WEEK 31

Prompt:

There was fire everywhere.

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I tore through burning wood, a blanket wrapped around me, screaming my daughter's name.

"This cannot be happening!" I screamed, panicking. I had to find her, I needed to find her, I had to get to her and save her. I couldn't let that man get to her. If I did, really bad things could happen. So insanely bad that one's head would most likely explode upon contemplating how fundamentally awful these things were.

I stopped contemplating, because if I didn't I felt like my head would really explode, and continued running through the woods. A loud roar erupted from somewhere in front of me but it was too dark to see. There was no way to see, so I needed to concentrate.

Focus. Breathe. I kept telling myself, running in the woods blindly, having no idea where I was going. I continued to run, ignoring the trees that snatched my arms and legs, making them bleed.

"Mom!" my daughter's voice, filled with fear and pain, cried out from somewhere to my left before being drowned out by another strange, savage roar. I ran towards her voice and found myself in a clearing surrounded by fire; she was nowhere to be seen. My heart quickened in fear, I had just heard her!

"Mom!" The voice had come from just behind me—I skid to a halt and whirl around, my heart catching in my throat. And there she was, crushed under a flaming tree, her innocent face covered with ash.

"Sanya," I gasp, tripping over my own feet as I run towards her. Her clothes were half burnt and her tiny face was drenched in tears. My heart broke at the sight of her. I shoved my shoulder into the bark of the tree and pushed, ignoring the searing heat crawling across my skin and the smoke choking my lungs.

The tree didn't budge. Huffing, I pushed harder, begging for something to help. A golden lion dashed past me and in one big motion, it threw the tree aside. The lion stood there smug, looking at the fallen tree. For a moment, I thought the eyes seemed weird for a lion, almost like human eyes, but I heard Sanya cry of pain.

"Sanya, Sanya, are you okay?" I ask desperately, tripping over the words in my panic as I help her up.

"Mo-mom, I can't breathe, my ch-chest hurts--" she tripped over her words as I helped her out from where she was stuck. A golden aura floated from the lion's paw and encircled Sanya. She coughed and took a deep breath, all the scratches on her face and hands seemed to fade, I looked at the Great Lion curiously.

"What do you want?!?" Growled the lion.

"You can...talk?" I asked, tentatively, officially freaked out.

"What? Have you never read the Chronicles of Narnia, or watched the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe?"

"No, what is that?" I asked.

"H-hello, the forest is burning here," Sanya interrupts weakly.

"I will help you, but you must pay a price."

"Wh-What is the price?" Sanya asked, her voice raspy and her eyes filling with tears.

"You must-" Before the lion could finish, Bulbasaurus came and extinguished the fire. The lion slashed Bulbasaurus to pieces, then breathed fire into the forest. I stood there frozen trying to comprehend my surroundings.

"You started the fire?" I asked.

"Oh yes, dear do keep up, so as I was saying you must go on a quest to strange lands, fight wicked monsters, etc, to bring me the golden Apple of immortality to gain my help in extinguishing the fire."

"Okay," I reply immediately, tugging Sanya closer. My mind was filled with questions. My thoughts were cut off as Sanya screamed. I turned in her direction and saw the wicked monster the lion spoke of—a six-foot-tall bunny. The bunny had two heads, one of them had a mechanical left eye and a button on the side of its head which was holding a murderous gaze while the other one didn't have eyes at all. It's the one without eyes you have to watch out for the most. Because if you look into those eyeless eye-sockets you would turn into stone...

"Well, good luck," the lion said before disappearing in a flash of light.

"Sanya, remember all those aerobics classes I paid for? Show me they paid off!" I said this and handed Sanya a golden pen. I disappeared after Nalsa the lion and left the story in the hands of my daughter. Sanya just stared at the robot bunny, who was busy charging a laser beam in its mechanical eye.

"I don't wanna fight you," she said, staring weirdly at the bunny. The bunny ignored her, the laser beam firing up and incinerating a burnt tree branch a few feet beside her. The burnt tree branch suddenly poofed into the Golden Apple of Immortality. Sanya, not knowing the apple gave immortality, picked one and ate it. Sanya became an Immortal Child, now bound to the Earth as an Immortal Being forever.

Then with a flash Nalas appeared and shouted "that was supposed to be mine, so all this virtual stimulation was for nothing", and as he said that everything disappeared and they were now both humans standing in a green room.

Sanya was no longer an Immortal child. In fact, she was no longer Sanya. She was Sarah.

Just about 5 hours ago Sarah Jackson was having a very regular Sunday but then this random stranger comes to her with an offer she just couldn't say no to, I mean come on it was a million dollars for playing a stupid game, and who could say no to that?

The random stranger didn't realize that Sarah with money was a very dangerous thing. Sarah decided to go and rule the world! And this is the reason why Sarah ate the Apple of immortality while pretending to not know what it is but what she did not know was that the Apple of immortality was not real, and so Nalas docked her million dollars to keep her from taking over the world.

Sarah wanted revenge on him, but she kept failing and failing and failing. So she planned a heist with Sir Piggy and together they stole all the gold from half the city. Sarah then put that money towards ruling the world. However, before Sarah could even rule the world, it crumbled to dust and faded into myth.

(Editor note: This started as a serious mystery thriller but ended up being the usual chaos 🤣)