“Wake up!” my ten-year-old brother, Sean, squawked as he banged two pans together manically.

You see, my brother can be pretty freakishly annoying. Like when he wakes me up at five o’clock in the morning. My name is Trent Pearson, and I am twelve years old. I want to scream my head off and jump off a building for living in the same room as my brother. Everyday he does the same thing: drive me crazy. Every time he has a nightmare, he gets up off his bed screaming and crying and then he crawls onto my stomach, creaming me.

Well, he’s not too bad – at least he keeps me company when we both get in the school’s idiotic detention.

I looked out the window; it was a very cold day, and a lot darker than usual. But I just assumed it was normal for a New York day. Then I remembered something: the first day of school was today! I sighed and almost walked out the door.

Until a fat bloated man stood in front of me.

“Guys, are you kidding me?” yelled my dad, who was still in his boxers with, thankfully, a shirt on. “Waking me up at four o’clock! You know I need to at least sleep until two o’clock in the afterno-”

He tumbled to the floor, snoring

That was another reason I hate my life. My dad literally hollered at me every day. In fact, he screamed at me so much I’m actually kind of used to it. My mom then came in the room with her hair all messed up and all over her face.

She mumbled, “Go play something for 2 hours, and then get ready for school. When you two get home from school, I’ll make you your favorite cupcakes.”

She fell onto Sean’s bed. My mom had always been my favorite. She was the nicest mom anyone could have. I never realized, but Sean had been silent the whole time – he must’ve been scared of dad. He was hugging (more like squeezing) one of my pillows so tightly that I actually felt bad for it.

***

Two hours passed by and I have done absolutely nothing. I had actually felt relaxed until my brother came screaming out of our room.

“HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN ABOUT SCHOOL!” my brother complained. I was surprised that my brother had actually cared about school today since we had been sent to detention about every day last year.

When we got to school, the teachers gave us morning detention for three hours for being late. I didn’t really care but my brother was scared to death. When we got to the detention room, there was a man who looked like a hobo sitting at a table. He was wearing shaggy tan pants, and a torn blue shirt. Why was he in a detention room? I sat down and looked at my brother.

“I’m gonna go to the bathroom, I’ve been holding it in for the whole day.”

And yet, he was stupid enough to not go during the whole day.

He rushed out the door and so did the hobo. Why did the hobo follow him? I didn’t care.

It had been 20 minutes, and my brother still did not come out of the bathroom.

What’s taking him so long? Is he stuck in the girl’s bathroom again? I thought.

I dashed out of the detention room, ran into a teacher eating a hamburger, took the hamburger, threw it into the detention room, and went into the boy’s bathroom eagerly.

He was gone, and so was the hobo.

The window was open, which meant the hobo had escaped with my brother.

“Wait, why did they add windows in the bathroom?” I asked, shocked.

I panicked and dashed out the door; the hobo was getting away fast, carrying my brother.

“Help! This guy’s armpit smells like when my dad farts, which means it’s really stinky!” Sean bellowed as he kept waving away the armpit stink.

I kept chasing the hobo until something happened that didn’t happen very often. The man lifted his hand up for no reason, and the whole world turned dark. The hobo and Sean disappeared.  I knelt to the ground, crying that I lost my brother. What did this man want, and why did he kidnap Sean? That’s when it happened. A piece of a roof landed next to me.

“Gah! What the?” I questioned and looked up.

There was a fifty-foot dark figure, literally made out of dark stuff, heading towards me.

I gasped and made the mistake of running. Did the hobo send this? The dark figure put his arm out, and a piece of concrete formed in his hands. He threw it and it hit my mom’s apartment.

“Mom! No! Dad! I don’t care about him.” Tears came out of my eyes. Suddenly, I felt anger.

Then the monster put its other arm out. I was floating towards it. No matter what I tried, I kept coming closer and closer to it. It looked like an ordinary man, except for the fact that he was made out of dark clouds and was the biggest thing ever. He opened his palms and grabbed me! Being high in the air had never scared me, but the smell of the monster did. It smelled like a billion skunks had farted directly in my face. I had never known that the monster was solid. Then, something no one could expect happened. A lightning bolt struck the dark evil cloud guy in the chest. The monster was going crazy with electricity emerging out of his body. I fell to the floor, wondering what had just occurred. Then I felt victory – the monster exploded into soft dark clouds in the sky.

“Take that, dark poopy guy,” I said, and I wish I hadn’t, because it reminded me of Sean. We used to prank teachers and feel victorious, just like right now, but a maniac just kidnapped my brother, and he will pay for the destruction of my family.

***

I wandered miserably to, well, nowhere. My mom’s apartment got mashed to smithereens, and I doubted my parents survived that piece of concrete…not that I cared about my dad. But I still had a question: what the heck happened back there and why did a lightning bolt strike the monster out of nowhere on a (kind of) sunny day? Now I was going to rot and die next to the trash can (my new home) like a hobo.

“Hey, you okay?” a voice appeared next to me.

I looked up and saw my old friend Max. He was standing with his jaw open, and with a man that I didn’t recognize. The mysterious new man was wearing an expensive tux with dark glasses that covered his eyes. Under there, I felt like there was darkness.

“What is the meaning of this?” the man barked. “I am the new principal, Mr. Momo, and  because you ran out of school for no reason, you will have a month’s worth of detention!”

I made a choice and I will never regret it.

I ran.

As I ran, I heard footsteps behind me,  I looked back and saw that Mr. Momo and Max were chasing after me. To lose them, I cut around the school corner and grabbed a trash can lid.

As soon as I grabbed the lid, I realized that it was a dead end. Mr. Momo had already caught up to me, but he was breathing like a demented person. Now was my chance.

“Hey, why ya holding a trash can lid?” he asked.

“Uhhh, I’m a trash guy,” I lied.

He charged at me, and there was only one thing to do.

I hit him directly on the head, and then he tumbled to the ground, lying very still. Fear flowed through me – I had just killed a man. Max came running down, gasping for air. When he saw Mr. Momo on the floor, and me holding a trash can lid, I was sure he was going to run. He was wearing a ducky shirt, like he always had, with words that read: Duckies Rock!!!

“Uhhhh, why is Mr. Momo sleeping on the floor,” he said with a stunned expression. He looked up from Mr. Momo, still looking at me still with shock.

“I can explai-”

Kaboom! Blocks of brick from the school flew right next to me and hit Mr. Momo on the head.

“Ughhh oww-”

“Ah!”

“Ah! What, hey, you magical talking lollipops should be in my mouth, come here-” Mr. Momo yelled as he woke up. He wasn’t dead after all.

We were gone in a flash. We ran away and left Mr. Momo yelling like a confused baby. Max and I regretted going in the direction we ran because that was where the blast came from. A forty-foot robot hovered over us, and as we tried to run away screaming like little girls, the robot grabbed us both just like the dark poopy guy did to me. This might’ve been another thing the hobo sent after me!

Max had the good luck of not hanging upside down. Sadly, I was hanging uncomfortably.

“Hey, giant robot dude! Fight me like a man, or man robot, whatever you call a grownup robot,” Max shouted.

He shouldn’t have said that.

The robot let go of us and we were falling out of the sky. I had an urge to strangle him, but something told me that strangling a kid who was also falling out of the sky was useless. That’s it, I was going to die falling out of the sky.

***

Am I dead? I thought.

Everything was black, so I couldn’t see a thing. But something did make me freeze, the groaning of a kid.

Max was alive, and so was I.

He ignorantly struggled to get out of the pile of cement.

“How did we survive? he asked. “And where did that robot thingy majiggy go?”

He was right, that robot was going to regret dropping us like a toy, but where were we and how did we survive? I guess Max read my expression because we both sprinted outside curiously. The mysterious robot left a big trail of footprints to an odd building with all the lights on.

“There must be someone in there, let’s go!” I suggested.

As we approached the bizarre and huge looking building with flags and skulls at the top, guards with spears across their chest randomly appeared. Max’s response was a shriek. They stayed absolutely silent and paid no attention to us as if we weren’t there.

I wonder if they’ll stop me from getting in…. nah. I thought. When I moved just an inch towards the door, the first guard pointed his sword at me. I spoke too soon. My response to that was punching him in the face, kicking the other guard, and moving on. Max looked at me in complete shock.

“Are you going to knock out every person you meet?” he questioned.

When Max put his hand up to knock on the door, I just kicked the door open impolitely, no problem.

“All right, who sent a demented robot out to drop me out of the air a million feet from the ground?!” I said.

No one but one hairy man raised his hand. He was wearing a striped colored turtleneck and striped socks. This guy sure liked stripe stuff.

“That would be me, and no one calls Patty ‘demented!’” he finally answered. “The guards you knocked out there are in fact one of you, and, by the way, my name is Bob!”

We looked at him suspiciously. What did he mean by one of us? I took out the trash can lid I used to knock Mr. Momo out back at the school. Max had just ran outside like a coward to hide from this deadly (not) fight. The hairy man took out a curved stick with a string attached to it, a bow, and an arrow. When I flung my weapon at him, he pulled out a shiny weapon and cut the lid in complete half. When he took his turn, his first arrow nearly hit me in the skull and landed right between cowardly Max and me.

“Wow, you really think––”

KaPooo!

Air ran through my hair, and explosions made my ears ring as I flew into the air. The arrow was explosive, and I probably died.

***

Five hours later, I was laying in a bed that was as hard as steel. Seriously, you could at least give me a comfy place before I die. The room was somber and mysterious, with pictures of people fighting things like the dark poopy guy! As I looked to my right, Max was lying unconscious on the bed with a scar on his head. Quickly, I got up and  slapped him in the face, no biggy.

“Owee!” he said.

“Get up!”

“Okay, jeez louise.”

We dashed silently out the door, when two arms, as fast as cheetahs, grabbed our shoulders. As I was struggling, I heard footsteps behind me. Could that be…

“Well, well, well, I see you guys woke up!” Bob said.

Duh, why do you think we’re standing? I thought.

“Do you know why you’re here?” he asked. “That robot brought you here to be safe, not to be killed. That hobo, well, he’s Mr. Momo. He kidnapped Sean to destroy humanity. This place is called Base Flash. Oh yeah, you are a mon-fighter, a warrior who kills monsters.”

“Wait, how do you know about Sean?” I asked cautiously. “I don’t believe that the hobo is Mr. Momo.”

“I want you to go get Sean and save the – wait, what is it called again? – oh yeah, the world!” he said as he ignored my question.

He took something from behind him. It was a red dagger. I thought he was going to kill us with it since we had tried to run out of the room. Man, he must have been really mad. That doltish man, he lied to us!

“Here, this dagger is from me and your father; he just made it,” he offered.

I was mistaken that he was stupid, but how did my dad just make this? He’s supposed to be dead, unless…

Quick footsteps interrupted me, and I was very surprised to see my dad running down the hall. He was skinnier! He was wearing overalls, with mysterious stains, marked, “Jack Pearson.”

“I’m guessing you’re wondering why I’m not fat…well, that was a disguise so the other side couldn’t kidnap me,” he said. “And that lightning bolt, well, you did that, and that dark stuff the hobo did – that was his potential. I saw through the window.”

“What happened to MOM!” I yelled.

“I tried to warn Mom, but she just slapped me as if I was lying, and she kept slapping me until I was outside. Then, she locked me outside. The apartment blew up as I sat on a bench and thought about my life.”

“Why are you here?” I asked.

“I work as a blacksmith here, so I make weapons.”

He told me that I had used my true potential, which was lightning. My response was a wide open mouth. Max fainted.

“Yeah, all that is great, but Trent and I need to go to save Sean!” Max demanded as he got up.

Bob took out what looked like a stained old paper and showed it to us. A bunch of squiggly lines roamed the page. I realized it was a map.

“Walk down the Trail of Darkness, and you will find your brother,” he said.

***

As we walked down the road, uncanny things stalked us behind tree leaves and branches. I got a feeling we were definitely on the Trail of Darkness. The eyes made me shiver and made my hand tremble. The ground was very moist, and crows kept flying around us, almost like they were tracking me.

“We’ve been expecting you,” a very familiar-looking kid said as he alighted from a tree.

“Sean!” Max yelled, astounded.

As I turned my head to see my brother, a loud blast emerged right next to me.

Oh, shoot! Max!

White smoke emitted from the middle of Max’s shirt. His chest was caked with black stuff I didn’t recognize.

“S-Sean! Why did you do that!” I said.

He just smirked evilly. Had he joined the hobo?

“Ha! I’ve turned your dopey brother against you,” said the hobo, as he came into view.

“Hey! You’re the hobo!”

“You may call me Mr. Momo.”

I had a very confused expression on my face. If he was the hobo who kidnapped Sean, who was the lunatic who pretended to be the new principal?

“Oh! That principal was a robot. We had the old principal kidnapped and sent to the Himalayas for vacation. The robot was meant to kidnap you too,” he said annoyingly as if he read my thoughts. “Now, Sean, your brother has annoyed me – kill him, please.”

His face darkened, so I was pretty sure that he wasn’t kidding about that. I knew I would have to fight my brother unless I could persuade him not to listen to Mr. Momo. So I took out the only  thing I had for defense, my red dagger. He snickered, and before I knew it, he had a pure white sword in his hands. I was doomed for sure.

“Time to end this,” he thundered.

***

He made the first move. I should’ve done some training before I came here because as I tried to block his attack, I missed and the blade of Sean’s sword sliced through my skin. After it slashed, it emitted fire from the tip and sent me forty feet behind. It felt like I had fallen from the Empire State Building, and that’s saying a lot.

“Come on, attack me, even though you suck at combat,” he commented.

I couldn’t attack my brother. He could get hurt, and plus, like he said, I suck at combat. I just needed to convince him, but I’d probably die in the process.

“Dude, why did you join his side? He’s evil, cruel, and selfish. He’ll probably eliminate you after he takes over the world. I think you’re under a spell. He killed mom…think of the happy days we spent together, and when we pranked the lunch aid!” I screeched.

That got him thinking, I slowly marched towards Sean, and the last thing I saw before I blacked out was my brother floating in the air with fire circling him.

That was his true potential.

Fire.

Maybe I’m dead now, finally, some peace, I thought.

Or maybe not. The air smelled of dirt, and my vision blurred. I saw a figure with its hand out.

Dang it, Sean is going to kill me.

Not this time.

I kicked him hard in the chest, and I hit his sword hard with my dagger. The weapon clattered to the floor, leaving Sean rolling across the pavement.

“Hey, I’m on your side now!” he protested.

Part of me didn’t trust him, but I might as well have agreed because Mr. Momo was going to kill both of us anyway. When I looked over his shoulder, Max was (stupidly) sneaking up to Mr. Momo for the kill, but the insane kid got intercepted by a kick in the stomach by the ex-principal. “Stop trying to be the hero!” My brother and I looked at each other. We both had the same thought about what to do.

“Hey, Principal, what time is it?” Sean asked.

“Uhh, it about-”

“It’s kabob time!”

Our two powers collided, and we threw the massive ball of lightning and fire at the hobo. A yellow dome emerged, but after, nothing was left but a hole in the ground. We had finally killed Mr. Momo.

“Listen, Trent, I’m sorry for knocking you out, even though it was funny and I kind of liked it,” my brother apologized. “But is there a way to get Mom back?”

He was right; there had to be a way to get Mom! But I doubted anyone knew how. We picked up poor Max and headed back to the building. On the way, I ran into a pole, but my two friends picked me up.

When we walked in the house, I was sure my dad was going to kill Sean. But as we entered the blacksmith’s area, he was still wearing his overalls and was hammering an ax. I never knew I would see my dad be hardworking.

“Oh. My. God! I’m so glad you’re safe. I’m sorry for being mean…you know I’m grumpy when I’m tired. But Sean, you didn’t do anything stupid, right? Even if you did, I forgive you. Come here, you guys,” my father said as he put his arms out to hug us.

I guess he really did change. We went to the game room and played on the Pac-Man machine.

For once, I felt happy to be with Sean and my dad, but what about Mom?

The End!

Be sure to read Part II in the adventure with Trent, Sean, Max, Bob, and Mr. Pearson.