Characters: Mundo, Isaac, Grandpa, Quentin
Location: Felwinter
Time: Day 4 - 3:38 PM
After escaping from the coliseum, Mundo, Isaac, Grandpa, and Quentin wandered through the cobblestone streets of Felwinter. Luckily for them, the town was practically empty. Everybody was at the Tournament of Champions. All except for that strange pirate ship floating along in the creek, but they had other things to worry about.
“The NQIM room should be somewhere in easy access,” Mundo said. “Probably in the town square. We should probably spread out if we—”
“Maybe that’s it,” Quentin said, pointing to a sign that read Sally’s Fish and Firecrackers. Next to it was another sign that read NQIM Room.
“…Well, that was unusually easy.”
“Fate favors those who struggle through the hard times,” Grandpa remarked with a wink. “I should know. I was in WWVI.”
Isaac rushed for the door. “Come on! Let’s get this over with.”
The others trailed him. The NQIM building was only about the size of an outhouse and, in fact, that’s what it resembled. It was tall and slender and made of rickety oak that looked like a tree after the bark had been peeled away. There was even a crescent moon whittled into the top of the door, way above their heads, and a sewer drain to their right.
“Reminds me of my home office,” Grandpa said as they came upon the building.
Isaac pressed his hands against the door, but it wouldn’t budge in either direction. “Great… How are we supposed to get inside?”
“Maybe I have an open lock spell,” Mundo said.
“Idiot. The door’s not locked. It’s just too big for us to open.”
“I could sing a song!” Quentin exclaimed. He grabbed his flute and began dancing in place. “Open sesame street, I say!”
Grandpa thumped him with his cane. “I’m the Wizard here, boy. I get to open the magical doors.”
“It’s a damn outhouse!” Isaac said. “It has no magic. God, you people are hopeless.”
Blushing, Quentin crossed his legs. “That reminds me…”
“We must put our minds together to solve this problem!” Grandpa declared, his voice dark and mighty.
Having just circled the entire building, Mundo appeared again. “Or we could use the back door.”
They followed him to the back of the outhouse where they found a smaller door, perfect for their size, with Men carved into the wood above it.
“This is all too easy,” Mundo said, reaching for the door. “It’s almost like somebody wants to hurry our story along.”
Isaac caught his arm. “Wait. Think about this. We’re about to walk into the back entrance of an outhouse.”
“Yeah, so?”
“Do you know what goes into the back entrance of an outhouse!?”
“…Men?” Mundo jerked a thumb at the sign.
“I don’t like this.”
“It’s not like it’s a real outhouse. It’s a portal to the real world.”
“Well, let’s send the idiot in first.”
“Good idea.”
Mundo and Isaac each grabbed one of Quentin’s arms and hurled him forward. The door flapped open with a heavy whoosh, revealing the static, black and white world of cyberspace. Wires like painted snakes, binary code, strings of letters, and distant, ominous, repetitive voices drifted through the vacuum before them. Mundo and Isaac stepped closer, their feet on the edge of the world, and watched Quentin’s tiny body flail about in the airless space.
“Well…” Mundo said slowly. “There’s our way home.”
“What the hell have you nerds gotten me into?” Isaac sighed. Then he clutched his sword in his hands, nodded to Mundo with a stiff lip, and they jumped in side by side.
Standing alone, Grandpa nodded rapidly and turned away. “Yup, yup, yup, yup. I’ll wait here for you crazy hooligans.”
Mundo’s hand reached out from the portal, grabbed Grandpa by the back of his robe, and pulled him in. The door slammed shut behind them.
The four of them found themselves floating through cyberspace, free of gravity. It was scary at first, but they soon discovered they could swim through the air by flapping their arms. And so they swam, amongst words and wires, dodging purple sparks and criss-crossing trains of code.
“Who are we going to contact?” Isaac shouted. His voice was strange, warped, different than usual, but that’s the way they all sounded now.
“We have a choice,” Mundo said. “We can try the GMs, but—”
“Screw that! Those idiots don’t have a damn clue what they’re doing. If they did, we wouldn’t be here now!”
“Well, our only other choice is Adam’s girlfriend, Natalie.”
“Can she do anything!?”
“How the hell would I know!?”
“Um, guys…” Quentin said.
“This is all your fault!” Isaac shouted as he flipped through the air, out of control. “You had to get Kim into this stupid game. We could’ve had a normal life. You and your geeky Nerdquest buddies ruined everything!”
“Don’t blame this on me! I’m trying to save us.”
“Well, you’ve done a real good job so far!”
“I’m trying my best!”
“I swear, if I have to spend the rest of my life in this—”
“Guys!” Quentin shouted. They didn’t have time to see what he was pointing to, though. A huge two-dimension white box slammed into them like flypaper, carrying them in the opposite direction at impossible speeds. They screamed, clutching to each other, and their lips began to flap over their faces as if they were on a wild roller coaster ride.
“It’s an e-mail!” Mundo shouted, pointing to the sender line.
Quentin’s eyes widened. He looked at what he was stuck to and realized that it was the bare anatomy of a sorority girl with no other way to make a quick buck. “It’s worse than that! It’s…spam!”
“Noooo! We’re going to get deleted!”
“What the hell is going on!?” Isaac yelled, getting a handhold on the e-mail and climbing its smooth surface.
Grandpa was doing something else with his hands.
The e-mail continued to soar through cyberspace with the four Men stuck to it like flies, getting carried further and further away from the friendly world of Neverquest. The black hole of the Internet was all they had to look forward to. Because in cyberspace, nobody can hear you scream.
Giantess World
