Burning Phoenix - Saga 1

(Solmonath 28, 56 / 10:59AM)

(Mary) Joseph! Joseph pick up!

Running through the city in her black leggings and boots, Mary clutched her phone, waiting for Joseph to respond.

(Mary) Come on, pick up! Please for the love of all holy—

(Joseph on the phone) H-hello? Mary is that you?

(Mary) Joseph, it’s Luke! Luke escaped from the penthouse!

(Joseph on the phone) W-WHAT!?

Mary starts to quiver, her hands shaking the phone the more she is on call with her husband.

(Joseph on the phone) Damn it, Mary! How did you let him go?!

(Mary) He must have escaped when I was in the bathroom! I’m sorry. Please help me find him!

(Joseph on the phone) Mary, go look for Luke! Please have your phone with you, I may have to call you back in a bit…

(Mary) But will you help me find him—

(Joseph) Sorry Mary, but I have to go. Please look for him!

As soon as both Mary and Joseph hung up their big block cellphones, Joseph let out a stressful sigh.

(Joseph) sigh … I hope he didn’t go to the downtown district…

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(Solmonath 28, 56 / 11:52AM)

(Luke’s thoughts) Oh no…

Now having a bunch of eyes on him, Luke was now the perfect center of attention for the group of geeks and nerds..

Mostly because everyone in the building was in their late teens, and Luke suddenly felt small again.

(Geek #1) Who invited him here?

(Geek #2) Don’t know, let’s just continue planning this thing.

Everyone just went along with what they were doing, ignoring Luke since they didn’t think much of him.

(???) Hey Luke! You made it!

(Luke) Hey Fred!

After an embarrassing introduction upon entering, he was finally greeted by his best friend Fred, finally reaching the destination that he wanted to go from the start.

Fred was only a couple of inches taller than Luke, but both he and Luke were mostly skinny. Described as having normal ears and nose, the key difference that made him different was that Fred had silver hair. He usually wore a black miner helmet with goggles on top, as well as wearing yellow shirts and blue plants.

Fred gave Luke a fistbump, a way to greet one another as they did in school.

(Luke) Where were you? I thought you weren’t here.

(Fred) Sorry, I was constipated. Accidentally ate bad food…

(Luke) Heh, that’s definitely you…

(Fred) So, what happened? How did you get here?

(Luke) I just followed the address, that's all.

(Fred) Really? It usually takes me 25 to 30 minutes to walk to your penthouse. It took you an hour.

(Luke) I just happened to walk into this crazy scene with a crazy man. Nothing particular about it though…

(Luke’s thoughts) What was that man’s goal anyway? Maybe he was just a conspiracy weirdo…

(Luke) And then I got held up by some red-haired yo-yo master. He said he knew my dad well and we talked for quite a bit.

(Fred) Ah, so that’s why you’re carrying that broken-down yo-yo. Can I see it?

(Luke) Sure.

Luke gave the old yo-yo to Fred, and for a moment, Fred’s blue eyes gleamed.

(Luke) I don’t care if you keep it, I can’t seem to find anything valuable with that thing.

(Fred) I-I’m not going to—

(???) Fred, you’re probably going to keep it to yourself, so give it back to him.

Another boy, who looked to be 16, came over to check up on Fred. The boy looked to have brownish ginger hair, followed by a bunch of freckles that laid waste upon his cheeks. He had a big nose, normal lips, and squinted monolid eyes. His hair was styled short to moderate, with a cowlick on the back of his head. The color of his eyes was brown, and there were some spots of facial hair starting to pop out.

(Luke) An elf!

(???) Uh yeah I’m an elf. What of it?

As the elf was taken aback by the increase of Luke’s voice, the elf took a couple steps back.

(Fred) Don’t worry, this is Luke’s first time seeing an elf close up.

(???) Oh, good to know… anyway Fred, like I said, return the yo-yo.

(Fred) Come on, when did I keep things to myself that I shouldn’t have?

(Luke) Come to think of it, you still haven’t returned the movie CDs that I let you borrow.

(Fred) I’m … still not finished watching them…

(???) Didn't you already finish watching them a year ago?

The ginger brownish-haired teen then looked at Luke.

(???) My name is Stanley, or just call me Stan for short. Don’t care.

Luke was about to introduce himself back but Stan stopped him.

(Stan) Don’t worry about it, Fred told me all about you.

(Luke) Wait. Fred told you all about me?

(Stan) Yeah, man, he kept on telling me crazy stories about how you and he would mostly cause a lot of trouble in school. Mostly about how you and him would scare people away when both you and him were in chemistry.

(Fred) That’s mostly Luke, he’s the one who starts most of the fires…

(Luke) I just like exploring chemical bonds, that's all.

As the three boys continued talking in the doorway, a speaker, standing on top of the podium in the center of the building, made his presence. Turning on his megaphone, the booming noise of the megaphone’s switch roars through the building, putting all planning to a halt.

(Speaker) Attention everybody! The Robotics competition will commence at 4 PM, so make sure your robot is already built by at least 3:30.

(Luke) What?! Fred, you never told me about this.

(Fred) Don’t worry Luke, it’s just a competition.

(Luke) But I don’t want to make my parents worry that much…

(Stan) I mean, your parents are going to kill you for just leaving right? At least make the most out of it.

(Luke) Well … ok!

The speaker then put the mic down a little to see that everyone was listening to him. Upon noticing that a few people were alone, as well as seeing Stan, Fred, and a newcomer joining in, he had to acknowledge the presence of teams and solos.

(Speaker) And another thing. Teams can only choose one robot for the competition! Solos can receive help from other people as well! If you're a solo who wants to be part of a team, come to the east side of the building!

Then the speaker put down the megaphone, the speaker petting his pet baby wolf on top of his head.

Luke, Fred, and Stan heard of the announcement and the three of them sort of agreed without speaking that they want to work on the robot together. As the clock started to strike at 12, the three boys head to their workstation, to come up with the best robot that the world has ever seen, but—

(Luke) I’ve never built a robot before…

(Fred) Don’t worry, me and Stan will help you out with it. Careful though, Stan can be a little competitive in robot building, so he can be a little … What do you call it?

(Luke) Passionate?

(Fred) Yeah … really passionate…

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(Solmonath 28, 52 / 1:00PM)

The clock struck 1, an hour into constructing the robot.

Things were going quite well for the other teams and singles, most of them already knew what they were doing, as if they already had a plan on what type of defense their robot had, and how their offense would look like.

As well as the fear factor that it will cause.

But for Luke, Fred, and Stan though… well…

(Stan) Why the hell would you put yo-yos as freaking arms?

(Fred) But yo-yos are cool.

(Stan) For a freaking elementary schooler—well, you’re barely a middle schooler so it makes sense!

Stan and Fred butted heads, face to face, mostly because Fred decided to wing the idea that the robot should have yo-yos as arms.

And Stan hated the idea…

(Stan) You’re going to ruin the robot!

(Fred) As if the size was already going to ruin the robot!

(Stan) Size does and will matter! It builds into the fear factor!

Meanwhile, Stan built the robot to be the biggest robot out of the, trying to make it seem like a big shot compared to other robots.

And Fred hated the idea…

(Fred) The robot is going to be bodied!

(Stan) You see the metal we're using? The robot could tank it!

(Fred) Hey Luke, what do you think?

Both boys then looked towards Luke, their eyes glaring at him waiting for Luke’s opinion on the given result coming to hand, but Luke was too busy making the legs of the robot.

(Fred) Hey Luke. Luke. Luke—hey!

Fred tugged Luke’s shoulder. Being pulled away from the zone, Luke’s nostrils flared.

(Luke) I was doing the legs…

(Fred) This is important. Do you think yo-yos as arms would be a good idea?

(Stan) More importantly, do you think size does matter for fear factor?

Both boys’ hands and faces were a little sweaty and red from the hard work and frustration that they were putting into the robot, and each boy started to sweat a drop since neither one of them wanted to take down their own interest—

(Luke) How about you guys do both?

(Fred) Really?

(Stan) That’s your answer?

(Luke) Or you guys could do neither … I’m just trying to be moderate with your guys' interests…

Luke began putting his right hand on the right side of his face, his eye bang touching the tips of his knuckles. He started to inhale and exhale slowly yet again, this time more composed. Luke didn’t care if he won, he just wanted to hang out with Fred and others, that’s all he came here for.

(Fred) Alright … alright … hey, Luke, I’m curious, what have you been working on?

(Luke) Well, I’ve been working on the legs, and I think I have an interesting idea.

(Stan) I mean, it can’t be worse than yo-yo arms.

(Luke) I’ve decided to make the legs have an explosive kick when hitting a robot with its legs. By combining fulminated mercury inside its legs, and with a little switch, the fulminated mercury would come out and the robot would kick the mercury, causing it to explode. If the metal is hard and resilient, then I think it will put offense and fear points as well as defense points in terms of fighting … What do you guys think?

(Fred and Stan) Never cook again…