By: M Monroe Casey
Introduction
“Hey C…” A cautious and confused Monica quizzically muttered as she walked into the kitchen.
“Yeah, Mon?”
“I think we might have missed something with the whole shockwave/ wish/ Goddess clash thing…”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I think Marche wasn’t the only one who jumped through history. I think there was a ‘7th wisher’ that we never noticed. I just got done watching the full project of ‘Santi & Bubbles’ and sweetheart… I think you are going to want to see this too…”
Bringing her fellow pajamas-wearing love into the viewing room, they sat on Mt. Couch then began to watch the earlier moments of Bubble’s childhood. The moments before Cal’s hood turned on the Windowsill.
The recorded but previously unseen moments.
She was moving, living and breathing. She was still almost a teen and pretty friendly overall.
All of that was the same and true.
But she wasn’t on Surnor and it wasn’t 1982.
From New York City’s Upper Manhattan in the year 2026, Bubbles was a pretty typical preteen. Bored with most things and super interested in and into a game. It wasn’t necessarily even a popular one. Called Six Point Stars, she found a deck or two in a random card shop on a random street she doesn’t even remember anymore but it was now a once random day that she will never forget.
Mastering the game quickly, she became pretty obsessed with it and wanted others to play it too. Trying to spread the word about how great those bombardments and cards were.
Even developing her own piece of unique technology called the Power Amplifier, Bubbles was looking to champion the game that she grew to love as she traversed up, down and across the city. Looking to challenge any and all who stood in her way.
She was strong but fair and all who played the game began to understand just that.
She was the player with the Gods. The Gods who went boom.
Simply known as, The Goddess of Boom.
But on chilly April night, she was playing late night with her friends when she was walking back before her 12-year-old curfew of 9 PM EST. There was a light rain on the foggy city streets but she walked briskly still. She had to get home to Yo! Girls Need a Place to Sleep? Orphanage and Bird Sanctuary because she absolutely couldn’t be late again. Sister Helga would not be so forgiving the second time.
Traversing ahead, she just wished more people could understand how much this game shaped her life. Before it, she was kind of awkward, kind of quiet. She liked games but could never talk to anyone about it. Some friends but nothing new. No new experiences or grand adventures. Just a pretty average life honestly.
That was all true until she accidentally found herself wishing when the legendary shockwave ripples of Abby-Addison “Giggles” Dawson Effect graced her presence as it shattered through space and time. Coming from 2023, it hit her then and as it did, her wish to bring the game she loved to the whole universe was about to fully take shape.
Blinking her eyes with a yelp and then opening them again, her amber eyes looked upon a completely different planet with wonder. Vast prairies with small nestles of trees were going for as far and as long as she could see. The cards she collected with her though and as Bubbles looked around at Surnor in 1954, she knew that nothing would ever be the same again.
Watching all of this with a strong and intense gasp, CJ and Monica watched on as Bubbles accidentally spread the game across the Outer Ring. Miraculously barely aging through the mysterious effects of interplanetary travel, it was whole decades before she met Santi. Adopted into a nice family from a small and modest new orphanage, Bubbles began her new life there. Fully ready to start over on this strange but nice planet.
Seeing how these events lead this new game to becoming the “law of the land,” they saw her friendship with a fellow newcomer to town, a Doenca who would later be known as Doubtanian.
Then, they watched it all apart.
His rise to power through the game she taught him and how he abused that power for his own. Spreading the game even further with his newfound celebrity and cruelty.
Leaving her all alone and friendless again.
But it was in that emptiness and darkness, she was saved by a mysterious “angel” one day. One who would take her on an adventure across the Cosmos. An adventure whose memory she would later hold onto forever.
Hailing from parts unknown but later identified as Pyroclastia, Santiago the II or Runner Doenca entered her life when it was near the lowest and helped spark it back to life. Showing her that new friends weren’t all bad and she could trust again. That she really wasn’t an idiot for believing in any of that.
But sadly, not all good things can last.
Her Santi spark was snuffed out on this journey, literally glitterized in front of her and it was all far too abrupt for one to “take it lightly.” As the summary of this project forecasted. The title, “Potential Villain Brewing.”
With a ding, their four eyes saw a brand new update for her folder and knew it was time to see just where her storyline continued after the epic and massive standoff with Dr. Chuck Smith. With the whole “Santi & Bubbles” story completed now, the puzzle pieces were finally beginning to take even more shape and design as they hit the button once more on their remote.
Click.
Part One
“SAAAAAAAAAAAAAANTI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
She screamed his name so loudly it woke herself up yet again.
With a grumble as she wiped the dried tears from her amber eyes away, she then tied her hair back of the same shade and proceeded to exit her tent. Camping on the southern edge of the beach on Atala City on the Catalina Sea, she looked across the vastness and sighed. All the stars were out above and the tranquil, nearly endless blue ocean moved softly in front of her but she felt nothing still. A deep chasm of nothing but a haunting sadness and a pity for any soul who crosses her now.
Grabbing her Power Amplifier and her deck of cards, a 1984 dwelling Bubbles began to pack up the tent with her usual five hours of sleep. It seems like that’s all she could get nowadays before the images rushed back to her. Seeing him fade away in front of her very eyes in a poof of golden glitter.
Over and over again, she saw this happen. Roughly about five or six hours into every time she tried to rest. She was tired but knew it wasn’t time to quit. It’s been over one year of this but it wasn’t over. She couldn’t just go home now. The nightmares still kept her up and she knew they still would.
Everyday until she found the real one responsible.
With her backpack back where it belongs, she continued north on the beach, towards the vast and bustling city ahead. With the moments from the 1666’s future playing out, Bubbles was continuing her Six Point warpath through the milky white stone city’s streets. Letting her bombardments and resent fly.
“I declare bombardment!!!!!”
As the third hit was delivered to yet another sad soul who lost to her, they cried out for mercy but she ignored it and took her prize anyways. Grabbing their deck of turtles, she won the ante and continued on. The decks she was collecting were merely just a fun way to satisfy her anger a little bit. She actually already got what she really wanted from that most recent “card game losing loser.”
She could track it all like a simple trajectory in her mind.
First, she held onto and honored his Knights still. But that wasn’t an ante. No, it was her merely protecting her best friend’s legacy. Santi was gone but she will protect his memory with every last bit of her strength. No matter what. She would honor him but not all of the “losers” from her past.
In one seemingly long ago day, she hunted down and claimed the decks from those two pitiful losers from before.
Mizzou Cuse and LC Mav. The deck of fish and the one of birds.
Then, she had to collect more while she found all of that information that led her back here.
Even hunting down Fer and Camila, it seemed very little were safe from her wrath. In total, there was the deck with the law cards then came voting, home, zombies, sharks and boots. All of them lay defeated at the heel of her black boots. All of them laid to gaming waste. Them and even more.
All of those bombardments declared led her to this turtle player and this player led her to what she needs now.
She finally knows where he is.
It was time to return to Sololi.
With a smirk and intense look in her eyes, she continued on down towards the building and the sign that she remembered seeing before.
“Portals. Random. Cheap.”
With a devious chuckle, she knew that she was going to get somewhere much less random for much much cheaper. They just needed a little push and hopefully not lose too fast. She was feeling a bit intense today and she wanted to have some fun. Opening the front door, she walked inside the small and humble one-room white clay building.
Holding her silver metallic ball-shaped Power Amplifier and the necessary cards for use at the ready, Bubbles made eye contact with the shopowner, and smiled.
Part Two
The newest portal opened then abruptly closed as she walked through. Another deck collected in the process. A black leather jacket on with black leather pants to match, her outside matched the inside now too. With each and every last hit she delivered, she noticed something.
Her deep anger wasn’t subsiding.
It wasn’t being satisfied.
It only intensified.
Smirking with this new “fun” feeling, she approached the tall, dark wooden creature on the end of this cave-like workshop. Deep underneath the “Mountain Planet,” the core of Sololi’s main resident was unsuspecting of the ill-wishing visitor that approached him now. Adirondack merely still tinkered away on the plans for a new creation.
Sure, he created the Windowsill that watched him now for the High Goddess and her lover.
Sure, he also created the other recording Windowsill for that lover’s sister and her Pyroclastian Prince.
But without a Windowsill of his own now, there was no way for him to know what came next. The “card gamed” danger that was about to unfold. The Characters, Concepts and Locations that were beginning to set up his very own undoing.
Walking through the smoldering orange and red room, Bubbles quietly approached him. Her mind summarizing the wild and very improbable journey here. For both her and all the Cosmos.
Since she last battled Chuck in Nuevas Amigas with the others, the game of Six Point Stars had undergone a bit of a transformation. Being more widely adopted across the planets, it had its greatest surge of popularity, with some small rule and name changes, which naturally came after Marche Tadala returned and changed everything as they knew it. Shattering what used to be entirely.
It took a few years but eventually, violent war seemed to fade away into nothingness. Becoming a cheap and pointless idea of the “old past.”
Guns, bombs and other forms of weapons were untouched and eventually, they ceased to be made entirely.
Now, also thanks to a certain timeline shatterer that merely required looking into a mirror to see, all of those across the Cosmos solved their conflicts and social hierarchies in one way and one way alone. It was the bombardments delivered to the hit total of any and all opponents. The game spread around life exactly like she always wanted. It was now the “law of the land” in every land. No more traditional war. Only battle through games.
Those white and black texted cards, their Power Amplifier and diverse strategies had become all which her and the Meritocratic Republic of Unistan had once hoped for. From their humble beginnings on Earth to where it is now, it has truly come a long way because it finally wasn’t just the Outer Ring now that cared about the national game of her other home planet, Surnor. From the other Princes of Pyroclastia to the Goddesses underneath the High Goddess herself, they each rocked a deck and intended to use it to the best of their ability to protect all they love.
But with the Gods in her possession, Bubbles looked to do something far less noble as she approached closer now, an angry string of vocals then escaped her angsty form.
“So… so… so… the legends are trueeee… it is you… finally… I found you.”
Turning around, the brighter green eyes of Adirondack looked upon her with a bit of confusion and a little fear.
“Secret place. New soul. Explain yourself,” responded the vocally limited mysterious being.
Made from a piece of the recently defeated “Murder Tree,” Adirondack split off from the group a long time ago though as he sought to create his own path. Creating wooden art and magical relics that could help the beings of the Cosmos connect more and more. Forming the Windowsill first for the High Goddess, he created another one for Veronica and Marche, knowing that the Cosmos needed even more “guardian angel coaches” for what was coming next.
His kin arriving from the sky was only the beginning to just what Crowopolis falling meant for all of life.
It was about to get much much worse before it got better.
But Bubbles wasn’t concerned about the impending dark days for the entire Cosmos ahead, only the sweet taste of a selfish revenge and her new brand of strict justice.
“You knew… you knew this would ALL happen… you have had to know to make those tools for the others. Buuuuut… those silly little windowsills can’t help you know… nothing can… so, now, it’s time for my prediction… YOU WILL FEEL MY WRATH AND I WILL LOVVVVEEEE DESTROYING YOU. So… prepare… yourself…”
“I knew? Windowsill shows. I see.”
“That’s all you can say?! You knew all of that happened. All of that injustice, all that pain, all that suffering and you did nothing…”
With a smirk on his wooden face, Adirondack replied, defending his honor, “Not me. You did. Your chaos.”
Feeling the same judgement from Camila in only what felt like yesterday, her patience was much lower now as she angrily yelled back. No friends or family to help guide her. What started first as a nice journey to honor her friend turned sour so fast with the assistance of those seemingly endless nightmares. Between those and the solitary lifestyle, it was no wonder she almost forgot who old Bubbles even was at this point. Verging on a point of no return, she replied.
“WHAT ARE YOU EVENNNNN TALKING ABOUT?!”
“So obvious. Your choices. Your chaos.”
“Me causing chaos?! You knew all of this was happening and DID NOOOTHING… you knew this Marche guy did all of this and you still let Santi disappear… you stood idly by because it’s not your fight and it’s someone else’s problem. I know your legend. You simply made the tool and nothing more. So, clearly, you don’t think you are responsible but to me, you are the ONLY ONE RESPONSIBLE! You are the ultimate bystander AND the ultimate coward!!!!!”
Sensing the fight ahead, Adirondack reached for his deck of thirty-two cards and his Power Amplifier as well. Offering a retort almost immediately as he gripped them both in his long and thin wooden fingers, “Vengeance corrupts. More anger. Another path.”
“Yeah… I know there are other paths but… I reeeeeally don’t care about them right now…”
Placing her shuffled deck of cards into the open slot in front of her on the Power Amplifier, the moment she was waiting for had finally come.
Intensely staring at her opponent, she drew her six cards and yelled the normal customary phrase with a much stronger and newfound sense of hostility.
“IT’S ON!!!!!!!!!”
Part Three
Bubbles looked down at her opening hand of cards, analyzing some choices.
Seeing The God of Pure Evil, The God of Protection, The God of Lighthouses, The God of Turkey Bacon, The God-Slaying Coliseum and The God of Serenity amongst them, she decided to play it more safely.
“I will play The God of Protection and The God of Lighthouses for a total of 25 power. Then, I’ll play my Location, The God-Slaying Coliseum. Go. Ahead.”
Playing The Knight Adirondack Tree of Doom from his elongated and wooden fingers, Adirondack smirked at his opponents much lower “weight.” His bombardment was far larger by over 75 points from this one Character so it was clear she was merely all talk.
Muttering in the dimly lit battleground, Adirondack declared his bombardment but the tricky styles of her “God-Slaying” Location proved to be just above his limited understanding of the game.
“Using the power of my Location, I’ll raise the power of The God of Lighthouses on my field by the one of Pure Evil in my hand. Raising my lighted one ALL THE WAY TO ONE THOUSAND!!!”
Watching in horror as the unfiltered energy power of his one character was absorbed into the Power Amplifier and hurled at his opponent for nothing short of vanity, only his field was left decimated.
Going for a defensive route now, he played his character limit of 4 spots with The Queen Adirondack Tree of Doom, The King Adirondack Tree of Doom, The Princess Adirondack Tree of Doom and The Lady Adirondack Tree of Doom for a total of 1,050 power.
Ending his turn then with the hit deficit against him, Bubbles had all 3 but he now was reduced to 2. It was one full turn in and he was already losing.
If he could just find one of those cards in his deck, he could maybe turn the tides in his favor.
He just needed to draw better.
Not having this same problem, Bubbles drew 3 new cards to make up for the 3 she played and still possessed.
Playing a new card, The God’s Great Hooded Land Snake, she merely offered a question to him as she then called upon her Location to raise her The God of Protection to the same power as The God of Pure Evil in her hand. Then, with a smirk, she activated her newest pet’s effect. Doubling the power of The God of Protection to 2,000, it was clear what was happening now. She was looking to deliver the offensive now. It was time to at least try to satisfy her anger.
“How can you justify what you have done? How can you EVVVVVVEN be okay with your own cowardly existence?”
“I build. Only that. My role,” believing his justification was enough, Adirondack watched on with a growing concern though as it seemed her deck was much more finely tuned for destruction than he thought.
“That’s it?! YOU… ARE… SOOOOOOO WEAK!!!! I DECLARE BOMBARDMENT!!!!!!!!”
Launching another massive amount of energy from her Power Amplifier, Bubbles’s weight of her massive amount of power crashed through his defenses and delivered the second hit to him.
Both of their fields were eradicated in the process.
With the score now being Bubbles: 3 and Adirondack: 1, it was riding more and more on this next big draw. He could remove 5 cards from his discard from the game and it would allow him to gain 1 hit back but he couldn’t risk losing his best attacking cards. Just in case. If he found the right combo, it wouldn’t matter that he could do that. He could raise his hit total up and return his cards from the discard. He was going to draw 5 new cards this next turn, the odds were in his favor. It just had to be, right?
He just needed one particular Location and/or a few other combos.
He could do this.
Skipping his chance to do that optional move, he decided to draw instead.
Reaching for his facedown deck with a trust to his wooden brethren he represented, Adirondrack grabbed the 5 necessary cards for that new turn he was starting.
Looking upon them with an intense stare, his bright green eyes began to read the names, The Flower that Shines in the Doom, The Hollow’s Guardian who found Smooth Stone (of Doom), The Transplanter of the Doom Forest, The Worshipper of the Doom Tree and The Friend of the Doom Forest.
Part Four
Not seeing a single card he needed amongst them, only Characters with power levels were found. It was truly only a slew of weak offensive cards and nothing more.
His deck’s delicate balance let him down on this hallowed day as the panic then began to overtake his thoughts.
I didn’t draw them. I can’t increase our hit totals or finish it after she reaches 6. Noooo…
Not playing anything because he knew exactly how this would play out, Adirondack’s turn ended almost as quickly as it started.
Unfortunately the card that was still in her hand, the same one that has been slowly messing him up this entire time, could easily overpower every last card of his.
Taking up the command of the match, Bubbles drew for her turn then paused before she acted promptly.
“I know what it probably seems like… Anyone seeing my story will think the same thing… ‘Oh… she barely knew Santi… they were only friends and connected for a few months and that’s it. Why can’t she just move on?’ Yes, I know what they will think but they do NOT know my pain! THOSE LOSERS WHO TOOK HIM FROM ME HAVE NOOOOOO IDEA!!!!!”
Staring back at her without a response, the clear winner of this match hammered in the last point before her last bombardment would do the same.
“Our time with someone doesn’t determine how close we are. It’s something undefined. Almost like two stars connected across the universe. Destined to meet. Maybe they fade away from each other or maybe THEY ARE STOOOOOOOLEN AWAY. LIKE HE WAS FROM MEEEEEE… But none of that matters now. Old Past or 1666, it simply doesn’t matter within either… my vengeance WILLLLL be swift and THEY WILL FEEL MY WRATH!!!!! ALL OOOOOOOF THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
Finally responding as she slowly reached to push the “Bombardment Button” on her Power Amplifier, Adirondack asked the burning question for all of those watching, “Very lost. New enemy? And Them?”
Pushing the button with a smirk, she softly and intensely replied in the quiet and tense space.
“Not a new enemy but… yes. Them. Every. Last. Coward. That. Ever. Justified. Doing. Nothing… Cowards like you. Cowards across the Cosmos. Them and all the weak-boned simpletons who want and pursue nothing more than hurting those weaker than them. Every. Last. Cowardly. Fool. Stuck. In. The. Idea. Of. Status. And. Power… AND. THE. OTHER. COWARDS. WHO. DO. NOT. STOP. THEM… Shall. Pay.”
“I see. Your want. Absolute justice.”
Gripping onto the ball now, the Power Amplifier then began to source the energy itself from the cards in play, adding in the new The God of Pure Evil on her field to the overall ridiculously high point total. Completely unnecessary but oh so fun for her.
Heaving like the great baseball legends of Earth, she then said the customary phrase of attack as she swept through Adirondack’s deck, not taking a single hit in return.
With the explosion knocking him off his feet, Bubbles stood across from him. Disdain in her amber eyes of war. Her all-black outfitted self slowly then strutted across the small workshop.
Claiming the deck from her defeated opponent, she began to walk away from him, towards the other end of the room. Placing it in a wooden box she carried with her, along with her own, she didn’t bother closing it fully yet though. They were secured and any fool who tried to take them from her now would regret it pretty quickly.
With each deck banded together but still loose in the box, she kept it like that. Loose until she wanted to maybe try them out on some poor and unsuspecting soul.
While claiming the first free ride here, she also defeated the assistant manager of the business, winning another deck in the process and stealing another free ride out too.
This next one would be a random portal though because it didn’t matter where she went now. Maybe she would go to Pyroclastia or Tirado. Honestly, maybe even going back to Earth could be a good place to start next.
But all that really mattered was she kept it going.
Just keep winning and bringing the “bombardments of justice” to those who truly deserved it.
Walking towards the new silvery lined portal ahead, a single comment resounded in the sad energy filled room of smoke and defeat.
“Impossible journey. Another player. The heir.”
Stopping in her tracks, about one meter away from where she just did battle, Bubbles took the bait and questioned him back, “the heir?”
“Hmmm yes. The heir. The greatest.”
“Hmmf… they can’t be that great. I haven’t even heard of them before…”
“They hear. They know. The voice.”
“What?”
“Their path. Their bridges. Their crown.”
“Okay?”
“Voice beyond. Gollaknor rises. Glen Falls.”
“Whatevvvver. It doesn’t even matter who they are. I’ll just beat them too…” Not looking down through the thick and billowing black smoke that filled the room, the fed-up and angsty 13-year-old Bubbles rolled her eyes then promptly stepped with her left foot on the small pool of condensation dripping down from above.
Stumbling forward towards the portal, every last deck she spent the last year or so collecting, then was quickly and abruptly launched out of the unsecured box and swallowed up by the magical transportation device.
Screaming in both anger and panic, Bubbles then charged in after them without a single moment of hesitation.
Following the cards to a destination and a new adventure unknown.
The End
Castle Johnson Publishings 