Well, another oneshot. Everyone's gonna get mad at me. TT_TT I need to work on my longer stuff. ;-; But, for clarification, the very end is set IN A SCHOOL. It's really really fluffy. Like when you open a new bottle of pills and you have to pull the cotton balls out. . Review? Also, the point of view style IS just like the Hunger Games Trilogy for example. So, please don't yell at me for it? TT_TT
I wake up and everything is just... so dark. The air isn't cold... it isn't hot, either. I hear sounds a distance away, but I don't know how to get to the source. So, I crawl. It feels like earth is filling in under my body. Grass, growing under my palms and knees. Light is starting to shine, like I'm in a tunnel. I get to formations like stairs. I get to crawl up those, too. Stretching my arms out, I touch a film. Pushing, pushing. It breaks. I fall down a hill of plush grass and begin to roll.
I finally open my eyes. My head hurts; I must have bumped it. Sun is streaming and I'm momentarily blinded. It's weird, though. The sun is green. A green sun surrounded by a purple sky. The clouds are smiling at me, and I feel like I've taken bad medicine. I stand and take in the view. It's like an animated movie, but I feel original. I don't know what to do first, so I take a walk.
The place is not barren, but... empty. The very thought induces a fear of loneliness in me. I'm alone. That's it. Alone.I bring my hands to my mouth and call, "Hello?" I look around. "Is there anyone here?"
Silence. Complete and total silence. There's a shuffle in the grass."Hulloo!" I look around, hoping to see who answered me. I twist, but I get blown around by the wind and finally fall.
"Hello? Who and what are you?" I feel like panicking. I don't.
"You can relax, you know," the voice says again. Closer, it's deep and almost lulling. I take a breath and lay back. The wind blows over my face, carrying with it the scent of toasted sugar. I'm trying to relax, and then a weight falls down on my chest. I sit up and there's a rainbow-streaked cat sitting on my torso. He is cleaning his paws and face like it's no big deal.
"You're a cat," I say, flatly I might add, and he steps forward. His claws are elongated and dig into my chest. He places one paw on my throat in a threatening manner.
"I. Am. A. Feline. It is a more sophisticated way of describing me. I am not... a cat," he spits out. He jumps from my body and begins to walk. "Follow." His tail keeps swaying. I wonder if I could cut it off. I slowly stand and brush myself off.
After catching up, I ask, "What is your name, Mr. Feline?" I had drawn out the word to irritate. He glances back at me with a cat-like scowl."You can call me..." he ponders. "Hmm. I'd like to be called Hilbert. No. Kyrian. No. Magnus." Freaking indecisive cat.
"Magnus?" I ask.
"Definitely. Now, put a spring in your step. We have to hurry." He padded forward faster.
Following the rules of a strange feline, I try my hardest to catch up to him. Trees grew around us and he laughs at my astonishment. They were checkered, black and white. Magnus ran forward and led me to a break in the new trees. Magnus turned and scratched at his ear."Please open the door," he says, pawing at my shoe."Magnus... there's no door here..." I pick him up and he growls at me.
"Put me down and try it again." He scrambles away from me as his feet touch the ground. Looking up, there is a door in the gap. I stagger back, but stop, as I haven't done hardly anything sane here. I wrap my fingers around the door's handle. It's icy to the touch. "Open it! Finally!" He yells. I pull it and I am dragged through it with Magnus, his laughing echoing as we fall.
I land with a thud. I open my eyes to see Magnus's head hovering over my face. He turns and swipes my face with his red-tipped tail. His raised paw shows me that the pads are black and flecked with glitter. I shake my head and pull myself up. The environment had changed from what I saw before. The green grass had turned an autumn orange and ended with a fluorescent blue lake. I look up and the sky is normal. Blue with a yellow sun. "Do I have to spell it out for you?" Magnus had stopped and turned to face me. I trudge forward, my shoes sticking to the grass.
"Magnus! Why am do I keep getting stuck?" I yell to him.
"Well, you're not sticking. You're sinking," he says with a devilish grin. And he was right. I feel myself getting lower and lower in the dirt. I panic this time.
I look back to the cat and see Magnus rise up on flattened stalagmite, shooting up from the sinking grass. A path begins to form with others surfacing closer to me. I grab one and let it pull me out. I climb it and jump to the next, repeating the cycle until I meet Magnus. He's rolling around, whipping his paws in the air.
"I'm here," I say. He jumps up, as a startled cat would, and looks at me like a questioning child.
"Good. We can get moving." He starts up and flicks his tail back and forth. I rub my temples and wish this wasn't happening.
Magnus kept walking until we hit the edge of the sand. The sand is the color of a flower pot. That brownish-orange color. Terracotta. He sits at my feet and stares up at my face. A single 'meow' escapes from his furry lips.
"Carry me." Instructions. From a cat.
I bend and pick him up, allowing him to ride on my shoulder. He thrusts forward his right paw. It's blue and I get a closer view of his shiny pads. "Go!" He commands. I mumble something, but he hears it and scrapes the top of my ear with an extended claw. "You make an excellent steed. Do you know that? You just need a little help understanding some things." He begins to lick his other paw, this one yellow. I could do it. I could throw this cat. He's one sixteenth of my size, and I'm still fairly stick-like. I don't hate him, though. I don't like him either. He's continued talking, though.
"Am I not beautiful?" He asks. A random question, but it's still a question.
"You're a cat." He scowls. "Fine, a feline. The color though. It's interesting. Rainbow? With glitter?"
"I can change my appearance at will. I love rainbows the most, though," he explains. With it, red coloring courses through his fur. His ears fill in with black. His eyes change to become red, blending in with his eyes. "Pretty?" His deep voice is creepy in my ears. And out of nowhere, his claws extend into my shoulder. "We're here!" Magnus announces.
We're at the water. The lake is clear and the seafloor is bare. Magnus purrs on my neck, and I turn back to him. His color is back to the rainbow scheme and he is smiling at me. In happiness, his claws extend, and I feel a sharp pain in my skin. His tail flicks my ear numerous times and he shouts in my ear, "Let me down! Oh my gosh, please let me down!" I grab his sides and he actually yells in excitement.
I set him on the sand and he kicks up orange, running to the water. Never in my life have I seen a cat desire to get wet. Magnus is galloping in the surf. Splashing in the cool blue. Magnus goes under.
"Magnus?" I call to the answer.
"Magnus?" Again.
I rush forward into the blue water. Getting wet, I'm not fazed. It's as if there's no temperature. Magnus still doesn't surface. I dive. I try to breathe. It doesn't work, and I thrust my head through the barrier and breathe deeply. I sputter and water bursts from my throat. Not trying that again. Swimming. I have to find that cat.
You know that you don't have to suffer trying to find me, right? Magnus's voice pounds into my head. I think I see him, but don't. I'm not even below the water anymore. I'm waiting for you.
I push off from the sand and breathe in.
"It took you long enough."My hair's fallen into my eyes and I'm blinded. Gasping for air, I hear Magnus chuckle. I look to him, after I brush the hair away, and there's no cat. Instead of a cat, a man is sitting on the beach. His hair is the color of Magnus's. I step out of the water and stare at him.
"You really took your time didn't you?" He asks.
I can't stop blinking from the water. He's talking to me. "Who are you?"
"It's been five minutes since I went in and you've already forgotten me." He sounds hurt.
"You're Magnus? What happened to you? You were just a cat!" I sputter.
"The water. It's a catalyst, actually for magic-users. I am a warlock... I was just stuck as a cat," he says, picking the sand from under his nails. "Hungry?"
"Starving, actually." My stomach starts making sounds, embarrassing me. Magnus smiles and a spread grows from the sand. He beckons and entranced, I follow. Magnus picks up a sandwich and takes a bite. He spits it out immediately.
"Revolting. Bologna." Magnus holds the sandwich away from his body and lets it fall from his grip.
"You can have another," I say. I take a sandwich myself and bite down. The taste of sweet peanut butter fills my mouth. I savor it, as it is probably the best I have ever tasted. Magnus dusts another sandwich off and starts eating.
"Delicious. Jelly," he says through a mouthful of sandwich. His eyes glow with delight.
We finish and Magnus helps me up. I shake the sand off of my clothes, a shower of brown dust. I see his hands up close for the first time. His nails are black and glittery. That's where the scheme of his pads went. He wraps his arm around my shoulders like we were old chums.
"Hmm. I didn't think I'd like you. I do, though. You're very good at listening," he giggles. He runs a hand through his air, letting some colored locks fall. Some purple strands fell into his eyes. His eyes glowed violet with sincerity.
"Do your eyes change color as well?" I ask."Mood ring colors. If I will it with my magic. You could easily find the meanings. It's secret." He winks at me. "It's nearly time for you to get back," he says. The sky changes and fills with stripes. The grass begins to shrivel before my eyes. "Move along, you'll be sucked in if you don't," he laughs. He grabs my wrist and drags me behind him.
"Magnus, you could let go of my arm. I'll try to keep up," I manage. He stops dead in his tracks.
"Wait. Hold still. I'm taking you somewhere new." His words are confusing, but I follow his order.
The now barren wasteland is beginning to eat me. Dirt is filling my shoes and my legs are stiff in the disgusting substance. I look to Magnus who is tapping his fingers on his opposite elbow; It must be taking too long. Finally, it's up to my stomach and I get a tight feeling. I feel like a tube of toothpaste as the oxygen is being released from my body, pushing from the bottom up. Magnus mumbles something and I focus on him.
"For this part, you need to pretty much close every orifice you can." He says this through a small opening he's allowed in his lips. His eyes are shut tight as the level has risen to our necks. He was right, this is taking too long. It's a fairly scary process as well.
"See you on the other side!" I yell and am engulfed in dirt.
Before I feel like I am going to expire, I kick and my feet are free. I'm over an opening. Short on breath, I keep kicking and slide through the earthy block. I fall flat on my back and whatever breath I have is knocked out of me. I gasp and Magnus laughs, a normal thing now.
"Are you okay?" His voice has calmed down and I inhale deeply.
"How many times am I going to fall?" I retort.
"As many times as I wish you to." He extends a hand for help."So, where are we?" The place is white. The borders stop at walls. We're in a the center of the room sits a small table, two chairs, and a shining platter. On the platter, two mugs were placed with an assortment of delicious-looking pastries and a glossy white pitcher. Magnus smiles and sits in one of the chairs and crosses his leg. He pats the other one and pours a dark liquid into his mug. I sit.
"Drink?" He holds the remaining cup out to me. I take it and feel the smooth finish on the ceramic piece. The mug itself is cold, nearly frigid. Magnus lifts the pitcher in a way of saying "Take some."
"Yes, please," I mumble. I grasp the handle and pour. Magnus's drink was a dark brown color while mine turns out to be a lighter tan, with a caramel-coloring marble effect. The cup comes to my lips and I smell the hearty aroma as it makes its way to my nostrils. Caramel cappuccino, delicious.
With his hand on a cookie, Magnus says, "Lucky. I wanted coffee." And he pouts.
"What did you happen to get?" I ask, thoughtfully.
"A mug of cola," he scoffs and releases his mug in a pitch at the wall. In a crazy haze, the debris dissolves into the floor with the liquid and Magnus has a new mug already filling.
"Magnus, where are we?"
"Oh! My room. Don't you like it? Does it seem like me?" His eyes shine in an animated fashion. I look around once more and think for a second. I give him a weak smile and shrug. He slumps back in his chair and growls. "Fine."
In what seems like a tantrum, the walls expand and they change from white to blue, to black, and then finish with orange. Furniture pushes through the floor and fills in the space. With a bed in the corner, Magnus jumps from his chair and dives face first into the pillows and cries out. I am astounded at the sudden change in the room and feel my mouth fall open.
"Magnus... I'm sorry," I say. He rolls over and glares at me, clutching a pillow to his neck.
"Do you mean that?" He asks.
"Yes. I. Mean. It."
"Fantastic. Let's go." He throws the pillow and stands up. A door's outlined in the wall and he opens it to show me daylight.
My day has been insane enough already. Is he really going to take me somewhere else? Outside, it's the first place I was. The green sun with the purple sky and smiling clouds. There's actually a tear in the scene, like ripped paper, from where I entered. Magnus crosses his arms and taps his foot. He is visually impatient.
"Yes?" I ask, starting to examine the hole.
"I found a person. That person became my friend, my first friend, in fact. They're fairly cute as well. My friend is leaving. They may never come back." He's talking about me, and I feel terrible.
"Hey, I had fun. You can't forget that," I say.
Magnus rests his hand on my shoulder and says, "Yeah, I can't." He smiles. "You go ahead. Wake up." His last words is the only bit I hear. All sound has ceased, but his voice resonates.
"What do you mean 'wake up'?" I yell and no sound comes out. The world disintegrates. First, the colors, followed by details, and finally Magnus smiles one last time and falls apart himself.
My head is spinning when I sit up. My back is sore and I stretch my arms. At first, all sound is just static in my ears. My sight is fuzzy and I rub at them. I feel a hand on my shoulder and I shaking. Lastly, I yawn.
"Excuse me, did we wake you?" A voice says to me.
I nod sleepily. "Well, you should get more sleep at night in your bed instead of in your desk during the day." I finally understand that my teacher, Hodge, is upset with me. He's standing at my desk and staring down at me. I'm not only being looked at by him, but by everyone else. "Sorry," I mumble and he returns to her desk.
"Nice dream?" A new voice. I look to the user and see a boy about my age laughing at me. His hair is dark, save for the multiple colors dyed at the tips. I was forced to hold my mouth shut. I essentially had a dream featuring him.
I ran over everything that I could remember. Waiting for an answer, he's staring. "Uhm, you could maybe say that," I said. "You maybe wanna hang out sometime?"
"Hmm. A date?" His eyes flash violet and he nods.
Update (August 6, 2010): Well, guys, I modified a short story to make this. Good news? The real thing made 150/150 points and got a Best of Show when I turned it in.