wide grin and nodded. “Right on! My name’s Derek I’ll be right out dude.” He stuck his head back in and Rodney could hear him un pause the video game and finish his level. Rodney grabbed the nearest stool and sat at the bar. Closest to the cash register. He pulled out his phone and set himself up on the wifi, able to check on the life he had left behind when he came to Spoonerville. His Facebook profile was a never ending stream of condolences and well wishes on his new life in this dirt hole, middle of nowhere village of forgotten tween romance. He closed Facebook and opened up Reddit to see what his friends were saying about the new rule set for star pilots, a board game he was sure no one in this town had ever heard of. The timing of his move had forced him to miss the most recent regional qualifier and he was pretty sure that he was no longer going to be a part of the professional scene considering the nearest regional tournament had already happened and was in a town almost four hours away.

He had gotten so lost in reading about his game that he completely Missed Derek coming out and firing up the pizza oven. “Hey buddy, what can I get you?” He asked.

Rodney pulled his mind out of his phone. “I feel like it’s a dick move to order slices when you’d have to make an entire pizza to do it.” He said.

Derek shook his head. “Either I’ll eat it over the next few days or someone else comes in and orders stuff anyway, don’t hold back on my account.” He assured him.

Rodney nodded. “Cool, I’ll take two slices of pepperoni, and an orange soda if you got it.” He said.

Derek nodded around the corner to the back wall of the shop. “Sodas are back there, help yourself. Two slices of pepperoni coming up!” He went back into the kitchen as Rodney filled his cup.

Shades of Justice: Page 36

Mark teleported into the command center. He had been spending the last few months in Hawaii surfing on every wave he could catch. So when he appeared in board shorts and a Hawaiian shirt the others were surprised. “What’s up kids?” He asked taking off his silver sunglasses.

Gordon took in the garish outfit quickly “Aloha I guess, sorry to call you back so soon but were in a bit of a situation.” He started.

Mark nodded. “Par for the course wouldn’t you say?” He replied with a smile.

Gordon nodded. “The good news is, we got Technarious back, the bad news is, Sonya almost died to make it happen and Technarious isn’t functional and we don’t know if he can be fixed, what we would fix, or how to fix it if we knew.” He explained walking over to the platform where Technarious was laid out.

Mark looked him over. “First of all, congratulations on getting Technarious back, is Sonya going to be ok?” He asked.

“She’s already starting to recover thanks to the command centers medical systems and Spark.” Kelly added.

Mark turned around to reply to her. “Who or what is Spark?” He asked.

Lumarion’s wall light up. “I’m Spark. These guys thought there were going to rescue Lumarion and found me instead.” He explained.

Mark nodded. “So you found a different Shimmeron, you have Technarious back, and the command center is still standing, you guys are doing all right.” He smiled and put his glasses on. “Computer, give me a full body structural scan of Technarious compare it to his last fully functional scan on file.” The others stood in silence and Mark looked over the information that was coming through his glasses. He snapped his fingers. “Computer, display discrepancies on the center holoprojector.” As soon as he finished the command he took his glasses off and two holographic three dimensional representations of Technarious appeared in the center of the room.

The left one was dimmer than the right one and there were several area’s that were lit with red light instead of green. Gordon reached out and pointed at one of the red sections. “I’m assuming the red sections are the area’s that are damaged and in need of repair or replacement?” He asked.

Mark nodded. “Exactly, now all we have to do is break into the storage facility underneath the command center.

Warren sighed. “Of course, why didn’t we think of that?” He said sarcastically.

Mark shrugged his shoulders. “I know you guys are new, but where did you think Blinding Light went when you weren’t fighting giant monsters?” He asked.

Warren held up a finger, realized it was a decent question and then shrugged. “Fair point.” He admitted.