ONE
NIGHT ALONE a reboot fanfic by
Mary Jane
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CHAPTER
TWO: A SIMPLE STORY
"Dot?"
"Yes?"
"Will
you tell me a story?"
"Enzo,
it's late..."
"Just
a really quick one? Please? I'm not tired at all, I swear!"
Dot
smiled as she looked down at Enzo, whom she had just tucked into bed after a
long day of activities. She was
exhausted, and she knew he was too, but that look in his eyes always caught
her. He was just so innocent in his
quests to become a hero, and he was so passionate about learning of the
mythical greats that had come before him that his eyes showed his entire heart
to the world.
"Alright,
I give in, but just a short one. And no
prying for extra information, either! You'll hear this story the way it was meant to be told - straight
through!"
"Agreed. Now, which one? Which one are you going to tell?"
"Well,
what would you like to hear?"
"Um,
I dunno, something..."
"Yes?"
"Long?"
"Nice
try, buddy."
"Oh,
okay. Oh, what about that one that Old
Man - um, I mean, Mr. Green was telling at the gathering last night? I never got to hear the end of it."
"Um,
yeah, okay, I think I know how that one goes. Let me get under those covers first, it's cold in here!"
Enzo
giggled as Dot scrambled into bed next to him. She made some silly joke about how if felt like a shutdown had occurred,
it was so cold. Then, as she got situated Enzo leaned up against her, and she
put an arm around his tiny shoulders. Finally, she was ready to begin.
* * * * * * * * * * *
Once
upon a time, when the system was so young, and all sprites were young and
carefree, a tiny little boy sprite discovered that he wanted more than he
had. He had seen the world beyond the
gates of his home, and he wanted so badly to explore. Well, he had been living by himself, for he had no mother, no
father, no one to care for him and worry about him. Except for this tiny little cat, who was his only family, and his
only friend. This cat was actually not
his cat, and he had never gone out searching for a companion or a pet, but
rather this cat simply appeared to him one day. He had been out in his yard, and the cat just strolled over to
him, looked at him with its big, bright eyes, and became his friend. Just like that.
The
little boy honestly didn't know what to do. He had thought that he was an independent sprite who didn't need any
one, and had no one to tie him down, but then he had remembered this cat. He loved his little cat, for it had been so
good to him; it had snuggled with him on cold nights, it had rubbed up against
him whenever he was depressed, it had smiled at him and loved him, no matter
how angry the boy was. So, the boy
didn't want to go, but at the same time he didn't want to stay. He was happy with his home and his friend
the cat, but he dreamed of the adventures and the lands that lay in the expanse
of land outside his gate. He dreamed of
it so often that he knew that he could never forget what he wanted, and even if
he was to try to stay home and remain content with what he had, nothing would
be quite right. There would always be
this small sense of regret in his heart.
So,
finally, the cat walked up to him one day, and it said to him, 'Little boy, I
love you, and I will be so sad without you. But, I know that you love me, and you don't want to hurt my feelings by
telling me that you want to go out into the world. Well, what I am here to do is to tell you this: it makes me sad to see you sad, so I want
you to go. I want you to go out into
the world and find the things that you seek. And, I will wait for you. I am
your friend, and I will stay here, and every night I will wait for you to come
home. When you are ready, you can come
back, and we can be loving friends for the rest of our lives.'
When
the cat finished this, the little boy was overjoyed. He was filled with more loved for the cat than ever, and he
hugged and petted the cat and told it that he would be back, he would
return. And when he didn't, he would
take care of the cat and would tell it stories every night of the adventures
that he had. The cat smiled, and with
one last embrace, the boy set out into the world.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
It was
nearly morning, and some of the binomes that were "morning" sprites
were awake. They awoke with a
delightful stretch, feeling the exhaustion of yesterday just fleeing their
muscles, and they were rejuvenated. At
first they felt wonderful and alive and ready to go to work, but then they
remembered Matrix's lady friend.
Every
one of them sat up in their beds and thought. They wondered if she was still alive, but their rational minds told them
that it was almost impossible for any sprite, weak or strong, to survive longer
than a day in that kind of condition. AndrAIa was a very strong woman, they knew, but without her code and
with her energy loosely leaving her body, she wouldn't be able to last any
longer than any one else. Then, as the
sprites all sat there staring into the emptiness in front of them, they
remembered the man sprite. The huge warrior
frightened them all, but none of them could forget who he really was on the
inside. They knew that he was the
little boy Enzo whom they had met when they first came to the Mainframe system,
and they knew that, as tough as he was, he was one who was passionate about the
things he cared for. And from what they
had seen, the woman AndrAIa was something very dear to him.
Eventually
they stood up, and like drones put on all of their clothes, and headed up to
the deck. They were still so lost in
their thoughts that they did not notice Matrix lying on his back, on the deck
of the Mare, still dreaming. He could
never forget the ending to it...
* * * * * * * * * * * *
"How
much of this story did you hear, Enzo?"
"This
is actually as far as I've heard. Keep
going, I really want to know how it ends."
"Um,
Enzo, I don't know if I should tonight, the story gets a little - well, I just
remembered exactly how it ends, and well, I don't want to..."
"Please
Dot, I really want to know! I promise
I'll be good, just tell me the ending!"
"I'm
going to regret this...okay, but you might want to find some tissues before
everything is over..."
* * * * * * * * * * * *
So, the
little boy went out into the world, and while he did enjoy the world and had
lots of fun, he always remembered the cat, back at home. He missed his friend so much, and there
wasn't a cycle that passed where he didn't think of how the little cat must
have been waiting for him, watching the road, on the porch of their home. The boy thought that the cat must have been
lonely, but it still waited for him, because it loved him.
Well,
time passed, and the boy grew older. He
grew to the point where he was no longer a boy, but a young man, strong and
robust. He still always thought about
the cat, and one cycle the time came where he decided he had seen enough of the
world, and he just wanted to go home and spend the rest of his time with his
friend. So, he went on a long journey
back to his home, which took him a great deal of time, for he had gotten quite
far away from his land. But, at last,
one day he finally reached familiar lands, and he kept going until he saw his
gate, leading to his home.
A wide
smile passed over his face, and tears came to his eyes. He felt so happy to be home! So happy that, once he saw his gate, he
burst into a run. He saw the path leading
to his house, then he saw the garden, and then he saw his porch. And sure enough, seated on the porch,
staring right at him, was the cat.
The
sprite called out, "My friend! I'm
home!"
Oddly
enough, the cat did not stir. The boy
assumed that his friend did not recognize him; he had changed quite a bit,
after all. So, he just kept running.
But as
he approached the porch, he began to notice that the cat still was not
moving. He slowed to a walk and looked
intently at the cat, and he stopped when he saw that the cat's eyes were glazed
over. When he touched the paw of his
little friend, it was stiff. Tears rose
into his eyes and he collapsed to his knees when he learned the truth: the cat, his dear little companion, was
dead.
The
sprite, who was a man in body but still such a child in spirit, was
devastated. He hated himself and
screamed out loud, "Why did you leave! Why didn't you stay with your friend! Why were you so obsessed with getting away that you didn't realize how
much you were hurting the ones around you! You horrible, horrible, horrible virus!"
The
sprite yelled and yelled until he could yell no more. Eventually, he collapsed to the ground, and fell into a deep
sleep, which most sprites would not wake from. And this sprite was no different, except in one minor way: he couldn't
die. There was too much in his life
that he had to discover.
When he
slept, in his dreams he was all alone. He was sitting in a field much like the one in his real yard, except for
the fact that all of the plants in the yard were either dead or dying. He wanted to leave, except that he could
not. He felt like he had to stay and
wait for someone, and he had to bear the death and destruction that surrounded
him. It was his duty to wait for this
thing that he knew was coming, so he did.
Time
passed by, and finally, one day, a vision appeared to him. He gasped when he first saw the shadow of
something begin to form, and he was frightened, but he had a feeling in his
heart that told him this was nothing to fear. And it wasn't, for it was the spirit of his little friend the cat, who
had come to visit him.
The
sprite cried and cried, and he said almost all in one breath how sorry he was,
and how much he loved his little friend, and how awful of a virus he was. But, as the cat listened, it just smiled, as
it always did. It listened to the boy's
wailing, and it drifted down slowly to comfort the boy. The cat looked the boy right in the eyes and
it said, "Dear friend, it makes me so sad to see you sad. Why do you cry?"
And the
boy said, "Because you have left me, and you have done so before I had the
chance to tell you how much I love you, and before I had a chance to tell you
all my stories!"
And the
cat said, "No, dear friend, that is not true. For you told me your stories every night before you went to sleep, just
as you promised, and you told me you loved me every nano of every cycle that
you were away."
After a
long pause of thought, the boy said through his sobs, which were getting
quieter, "But why did you die? Were you
sick? You were not old, it was not your
time!"
The cat
replied, "I did not die. I only did
what you did: I left the space that was
familiar, and I am going to go explore the world, just as you did. Please wait for me, I will return to you,
and we will be together again, someday."
The boy
then found that he could not speak, for the lump had once again formed in his
throat, and he feared that if he were to speak, he would break down. But, in his mind, he told the cat that he
loved it, and that he would wait for it forever.
And the
cat heard him as it finally left.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Dot
looked tenderly down at Enzo, who was holding her very tightly around her
waist. She couldn't see his face, but
from the wet sensation on her stomach she knew that he was crying. She too, after thinking about the story, had
to stifle some tears. She scolded
herself for telling him this story; not only would it keep him awake all night,
but it really wasn't a story that was meant for children, despite the childish
wording of it.
She
stroked his hair slightly and leaned down enough to give him a tiny breath of a
kiss on his head. He sniffled and held
her tighter.
The two
of them sat there for a while, not saying anything. After a little while, Enzo finally spoke up, but he was talking
more to himself than to Dot. In a tiny
little voice, he said, "Why did it end that way?"
Dot
knew that she really wasn't supposed to have heard that, but she felt like she
had to reply. "I know it's sad, Enzo,
but it is just a story…"
"It's
not just a story, Dot!" Enzo said
louder, looking up at her with his bloodshot, tear stained eyes and flushed
face. "It's not just a story!"
"Yes it
is, Enzo."
"You
don't understand, Dot! You're not
thinking about it enough!"
"Now
wait a minute, Enzo, I did think about this a lot when I heard it. I know that there is a lesson behind it, and
I know that the lesson behind the tale is what makes this story powerful, but
don't over think the cat and sprite thing. They aren't real people."
"But
they could be! Don't you see, they
could be! They could be real sprites,
who loved each other, and should have stayed together, but one of them had this
stupid dream of becoming some kind of hero, so he left his friend all
alone! And the friend died all
alone! Doesn't that mean anything to
you?"
Dot was
amazed at the analysis that Enzo was putting into this simply little
story. She was expecting him to cry
over the cat who had died, but he was crying because he was somehow relating to
the words. For some reason totally
unknown to her, he understood the message more than she did. She felt foolish, but she was understandably
very proud, and very sympathetic, of Enzo. He realized things like this, with his innocent little perception of the
world in which they lived, and he was viewing the action of the character with
a child-like opinion, un-jaded and untainted. And she loved him all the more for it.
"Yes,
it does mean something. I'm sorry,
little brother, I should have thought this through like you. I'm very proud of you, for thinking of these
things."
But
Enzo didn't respond to the compliment, nor did he respond to Dot's
apology. He simply rested his head on
her stomach once more, and she once again felt tears falling onto her
body. She held him around the shoulders
and let him cry.
Enzo
said, "I'll never be that kind of friend. I'll never leave someone I love alone."
"I'm
sure you won't."
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Hi
everyone! Thanks for reading Chapter
two! Number three should be out soon,
and please review!
--MJ