Bade

Chapter 4: Pseudonyms

I woke up that Saturday morning not knowing that it would be one of the most ridiculous days of my life. The first thing I did is pretty mundane (that means boring). I texted Ash. She responded almost immediately, and so I told her I was heading over. Then she tried to make some excuse—that she had homework to do, but I ignored it. She’d better have a good reason for not showing up at the fight. Dad had taped a note to my door, a list of chores: standard stuff, mostly--cleaning my room, the kitchen, laundry. But the chores could wait. I had to get my bike back from Dave Dumont.

Find Ash

    I hadn’t slept well. Mostly, this was due to all the crazy dreams—which in itself are nothing new. I always dreamed a lot, and remembered most of them vividly (that means with lots of details). I used to keep a journal. Dad worried that me waking up so often at night would stunt my growth—we Calderóns are not the tallest of creatures. My older brother Mike measures in around 5’8” and he dwarfs my folks. I had another brother, but he died when I was little—who knows how tall he would have been? I dreamed about him sometimes—about him growing up and us playing together.

    Last night’s dream I couldn’t quite remember, something about Bade and having to erase my avatar, throw in a bit of Ash being kept in a tower and an approaching tsunami (huge wave), and then a bunch of talking sticks telling me to wake up. I know, I know. But I definitely did not fall asleep with Nerds candy all over my mouth. Not this time, at least.

    The first thing I did was go on Bade, and everything was total craziness.

…ENTER BADE…

    The message boards had gone wild—apparently someone had stolen something really important from Corundum, and my first thought was GanonCannon—maybe DeusKiller was trying to get to him through me. Luckily GanonCannon was online, so we met at a little restaurant in Hogtown where he usually hung out.

GanonCannon: What can I do for you, CF?

CauldronFire: Help me find a guy named Locke22. I need some info on him, ASAP. He might be going by the pseudonym DeusKiller.

GanonCannon: Sure. I heard that someone found out when to arrive for the source.

CauldronFire: Haven’t heard, dang.

GanonCannon: We still need this Twin Sight thing.

CauldronFire: Yep.  Hey, watch my back, will you. Someone might have put out a hit on me.

GanonCannon: I’ll start now…think you were followed. Don’t underestimate our enemies. We’re getting close to something.

    When I left the meeting place, a wispy black line (the neutral avatar form everyone starts with in Bade) was trailing me. I tried to shake him without luck---the dude was fast! He tailed me from Homestead to Dawn Town to Forest of Silhouettes. The wispy line stopped, dropped something, then vanished.

    In its place, written in the dirt:

Need your help...don’t trust DK

A quake spell had been set, and as soon as I backed away, earth swallowed up the note. I kicked the dirt, then scorched  the ground just in case DeusKiller had followed me. Then I headed for the nearest waypoint and reentered the real world and real problems.

…

    Without my bike, I was forced to trek over to Ash’s house on foot. It took freaking forever, but I didn’t really mind. I had a lot to think about—mostly why Dave Dumont would go to such lengths to exile me from Bade.

    The Rajakumars were out in the front yard, gardening. When my folks were still together, they had a small vegetable garden in the back yard, but since Mom moved out, the weeds had quickly conquered it. Now we just had a fig tree out front and a dirt patch. We never got any figs because the squirrels ate them first. But really—who eats figs? Newton or Newman form only, please.