Old Friend

“Daddy! Daddy! This one!”

Its seven in the morning and David is jumping and smiling for his father Greyson to set up the old game system. He choose a game earlier and was promised that he could play it today. Unfortunately , Greyson had to wake up so early on his free day to play with his son. In fact, David’s mother was down the hall in her room still sleeping.

Greyson, even though he was half asleep, had gone to the attic and brought his old game system and video games down for his son.

David was around ten years old so it surprised him that he wanted to play a game that was older than even Greyson himself, but nonetheless promised David that they could play together. He was smiling just like his son was. It reminded him of his own father showing him the games.

Before he disappeared.

Greyson shakes his head. Not today, he thought. He only wants to have quality time with his son. That’s what matters.

“Hurry Daddy!” David playfully punched his father. Greyson apologized for dozing off and yawned as he finished setting up the entire game console.

It wasn’t so hard to set up. It was about a foot long and a couple inches high. The console, which was called a “Super Play System,” was made by a company that had a history of advanced gaming technology. They had elaborate sound effects, a decent frame rate, and the visuals were amazing for its era. It only came with one controller which was a simple trapezoide shape and a small joystick with four buttons. It also had a large port on top of it to hold game cartridges. It only used too colors as well, purple and black.

David snatched the controller out of Greysons hand and giggled in anticipation for the T.V. to turn on. He put the game in the port and the company logo shinning on the screen.

“It was “In the Purple Forest” right David?”

“Yes! The monster looks so cool.” He smiled wide.

“Monster?” From what Greyson remembered this game never had a monster in it.

He was going to question about it but then the game started up and the main menu and its music started.

The title sat right in the center. It’s words were gleaming yellow as the borders around it were green with vines and purple with mushrooms. The screen pulsed to the beat of the adventurous music and a man was swing back and forth on a vine. Greyson thought it was cute that the character chanted “let’s start” every few seconds. It was as if it was excited to play after so long.

Greyson sat by his son and started to explain the controls. He clicked start for him and pointed to the controls on what to do. The joystick was to move, which prompted the character to jump off the vine and begin level one. The right button was to jump and the bottom was to punch, which prompted the character to jump to a cage and break it, freeing the animals trapped inside. The other buttons grabbed and pulled things. David learned very fast. He jumped up to tall trees and freed animals. He jerked while he played almost acting out the commands his character was doing. He yelped when he freed animals or escaped the claws of a tiger. Greyson cheered him on and smiled with him.

They played and laughed together in the game for another hour. They started in the forest which was full of green and predators waiting to pounce on them. Greyson had to help David a lot but always left David to finish levels himself.

Then the next zone was a city zone. Greyson groaned at this level, he always hated cities. Too big, dangerous, and full of rats. The character seemed to like it though. It was running across building rooftops escaping the police. The city was unnaturally dark and the blue and red lights from the police was the only way they could see in front of them. A siren played the whole time, which they couldn’t hear over the sound of their own voices.

“David watch out! There’s a rat under there!”

David squealed and jumped erratically which brought the police closer.

“NO!” They both screamed in desperation.

As they escaped the frightening zone they turned down the volume to check if David’s mother, Maria, was still awake. Snoring came from down the hall and the two chuckled as they returned back to the game.

After the frightening city zone, they reached a sea zone. They had to balance as they dodged hungry fish. Some were small and helped heal them, while others were much larger and could eat the character in one fell swoop. They even encountered a whale-like fish. It was amazing how advanced this system actually was. You could see the pixels clearly but it’s artist detail was beyond its years.

But then something went wrong.

They reached the trademark zone of the game, the Purple Forest. It was a great color change from the previous zones blues, greens, and reds. The trees were full of cyan leaves, the ground was laced with purple mushrooms, and bright yellow fireflies flew everywhere lighting up the forest. Even now the forest looked great to Greyson, and David smiled ear to ear in wonder. Their eyes were wide. Greyson looked at his son and patted his back.

Then as they explored the forest, weird signs started to appear. Not lit up by yellow fireflies, but green ones.

The first sign was large but difficult to read through the pixels. But they both knew what it said.

“WELCOME BACK” was what was written on it.

David was confused but shrugged it off as a cool boss battle. Maybe it was even a friendly person. Greyson didn’t assume that, he knew that this sign wasn’t apart of the game. There wasn’t any dialogue besides the cute intro. He had no idea how there was a sign and, more importantly, how there was a message on it.

Another one appeared.

“YOU THOUGHT I WOULDN’T FIND YOU, OLD FRIEND?”

David scratched his head but kept running forward, not noticing that firefly’s were starting to disappear. Greyson began to worry. He scratched his own messy brown hair and pulled out his phone. The internet should know right? It was unlikely this was some “rare event” because this game was too old for that but that was his best guess. David still went forward, the character didn’t stop, but he question where all the animals went.

Greyson typed in the browser “the purple forest special signs” and hoped something accurate came up. This game was about thirty years old so it couldn’t be too hard to find. It was also really famous and known for being a retro game that people still remember. Maybe, Greyson thought, he had a bootleg copy. That would suck. He had all this fun and now had to tell David that they were playing a possibly pirated version of his favorite game.

But when he pressed the search button the only thing that came up was a white screen with a blue underlined message in the top left corner.

“WHERE IS YOUR CHILD?”

Greyson shot his head up from his phone. David was gone.

Greyson jumped up and looked around the room. All the toys and clothes were in David’s closet unmoved and the door to his bedroom wasn’t opened. He checked under the bed and in the closet anyway. Nothing. The window wasn’t open. The game wasn’t even turned off. It had a bright red error screen and a low humming noise. Where had David gone?

Greyson called out for him. No one came.

He was going to leave the room before an awful screech came from the T.V. It felt like nails were clawing at his brain. He covered his ears and had to support himself by leaning on the wall. The sound didn’t stop. He tried to turn around and kneel down to turn off the console, but his hand slipped. His whole hand landed on the console, missing the off button, and his hand sizzled. It was an awful noise and Greyson screamed. He snatched his hand away and fell to the floor groaning. He looked at the console, it was spiting dark red liquid that smoked. He started to reach for his phone again, which was on the floor beside him, and tried to dial 911. He almost pressed the call button but then a message appeared on the screen. The red error messages were gone and instead there were two crescent shaped eyes staring at him. White bold lettering was underneath it.

“FACE ME, YOU COWARD.”

The eyes stalked him as the letters faded away. And what faded in was two large white cartoon looking gloves holding a small child. The child looked asleep and calm.

David.

Greyson grabbed the controller. He thought he never needed to do this ever again. He thought he escaped that thing.

“YOU CANNOT RUN FROM THE PAST. YOU CANNOT RUN FROM ME.”

Greyson gritted his teeth, took a deep breath, and closed his eyes.

He counted to ten and opened them again. He was in a different world.

He was in a dark foggy city. The moon pierced through the clouds. It was a bright full moon. There were large buildings with broken fire escapes, broken windows, and smoking chimneys.

They turned and leaned unnaturally inwards towards him and the main road he was on. The dripped with rainwater and blood which splashed on the ground and streamed down the drain. The road was cracked and missing pieces. The fog was thick and you couldn’t see more than thirty feet. The air was dense and smelled like rot. It was cold and it nipped and Greyson neck. And right by the road, the sidewalk was broken with dark weeds growing outward with jagged edges. The weeds created a sort of path into a nearby alley way. The builds there looked like they were melting, dispute the bitter cold, and from the darkness he could hear rabid breathing.

It’s there.

As if on cue, a large creature emerged from the darkness. Vile wet stomping echoed across the city. Such a disgusting thing, Greyson thought.

He could make most of it out. It was a contorted version of a rat. It was massive, easily seven feet tall. But it was almost cartoon like. It took obvious traits of a rat such as the nose, long pink tail, large oval ears, and dirty hairy body. Everything else was wrong. It’s mouth was long and jaw stretched way to far into a haunting grin full of human teeth. It’s yellow crescent eyes pierced into Greyson in it’s empty eye sockets. It had shriveled up skin and hair wrapped around its skinny arms and long legs. The arms ended in large white gloves and it had black shoes that made it look like a cartoon character. It’s tail was even curling and whipping around like a hungry snake. And it’s most iconic part was its white hair with stripes covering its whole body.

It made Greyson shiver and hug himself like he was back to being a child. He released himself fast, angry that he would demote to such antics. But he couldn’t help but shake a bit every time the thing stepped. His old friend. Mr.Stripes.

The disgusting thing spoke. Its mouth didn’t move which made Greyson really think it was a mascot suit. A dark creature hidden within. Blood splattered out of his mouth as he talked.

“IT HAS BEEN SUCH A LONG TIME. I NEVER THOUGHT YOU WOULD CREATE SPAWN.”

Greyson always hated the way it talked. It made him shiver and bother his throat. Its vile voice seemed to come from a dark abyss of its soul and it reverberated outwards like wet gurgling.

“I thought we stopped playing this game. I thought I could move on.”

The beast stopped walking and stood up. It really was a massive thing. It towered over Greyson. He guessed it easily was ten feet tall.

“BUT I NEVER LEFT. AND NOW WE HAVE TO PLAY AGAIN. FOR OLD TIMES SAKE.”

Greyson looked down and saw his reflection in the dark puddle below him. The eyes of the beats were spotlights. Like they would never let him go.

“Why does David have to be involved? Just leave him out of this.” Greyson yelled.

“ITS SIMPLE. I NEED SOMEONE TO PLAY WITH.”

Greyson twitched.

“What do you mean…?”

The beast crooked his head and Greyson followed its gaze behind him.

There David was. He was on a bed sleeping out in this fog. He was turning and twisting in bed. He cried and yelled for his father.

Greyson tried to run to him but then the beast jumped in the way. They both looked face to face. It’s jaw wide and frothing with blood and puss. Its eyes were bright and unwavering. It’s smile was wide and chilling.

“THIS IS OUR GAME. IF YOU WAKE HIM UP FROM THIS NIGHTMARE, HE WILL LEAVE IT. BUT IF YOU LEAVE HIM ALONE AND YOU SLEEP, I WILL LET YOU GO.”

Greyson froze. He couldn’t. He couldn’t possibly make that choice. He couldn’t. There was no way he could ever make that choice. What would his son do without him. Maria? How would she react? He can’t leave his whole world behind. But he wouldn’t ever leave his son in this nightmare realm. Not even if it meant his life would come back to him. How did this decision come so fast? Was this really his last choice in life for his son? Will he ever see him again? What is this hellscape of games and torture be like?

“CHOOSE.”

Greyson went to his son, the beast moved out the way and let him. He took off the blanket covering him and held him tight. David stoped crying and hugged his father back. He wasn’t awake, but his body knew it was safe in the hands of his father. Safe in the hands of a father who loved him.

Greyson cried and put his son back on the bed. He kissed him on his forehead and held his face. He thought his son was beautiful, a little boy destined to do great things. He would do anything for his son. Anything to make him happy.

So as Greyson shakes his son awake, he tears up. He knows he might never see him again. Never see him grow old, never see him find love, never see him be great. Never see his son be his son.

Then David was gone. The bed was empty.

Greyson sobbed into the bedsheets. Now at the mercy of this monster.

The beast savagely ripped Greyson from the bed and brought him to its face. Greysons eyes opened wide. In its hands he was its plaything. He was its puppet to entertain it however it wanted. To play twisted games of savage demented fun. Just like old times.

“LETS PLAY FOR ETERNITY.”