Father & Son 5: Shards Of A Color Drained World

The Beginning Of The End

"This is only the beginning. The beginning of the end."

Purple's heart dropped as they all stared out into the open sky, Orchid's dark voice echoing out across the city. Dark clouds rolled in that almost seemed grayer than usual.

Purple noted that as weird before telling everyone to start evacuating before things got worse.

Almost as everyone started moving, dully colored pillars began shooting out of the ground.

"Shit!" Chosen started blasting fireballs, not even caring about the weird looks people from the city gave him.

Dark grabbed Purple and ducked into an alleyway, ushering for Chosen to follow them as crowds began to form.

"We've gotta find an easy way out of here before anything else bad decides to happen." Dark said to himself.

"How can we do that? We've lost everyone else in the giant crowd, so how can we get back to the desktop without getting caught?" Chosen asked.

"What about that...the gateway through the widget we always use? King and the others are obviously using the nether portal to get there faster, so why can't we use that?"

"purple makes a point...HOLY SHIT CHOSEN LOOK!" Dark pointed down at the street.

It was turning gray.

"Run. Run!" Chosen quickly ushered the two out of the small alleyway, where the city looked ten times worse.

The color gray quickly began creeping on them, and Chosen watched as people who were unfortunate to end up stuck in it's wrath were frozen.

"Holy fuck. We've gotta get to the cliffs. Fast."

"Uhm...Cho? Slight issue with Purple's plan." Dark pointed up at the sky.

IP addresses slowly started going dark. Alan's address quickly joined them.

"Shit."

"Plan B: Get to King's house before this reaches it." Chosen suggested.

"Can't. It's in the direction of the Gray Death." Dark said.

"Damn it. To the Outernet then!"

A pink blur rushed past them, catching them off guard.

"Where do you think you're going?" Orchid sneered, an evil smirk plastering her face.

"Fuck."

"Okay, everyone here?" Second gasped out once they got out of the city.

"I...think so?" Green asked, staring at the city quickly turning gray.

"Hold up...Purple and the two other hollow-heads. They're missing!" Gold noticed.

"Shit. Spread out and find them. They've gotta be here somewhere." Second ordered. Green and the others quickly started filtering through the large crowd of residents, searching for the kids.

"How could this have happened?" King asked.

"I don't know, but the first order of business is regrouping and making sure we can get to the desktop safely. Second order, stopping Orchid once and for all."

"Right."

King stared out into the city. "Maybe they're still in there."

Second looked at him. "We should go look."

"Mom, why are you doing this?!" Purple asked furiously.

"Making up for the sins of our family that you brought upon us, you little brat!" Orchid snapped.

Purple tried not to let it get to him.

"None of this will ever be your fault."

"It's not your fault."

"Guess it's all I'm good for, huh?" Purple shot back. "Bringing shame to the family name?"

Chosen and Dark saw right through it.

The goddamn genius.

Orchid, although not expecting Purple to start playing along, continued. "Yeah, exactly what you're good for. Bringing shame to the family name, disappointing your father and I?"

Chosen and Dark smirked at each other. She was falling for it.

"You know it's all your fault your father abandoned us."

"It's not your fault it's not your fault it's not your fault." Echoed in Purple's head like a mantra, and he'd been told it long enough for him to actually start believing it.

"Oh, is it now?"

"It was all your fault. You know you're nothing without us. You're weak, and good for nothing. You never were, and never will be good enough for your father. And you'll-"

"GET AWAY FROM THEM!"

Purple snapped out of the trance Orchid's words had put him in as Second smacked the woman with a pole he had found on the ground.

King further brought him back to reality by grabbing his hand. "Come on, let's get outta here!"

Second jumped back down and ran after them, Chosen and Dark following suit.

King sighed with relief internally. Thank goodness his kid wasn't hurt.

Sure, Purple was a little dazed, but otherwise unharmed when they got out of the city.

"You alright, Purple?" He asked anyway.

"Yeah...yeah, I'm fine."

"What the hell was that about?" Second asked.

"Orchid tried bringing Purple into her reality, and failed horribly." Chosen said.

"That's because I've been told the opposite of her statements long enough. I'm not stupid, which they haven't realized yet." Purple said, softening at King's hold.

"Well, no shit. They obviously know your biggest fear is still not being good enough for King." Second reminded.

"They don't know that." Purple said.

"Nice work, kid." King patted Purple's head.

"What are we gonna do about her, though?" Chosen asked. "She sucked the life out of the city!"

Dark stared down at the cliff side. "And it won't be long until she sucks the life out of the rest of the outernet." He said.

"We've gotta think of something, fast."

"There's an entire ocean we can explore?" Blue suggested.

"Maybe they've got a base far outside the city. We might be able to locate that."

"Well, we've gotta drive her away from the city first. Before she sucks the life out of the people here."

"She can do that?!" Blue exclaimed.

"Did you not see the numerous frozen statues of people that weren't able to escape her power?" Chosen deadpanned.

"Nah, I was busy running for my life."

"Of course you were."

Dark turned to Gold. "You and your friends will stay here and help the people here, while the rest of us return to Alan's PC, or try to, and figure out a plan there."

"Got it."

"Chosen, figure out a way to get to the PC. We've got villains to stop, and we're not about to let them get to us."