~~ Chapter 1-A: The New World + 1 START! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I quickly swung my hand up to brush off the drop of sweat that had rolled from my forehead to my brow and, just as quickly, latched it back onto the pitch-black Xbox 360 controller. A flood of button commands swirled around in my brain, and over and over I would go, “Horizontal, horizontal, vertical, and back plus Y! Dash back, run forward, and double-back plus B! Yes! Yahoo!”

My name is Charlie Gunner, and I have been playing Soul Calibur IV incessantly for about fifteen hours, only stopping for bathroom breaks and nourishment. I was practicing on Kamikirimusi, as she is my best character and because she uses a kanabo. I found it humorous because, of all the characters on Soul Calibur IV, I am only good with the Special Characters (all of which are girls). After another victory against Algol, I yelled, “Yes! Mark another one up for Charlie Gunner, the #1 Kamikirimusi-user in the world!” and mimicked a large cheering crowd.

I got up from the couch, stretching my long, tooth-pick arms to the ceiling and tightening my chicken legs to loosen them up. I decided to go into the kitchen and grab a root beer, my “game fuel”, while making a pizza (again, for the fourth night in a row). As I looked through the window to the backyard, I noticed that the sky was getting darker and darker, “Must be a storm or something. Bah, who cares? I’m not going out today anyway.” Then it suddenly started raining and thundering, with the winds howling and smashing into the house.

As I went to sit down on the couch with my hot-n-ready pizza and root beer, I got a strange feeling that something was wrong, like my sixth sense was kicking in or something. As I sat down onto the couch, I just thought, “What’s there to worry about? It’s not like I’m gonna’ die or an-“

Before finishing that thought, I noticed that - even though my knees were bent to a near 45-degree angle, my ass had yet to have reached the seat. I turned his head around to see some kind of black-hole-ish-thing-a-ma-bob pulling my ass down into the couch! Frightened, I lost my balance and fell backwards into the hole, screaming profanities like it was the National Swearing Competition and I was going for the gold medal. There was an excessive force pressing onto me from all directions, like the Hole-In-A-Couch was trying to flatten me into the first human pancake ever. A single image fell upon my eyes, a bird’s eye view of a gigantic forest, and then I blacked out.

After a couple of hours, I regained consciousness, pulling my heavy eyelids apart with my fingers, which felt like leather. When I looked at my hands, I saw that I had a pair of leather gloves strapped firmly onto my hands. And it just gets weirder, I look at myself and find that my entire wardrobe had changed; even my underwear – my underwear – had been changed, but how? When? Why? And, God forbid, who?

My new shirt was flowing around my body, exposing my chest – my very white chest, mind you – and it had a white seam with black fabric and red flames on the edges. My pants were like those old bell-bottoms that your grandparents wore at the disco, except they were made of a smoother fabric and were a little more form-fitting than other pants I wore. And now, instead of my white New Balance sneakers, I had tabi for socks and wore those annoying wooden clogs that Japanese people wore way back when. I had a white headband strapped across my forehead and my hair was suddenly five times longer than it was before coming to this strange place!

I looked around; putting the entire tragedy of my now lost Stewie Griffin t-shirt behind in favor of a direr problem. There were trees, trees, more trees, some bushes that looked like trees, some trees that looked like bushes, and grass….This is definitely not my living room, nor my house, nor my hometown. My pupils practically shrunk inside my head and my eyes split wide open, “Where the $%^& am I!?” I started scouting around to find some sort of clue, a road sign, a traffic sign, a sign sign, anything!

I got desperate, “Hello,” I screamed, “is anyone out here! I’m in deep six, if you know what I mean!” I continued screaming for a while, making my voice hoarse and scratchy and my throat hurt. As I started thinking that it was hopeless, I began to hear footsteps. Civilization! Video games! I had been saved... Or so I thought.

A red-haired girl, wearing a very short kimono with leg bandages, had leapt from a nearby rock formation wielding an obscure, yet familiar, giant bat… Then it hit me, literally. She apparently did not look before she leapt, and apparently I had a giant target on my chest with a sign that had ‘Land Here’ written in bold print nailed to my forehead. As the girl flew into me, the two of us skidded across the ground and into an oak tree, knocking the wind out of me. As I cursed to myself, I noticed the red-haired girl had two little horn-like protrusions on her head, and this person seemed familiar to me, but where have I seen her?

A somewhat cold, feminine voice filled the air, “Come out, come out little girl. I won’t hurt you,” then her voice turned harsh and fiery, “I’ll just kill you!” And appearing from the dense foliage of the forest was a pale-skinned girl with green hair, wielding a… Hula hoop? “Wait a minute,” I thought, “isn’t that Tira? No, it couldn’t be…. But if she was, then that would mean…” I looked down at the horned girl as she raised her face. As I made eye-contact, my eyes nearly popped out of my head!

“Kamikirimusi!?!?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Chapter 1-A END! ~~

~~ Chapter 1-B: The Oni Girl + 1 START! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As Kamikirimusi raised her head, nearly touching mine, she said in defiance, “Listen you green freak! I just wanna’ be left alone, so leave me alone already! Damn your ‘master’, damn your intentions, and damn you!” She grabbed her giant bat and lifted it into a gonna-kick-your-ass kind of stance - or, typically called, the Nightmare Stance - and sprinted at Tira with a blood-lust roar. Tira's face became very friendly as she nimbly dodged Kami's bat and swung the blade, slicing her across the side. Kami winced in pain, but she still tried to hit Tira until her wounds caught up to her. All the time, lil' Ol' Charlie Gunner was just staying far away, not wanting to get involved, but at the same time I couldn't just stay away, I had to be close-by.

The bat was suddenly knocked out of Kami's hands and it bounced over to the tree I was hiding behind, causing me to somewhat shriek in surprise. Kami was on the ground, panting heavily, while Tira stood over her with a giant Joker grin planted on her face. Just as quickly, Tira's face went from super-dooper happy to cold-and-devilish mad, "I'll end your pathetic life, you worthless oni-girl." As she raised her hoop-blade for the killing blow, something overtook me, I felt as though I had to do something, anything, to help Kami out of her bind. I popped out from behind the tree and made a mad-dash for the bat, thinking along the way "Can I even lift this damn thing?", but when I grabbed the bat, I lifted it effortlessly.

I didn't know how I would help her, but I had to try - as crazy as it sounded - to defeat Tira. I swung the bat to my left side and held it tight for a power swing and began to run at the two warrior girls. As Tira's blade reached the peak of it's attack, I screamed, "Back the hell off, you crazy, bi-polar, goth-loli bitch!"

Tira's scowl turned into a look of surprise, "What the-?" I swung, as hard and fast as he could, the giant kanabo and struck Tira on her side. Then, with some kind of super-human-adrenal-crazy-kung-fu-wolf-bitch strength, I - lil' Ol' Charlie Gunner - managed to lift her off the ground and send Tira flying far away, hopefully unconscious, into the forest. I dropped the kanabo onto the ground, collapsing onto my hands and knees with incessant panting.

I heard heavy breathing behind me, and I remembered the reason I was in this situation: Kamikirimusi! I looked around to see Kamikirimusi trying to grasp her kanabo and pull away from me. Without missing a beat, I grabbed her hand and said, "Whoa there, you shouldn't be movin' that much, especially with all those wounds you got." Kami shot him a cold look.

She took a deep breath, "YOU IDIOTIC MORTAL!" I grabbed both my ears and yipped in pain. She slowly stood up, wincing and panting as she did so, digging her kanabo into the ground as a support, "Why did you get involved? Why would a human help me?" She turned away, "Get out of here, human, don't poke fun at me, or I'll kill you." As she tried to stumble away from me, a familiar hand - once again, to her dismay - grabbed her left shoulder.

Her head spun around to see me with a serious look on my face, "Listen, Kami, I'm not gonna' leave just because you feel grumpy. Besides, I can't leave you with all these wounds, I gotta' help somehow. Here," and, with that, I pulled some kind of acrobatic maneuver to pull her onto my back, "there we go. This will make things easier for both of us."

Kami had a confused look on her face, "What are you doing?"

I simply smiled, "What does it look like I'm doin'? I'm givin' you a piggy-back ride, Kami."

Kami sighed, "No, not that. I mean, what are you doing helping someone like me?"

I just kept smiling, "Well, there are three reasons: (1): You're hurt, (2): You're alone."

Kami counted on her fingers, "But, that's only two reasons. What's the third?"

And I kept that genuine smile going strong, "And, (3): You're cute."

Kami's face blushed for some reason, I don't know. I could tell she was feeling faint from the blood loss, "Hey, if you're tired, just lay your head on my shoulder, ok?" She had a slight grin as her head lowered, she had fell asleep before her head even grazed my shoulder.

I didn't know where I was or what I was doin' giving a piggy-back ride to an oni-girl who I know could kick my ass, but I decided not to worry about it. If there's a way home, then I'll find it, eventually... I hope... Oh dear God, what have I gotten myself into!?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Chapter 1-B END! ~~