Chapter 2: Night Time Disasters

A man wearing a red overcoat and brown pants with a white hard hat covering his black hair came running down the street clutching onto a megaphone. He ran through the town of Tazmily shouting into it.

"FIRE! FIRE!" the man shouted. "THE SUNSHINE FOREST IS ON FIRE!"

The man kept running south as villagers came out of their homes. He ran until he reached a large house on the southernmost area of the island. It was a large wooden shack with a sheep pen and small flower beds full of golden sunflowers. Next to the entrance of the house was a small little dog house with a red roof where a chocolate labrador dog was snoozing in the early evening.

The man ran up to the door and started to pound on it.

"Flint! Flint! Flint!" the man said quickly. "The Sunshine Forest is on fire in a huge, fiery, flamey fire! You gotta do something, quick! Flint! It's the forest! The forest, the forest! The forest is on fire!" The man started to fiddle with the doorknob.

"Geez! Flint! Who would lock their door in a village as peaceful as ours?!" The man started to pull at the knob until it came flying off the hinges.

"Ah dammit! The doorknob! Why'd you hafta come off at a time like this?!"

The door flew open and a tall man wearing a brown cowboy hat with a brown hair and moustache on his caring looking face stepped out of the house. The man wore a red scarf around his neck and a yellow undershirt under his light brown vest. He wore a black belt with a golden buckle and dark brown cowboy pants with tan boots.

"I heard yah Thomas." Flint said calmly. "I just couldn't get out cause you were fiddlin with the knob while I was trying to open it."

"Ah doorknob!" Thomas said. "Ah, I mean...Flint! This is no time to be dozing off! There's a huge fire in the Sunshine Forest!"

"What caused that?"

"We aren't sure Flint!" Thomas replied. "But...Bad times like this call for reckless nice guys like you! Our town's sheriff! Please come on Flint! Please."

"Alright, Alright I'm coming." Flint said.

"Fantastic, I'll follow behind you!" Flint just stared at him.

"What?" Thomas asked. "What's so wrong with that? I happen to like following people."

"Woof! Woof!" The chocolate labrador had been awoken from his slumber and ran up happily to his owner carrying a long, thick, wooden stick in his mouth.

Flint smiled as he reached down to pet his dog.

"Sorry Boney," he said. "I don't have time to play fetch at the moment. Maybe when the boys get home they'll play with ya." Boney dropped the stick at his feet and walked back over to the dog house.

"Flint, pick up that stick!" Thomas said. "It'll make for a good weapon in case anything happens."

Flint sighed as he picked up the stick. Most animals in the sunshine forest were generally very calm, there was never any real danger on Nowhere Islands...or Tazmily Village as a whole. It was always so peaceful...nothing ever went wrong and there were never any reasons to fight.

The two men ran up through the town where most villagers had run outside to see what was going on. They ran up north into the crossroads of the village that led either to the Sunshine forest or to an old run down castle that hadn't been used or lived in for years.

There was also an old bell tower where an extremely tall man named Leder stood to ring the bell everyday. The man had been there since Flint was a child himself, so he always wondered what the deal was with that.

Flint and Thomas ran west where they ran into Butch, an old chubby fellow who wore overalls and had brown hair and a freckled face.

"Flint, this is seriously not good." Butch said. "Lighter and Fuel are still stuck in the forest!"

They could see now that there was smoke coming from the heart of the forest. Lighter was Flint's old childhood friend before he met Hinawa. Since then, he had a son named Fuel, who was good friends with Lucas and Claus.

"Well, let's not waste anymore time then." Flint said, tipping his hat down.

"Wait!" A man with a feather cap and plaid manskirt walked up to them. "I know that you all need to go stop the fire, but you need to offer your prayers at the shrine first."

"Jonel, this hardly seems like the time too-"

"It's tradition Flint!"

Flint sighed and quickly hustled into the shrine room, a large portrait of a white and black dragon in the shape of a yin-yang symbol hung over the hearth where prayers were offered on your average afternoon.

"Please, protect my family." Flint said calmly, getting down on one knee and putting his hands together for prayer. "See that Lucas and Claus make it home safe."

He stopped praying and ran back outside, thankfully, it didn't look like the fire had spread. He ran up the trial and through a tree, only for two gray bats to come swooping down at start hissing at him.

"I guess the animals are freaking out over the fire." Flint said to himself. "Guess I don't have much of a choice." he quickly ducked out of the way as one bat flew down and tried to sink its teeth into him. He stood back up and whacked the bat with the stick Boney had given him. The first bat was flung into the bark of a tree where it fell down in a dazed sort of confusion.

The second bat let out a horrible screech that made him freeze up a bit as the bat came down and bit him. The teeth didn't go very deep thankfully, and it merely was a quick wince before he shook the bat off his body and smacked it into another tree.

Flint continued north, followed by Thomas. The flames still hadn't reached this part of the forest, but as they got further north, they passed another wooden shack owned by Bronson, who was laying on the ground outside.

Flint knelt down to the man. "You okay there Bronson?" he asked nervously.

"Yeah, I'm fine." the man grunted. "Just got hit by some snakes, that's all...you need to go rescue Lighter and Fuel, don't worry 'bout me."

Flint ran up north and finally saw the raging flames. Trees were burning and falling over, grass on the ground was on fire, there was barely any safe ground to walk.

"Hey Flint!" Thomas said suddenly. "Look over there!"

Flint turned his attention to a flaming bark covered area, a person wearing some sort of pig like outfit with a pig mask covering their face was standing over a metal contraption. The contraption opened and some small little bugs came flying out. The person then quickly ran off.

"Careful now Thomas." Flint said, as they carefully moved through the flaming path.

"Careful is my middle name Flint, don't worry about me."

Another bat suddenly dove down at them. Flint quickly picked up on its movements and struck it down with his stick.

"The animals out here are certainly getting feisty." Flint said.

Suddenly, a burnt yam hopped out of the ground, it looked like a Jack-o-lantern with bright yellow eyes and a small flame in its mouth.

"What in god's name is this?" Thomas asked as the Yammonster charged and attempted to bite Flint, who quickly struck the Yam down and smashed it with his foot.

"I don't know, but that's certainly a problem." Flint muttered.

They continued up the path before eventually coming to an opening. A man about Flint's height was lying on his back. He had a plaid over shirt that covered his gray shirt and weird spike like gray hair. In front of him was a large piece of lumber. Also next to him was some red and white bug with flickering eyes that Flint looked at curiously.

"Lighter!" Thomas said, running to the man's side and shaking him. "You alright?"

"Flint…" Lighter asked. "Oh...and Thomas! Dammit." he coughed several times. "I tried to beat these stupid things up, but more just keep comin'! I can't get past em'" he coughed again.

"These little bugs?" Flint asked.

"Yeah, those Fireflys." Lighter wheezed. "They've been goin' around the forest, lightin' fires. But never mind that...Fuel's still at home!"

"What!" Flint shouted. "Fuel's still at your shack?"

"I heard the flames and told em' to stay put." Lighter wheezed. "You gotta help him Flint!"

"I will buddy, Thomas, you stay with Lighter."

"Oh...Take my lumber." Lighter wheezed. "It'll make a better weapon than that stick of yours."

Flint picked up the lumber with his hands and made a movement to head to the flaming shack. Only for the small firefly to start buzzing as it got up and two others joined with it.

"Dammit...Flint look out!" Lighter wheezed.

All three flies suddenly shot fire from their funnel like mouths at him before charging. Flint quickly patted out the small flames that sparked on his vest before taking the piece of Lumber and swinging it around wildly. The lumber smacked and squished all three flies against the wood and killed them instantly.

"Alright let's go." Flint ran up through the little valley way. He came to a small wooden shack that was two-floors, in the window he saw Fuel, a small boy wearing a red and white shirt with green shorts and dark brown hair.

"HELP ME!" Fuel shouted. "Help me Mr. Flint!" He suddenly ducked out of the way as some blue creature flew over him.

"I'm comin' Fuel!" Flint shouted. He ran up to the door only to find it was budged.

"Dammit, alright then, take this." He backed up and busted through the door with all his strength, the door shattered, but seeing as how this house was burning down, it didn't make much of a difference.

A sudden hiss came from the collapsing roof as a blue rat with blood red eyes and...wings? Flew down from the second floor."

"What the hell is going on here?" Flint asked himself as he ducked out of the way of the rat's flying bite. He got back up as the rat came back down and kicked him with its claws, scratching his face a little.

"Grr…" Flint muttered, he took a deep breath, relaxing himself. He didn't want to get frustrated. The rat then dove back down at him, Flint took a deep breath, then he took Lighter's Lumber and, using all his might, smashed the rat into the floor.

By now, the soot from the flames had spread all over his body and the shack was shaking. He quickly ran upstairs and found Fuel trapped under some rubble, like him, the boy was also covered in soot, he hopped over a hole in the shack and heaved the rubble off the boy.

"Thank you...Mr. Pitch Black Flint." The boy wheezed, Flint scooped the boy into his arms and hopped down to the first floor, landing very precisely on the floor before dashing out of the shack, he didn't even turn back as he heard the shack collapse. All he cared about was getting Fuel out of the smoke and flames.

He pushed out of the forest and back into the main entrance to the forest where Thomas was waiting.

"Oh good!" The man sighed. "You brought Fuel, I managed to haul Lighter over here for some medical treatment...hurry up...let him see Fuel.

Flint carried the boy over to a picnic table where Butch and a couple other residents of the town were over Lighter, who had bandages wrapped around his head and foot.

"Dad?" Fuel asked as Flint set him down.

"Ergh...that voice…" Lighter grunted. "Is that you Fuel?" he opened his eyes and saw the boy covered in soot. "What the…?! What in the world happened to you?!"

"I got covered in soot, so did Mr. Flint!" Fuel said cheerfully. "What about you though dad? You busted your leg!"

"Oh, this? This ain't nothin'! All I gotta do is twist it like this, then wiggle it like this, and then…" There was a loud pop, followed by a crack that made everyone flinch. "Dammit, Consarnit." There was another pop and the man let out a sigh. "There we go, good as new."

"That's Lighter for yah." Flint said, looking at the townsfolk's confused looks.

"Anyways, we sure are lucky Flint showed up when he did." Thomas said.

"Yeah, he and Lighter've always been quarreling buddies since they were kids." another person chimed in. "It's enough to make me jealous."

Suddenly, raindrops started to hit the ground as it started pouring.

"And now it's raining." Thomas said. "I hope this is enough to put out the fire."

"We need to tend to Lighter." Flint said, as the soot washed off of him and Fuel. "Let's head back to the village inn for now."

"Roger!" Thomas and two other villagers helped Lighter to his feet and guided him down the trail.

Flint took a moment to pause and look back at the forest. Hopefully the rain would put out the fire so that his family could get home safely. The last thing he wanted was for Hinawa to come home with only one child. And what was with those pig people?"

"Hey! Mr. Flint?" Fuel asked, snapping him back to reality. "Are you coming?"

"Yeah, I'm coming, Fuel" Flint said. "Let's go." the man set off down the trail, thankful that this already disastrous night couldn't possibly get any worse."

That's all for today's chapter, I hope you enjoyed it.

I really do love Mother 3 and while Earthbound is still my favorite of the bunch, I think Mother 3 wins in story by far, that's why I wanted to make this reinterpretation of it, because it's a very beautiful game that I wish got more credit and love.

Speaking of which, my friend showed me an article that says that Shigesato Itoi's Company is creating a Mother Project that's a book series of the beloved franchise, and that they have other plans that will be revealed later in 2020. Who knows...maybe we're looking at Earthbound on SNES online, maybe a 3d remaster of the Mother Trilogy! Or Maybe Ninten got into Smash Bros. I've been wanting Earthbound on the Switch for a long time, as I've only experienced the game through an emulator and didn't enjoy the lag and distorted music. But if we get translated Mother 3, that's a bonus.

Anyway, leave a review if you want, and I'll see you all next month for our next chapter.