Chapter One: Nick
"So, we on for a sleepover and Past's Secret tonight?" Nick asked his best friend Lucas as they stood at their lockers after school.
"Totally, wouldn't miss for it the world, what else would we do on a Friday night?" Lucas asked.
"What are you guys doing tonight?" Emma asked as she came over to them, a pile of books in her arms and a bulging backpack slung over her shoulder. She always had a notebook and pen with her, she was an excellent artist.
"Playing video games, dude stuff, you wouldn't understand." Lucas said, blowing her off even though they were friends.
"As newly sexist as that is, girl's can play video games too, and be good at it." She added seeing Lucas's mouth open, he immediately shut it again.
"She's right you know." Nick interjected. "We played Mario last weekend and she kicked my butt." He smiled at her, gosh she was cute. Long brown hair, brown eyes, and that gorgeous smile.
"Mario is nothing compared to Past's Secret." Lucas said, talking more to Nick than to Emma now.
"Past's Secret?" Emma asked, going slightly pale before she realized what was going on.
"Yeah. What's wrong? You look like you just saw a ghost." Nick asked, concern clear in his voice.
"Nothing, I just remembered I forgot to grab my Math notebook." Emma said, although how she could have forgotten anything was beyond them, but Nick also knew she was lying. She forced a smile that looked genuine enough and fooled Lucas, but he could by the look in her eyes that nothing was okay now.
"Well, why don't you come to my house with us." Nick offered. "We can show you how to play and then you can play too if you want."
"Yeah. Sounds good." Emma said, in a distant voice that sounded nothing like her own.
They made their way to Nick's house which was only a block from the school and there wasn't much conversation. When they got to the house Nick offered them a snack and then they sat down to play Past's Secret, their favorite video game.
"So, if you guys play it so much, why haven't you passed it yet?" Emma asked, seeing as how they knew everything about the game.
"Well, we've begun to think there is no way of passing it." Lucas said, looking kind of disappointed. "We can't beat level ten, and that's the final level before you defeat the Dark Queen and beat the game. We've tried asking people at school, but none of them have ever even heard of the game before. We found it in Nick's basement and his dad told us it was a classic."
"Oh." Emma said, was it just them, or did she sound relieved? "So, I guess that's okay then, that you didn't pass it, now you can play it all the time, over and over until you do, right?"
"Well, I guess, but it's totally frustrating." Nick said. "Level 11, after defeating the Dark Queen is when King congratulates you and you find out everything."
"King? Is that the king's name, King?" Emma asked, she was watching as they made their way straight through the game, passing every level like it was a piece of cake, like they'd done it a thousand times, which they probably had.
"See that's the thing, we don't know. That's the kind of stuff you find out when you beat the game, it's the key to Past." Nick explained.
"The key to the past?"
"Not the past, Past, with a capital p, it's the name of the town everything takes place in." Lucas said. His character on the screen was a guy dressed in a long cloak and had a bow an arrow for a weapon. Above his head was a health bar and the name, The Hunter. Nick on the other hand was a character dressed in all black, from head to toe, black boots, black pants, black long-sleeved shirt, and a black hood that covered their whole face so you couldn't see a thing. Above his head was a health bar and the name, Shadow.
"Is that going to a funeral or something?" Emma asked.
"No, he just dresses like that so it's easier to sneak up on his enemies, he's the best guy in the game." Lucas said. They got to level ten and then it ended. They were surrounded by these weird green things that looked like zombies, but more human, they were the minions of the Dark Queen. "Oh come on! Again!" Lucas shouted. Game Over, flashed across the screen in big, red letters and then it went black.
"See, once you get to the tenth level you're surrounded and there's no way to pass." Nick said and sighed deeply.
"Yeah there is." Emma said. They both looked at her quizzically. "You don't get it, do you? This level is about sacrifice. One of you has to die, to distract them, so the other can take them out and move on."
"Sacrifice?" Lucas asked like it was the most absurd idea he'd ever heard.
"Well, yeah. You mean you guys have never thought of that before, I suppose it would be better with more than two people of course." Emma said.
"Okay smarty pants, if you're such an expert on this, why don't you join us and show us how it's done?" Lucas asked, pouring on the sarcasm.
Emma looked reluctant but she couldn't come up with a good reason as to why she shouldn't. "Fine. Just get us to level ten." She said and took a seat next to Nick and picked a controller.
She ended up being really good at it, as if she played as much as them. By the time they reached level ten they were raving about how good she was. "Okay, now get us through those gates." Lucas said.
Then the minions came. The green humanoid zombies surrounded them and Emma had to put her plan to attention. Her character was just a random knight not The Hunter not Shadow which is why it is a good character to sacrifice.
"So what are you planning on do-" Nick started, but he never got to finish his sentence before he shouted, "No!" Emma had just dove into the mass of minions letting them kill her and tear her apart, well her character.
"Guys! Don't let me have died in vain, kill them!" Emma yelled them, it was by far the weirdest thing she had ever said.
They stared at her for a second like she was insane and then sprang into action, ripping the minions off her and killing them until there was no one left to kill. Then 'level 11' flashed across the screen just as Game Over had before and the gates that had been guarded by minions opened to reveal an open battlefield and an evil sorceress, the Dark Queen.
"Thanks Emma, we owe you o-" Nick started, but once again his sentence was cut off, not by his own scream this time but by what appeared on the screen and off.
When Dark Queen's thin lips parted no words came out, instead green smoke issued from her between her lips and swirled around Shadow and The Hunter, then the smoke surrounded Nick and Lucas, finally Emma. The smoke had found it's way through the screen and was now upon them. The last thing Nick saw before being knocked unconscious was the worried look on Emma's face, as if she'd made a mistake.