Sburb Time

Act 1 - part 1

Your name is Jacob, you are 15 years old and you live in a smallish house with your sister, mother and father. A few days ago, you were given a computer game as a birthday present called Sburb. You had to beg your parents to get it for you though. They agreed to buy their own copies and a similar copy for your sister so they could play it too. Of course, that took even more begging.

Speaking of computers, your convertible laptop is flashing: someone is pestering you. Probably your sister. Even though her room is across the hall from yours, she just loves to annoy you by constantly sending messages. You're tempted to reply with some rude comment to shut her up but first, you decide to look around your room.

Your walls are painted dark blue to match your bedsheets. You have a desk covered in fan art with your convertible laptop in the middle of it all. A reasonably large batman figurine stands on top of your desk, like a trophy, you think. Your bookshelf takes up a whole wall and its filled with your favourite action novels. You have a huge batman poster next to your bed, he is in flight and about to kick some ass. You love batman, but you love milo more. Tonnes of empty milo tins are scattered all over your floor. You would toss them in the trash but you love to build things with them or use them for bowling pins. Then there's the fact that the metal stuff you have to peel off them when you first open a fresh tin can cut through wood. You know, you've checked.

That about sums up your room: dark blue, fan art, batman and milo. Your computer is violently flashing now, you decide to put a stop to it.

Message: Kira

Kira: hey Chogee!
Kira: answer!
Kira: don't be rude!
Kira: I'll come in there!
Kira: hey!
Kira: hello?
Kira: urgh
Jacob: what!?
Kira: oh! Hey Chogee!
Jacob: what do you want?
Kira: I'm bored, I just wanted to talk :D have you seen mum around?
Jacob: no, I haven't. And I am very busy here so if you don't mind...
Kira: drawing and eating milo is not "busy" work, Jacob.
Jacob: who said I was eating or drawing, huh?
Jacob: I was actually just downloading the Sburb game.
Kira: you're like, obsessed with it or something. It's not that good anyway.
Jacob: how would you know? You've never played it. And that's probably a good thing, you'd need all the help you could get.
Kira: hey! I'd be fine playing it, it's just a game after all.
Jacob: have you even downloaded it yet? You'd better hurry, mum and dad are probably playing it already.
Kira: alright, I'll download it. Bye Chogee!
Jacob: see ya.

You should probably download the file now.

You quickly take the disc out of its packaging and insert it in the cd compartment of your laptop. You click "download file" and a weird spiral-looking thing flashes up on your screen. A bar below it indicates that Sburb is downloading. By the looks of things, it's gonna take a while.

To pass time, you message your mum.

Message: Karen

Jacob: hey mum, have you downloaded Sburb yet?
Jacob: mum?
Jacob: gdi.

Looks like she's not around. She's probably meditating somewhere, or doing yoga. She's into that.

Well, looks like there's nothing else to do. You sit down on your bed and eat some milo. That shit is like heaven in your mouth. If your parents found out how much of it you ate, they wouldn't be happy. Your mum is all about a healthy body and your dad is into gardening and organic food. There's no way they would let you eat as much as you do. They must never know. You captchalouge the almost full tin of milo in your sylladex so you can finish it later, don't want mum or dad walking in on you shovelling it down your throat.

What else do you have in your sylladex? You empty it and all the contents spill out on the floor. There's your Nerf Mega Thunderbow, your favourite book series: Ranger's Apprentice, a new Batman game you got for your birthday, your art diary and 7 empty milo tins. There's one more item but for some reason you can't open it. Oh well, you'll check it later.

You pick up your Nerf bow and fire a few bullets at a few different artworks hanging on the wall behind your desk. You have incredibly good accuracy with this thing, you won't lie. Each rubber bullet hits a character's head and bounces off with a pleasurable 'thwack'. You put the bow in you strife Specibus so it immediately changes to "bowkind". It's not gonna do any real damage if you have to use it against an enemy in Sburb but for now, it'll do.

You leave the empty milo tins on the floor to add to the pile. You'll probably make a cubby house out of them at some point. That's the best thing about having a huge pile of empty milo tins. The rest of the stuff you put back in your sylladex.

You take a look outside and observe the wonderful weather. No, it's not wonderful. Your in the middle of a very harsh storm. You love it. You love storms, especially ones with lightning. Not as much as batman or milo of course. You just like observing them. The best part? They can be pretty destructive at times. That's definitely a show you would watch anytime. You are wearing a comfortable pair of grey tracksuit pants and a long sleeve black top because of the storm. It's just too cold to wear your usual clothing choice of tank tops and shorts.

Your laptop screen flashes again, looks like the Sburb game is ready to play! You rush to your desk and are about to start playing when you remember the rest of your family are playing too. God damn it! Now you have to wait even longer! You better check if they're ready.

Message: Kira

Jacob: sis, have you downloaded the game yet?
Kira: oh crap, I forgot!
Jacob: oh my god! Just do it already! I'm getting tired of waiting.
Jacob: do you know if mum and dad have downloaded their files yet?
Kira: I haven't been able to get onto mum, she seems very busy today.
Kira: and dad is out in the garden trying to bring his plants in out of the storm.
Kira: wouldn't wanna lose all our delicious vegetables would we.
Jacob: what a shame that would be XD
Kira: anyway, I'll download the game. Right now. In a minute. In a while.
Jacob: now.
Kira: nope.
Jacob: now!
Kira: fine....

She'll do it eventually. In the meantime, you guess you'll draw something. You take your art diary out from your sylladex and place it on your desk, moving some other drawings out of the way. You take a pencil out from your pencil case and begin to draw a very detailed action picture of Batman.

He has beads of sweat down his forehead and all of his muscles are tensed. He is extremely focused on the thugs surrounding him. His teeth are clenched tightly and he holds a batarang in his hand. Damn it! A loud thunder clap made you jump and your hand slipped. Now batman has a line across his bat symbol. This will not do! You tear the page out of your art diary, open the window and chuck the picture out into the storm. If the thunder wants to screw with your drawing skills, it can have your pictures! You don't care... but that was a perfectly good batman drawing.