23 May 2012
Episode 1: The Beginning
It had been another normal day at school for 12-year-old Zorra Parre as he returned home, wearily dragging along his bruised body. Usually, his flaxen hair would have been shining, but after the day's events, it was a dirty brown, streaked with blood.
Beneath the grey trousers he was wearing were varied cuts and scratches seemingly covering his legs. Abandoned, a pair of earphones swung from side to side, at the pace of Zorra's walking, outside of his blazer pocket.
I look like a disgrace, Zorra thought to himself. What's my mum going to say? What's my mum going to do? I do keep trying to avoid it - but why does everyone have to pass to me?
And then he thought, I hate rugby.
Zorra had lost count after his third day of rugby how many times he'd been cut, bruised, scraped, studded, kicked, shoved, punched and thrown in the lessons. Zorra reckoned after almost 2 months of gruelling PE, he had suffered over 200 injuries.
At least there was cross-country. Zorra had found he was considerably faster than anyone in the school, let alone the form, even though he never pumped his arms to go faster. He had always felt speedier without having to swing his upper limbs around madly. Also, his body was much calmer when he ran, as if running was a habit.
Zorra knew that if he managed to incorporate his speed into his rugby, he would be able to dodge tackles much easier, score tries easier, and maybe get picked for a team. However, for some strange reason, he hadn't quite got the hang of it.
The only reason Zorra wanted to be in a team was to please his mother. It wasn't fun, it wasn't safe, but for the memory of his dead father and his mother's grief, he would do anything to please her.
Zorra turned into a small cul-de-sac and opened the gate to the first house on the left. Up on the attic window was a large sketch of Zoroark. Zorra smiled faintly. It was the one art project that had actually gone right for him. Looking at the picture made him realise that he wasn't just a useless kid with no life to follow. He could do something about his future.
Unzipping a pocket inside his blazer, Zorra retrieved his house keys and inserted the right one into the lock. Twisting to the right opened the door and Zorra stepped inside.
From the burning smell wafting out of the kitchen, Zorra could tell that his mother had been baking apple crumble for the hundredth time in a row. Zorra could understand her making it as it had been Zorra's dad's favourite meal, but completely ignoring the progression of the bake didn't really please her son.
Quickly kicking off his school shoes, Zorra rushed silently up the stairs, not wanting his mum to notice he was back. Her over-reactive greetings had begun to squeeze the life out of him. First of all, Zorra drained his bedside water bottle over his hair, to frantically remove the stains. Then, after rubbing his hair down with an exclusive Pokémon towel, he flopped down on his bed, opened his desk's middle drawer, and pulled out his 3DS. Flipping open the screen revealed his character in battle with Elite Four Caitlin. Grinning as he dispatched her Pokémon with waves of Night Dazes from his team of Zoroark, he thought about how lucky he had been to win an 'all events unlocked' game of Pokémon: White Version.
Suddenly, his door burst open. "Honey, dinner's ready!" a shaggy-haired brunette shouted through the wide doorway. "It's your favourite - apple crumble!"
"Mum, seriously," Zorra groaned. "I'm not dad and I'm not interested in burnt food. Go bother our neighbours or something."
His mother's face drooped, and Zorra realised how harsh his comment had been. "Sorry," he apologised. "I'm coming."
The head retracted away from the door and Zorra heard his mum skipping down the stairs, whistling to the tune of 'Daydream Believer' - her husband's favourite song.
Zorra sighed and closed his 3DS. He followed his mum into the kitchen and sat down at the table.
"Here it comes, honey," his mum trilled, handing him a large dollop of charcoal. "Eat up!"
Zorra stared at the bowl of indigestable crumble, and said, "Could I perhaps make a sandwich?"
But after a lot of persuasion from his mother, he took a bite. There was an immediate sensation in his stomach that told him to go to the restroom as quickly as possible. With only his hands to speak with as he gagged on the crumble, he gave a thumbs up to his mother, to keep her morale up, and rushed off.
After the event, Zorra carried on with the task of defeating Caitlin and Marshal. However, Marshal's Pokémon were't a pushover with his Fighting-type moves. Luckily, Zorra had a counter-attack placed on one of his Zoroark.
Zorra grinned wider as a few well-placed Aerial Aces decimated Throh, Sawk and Conkeldurr. But an unexpected Stone Edge hit with critical damage and sent his Zoroark's health reeling all the way to a 1-Hit KO.
Frustrated, Zorra returned his Zoroark and brought out his most powerful one from the ranks. Zorra took no chances as he first smashed with a Critical Hit Night Slash, and then destroyed Marshal's last Pokémon.
After skimming through the text, Zorra ran up something like 216 steps and reached the Champion's building. But when he got there, he found N. Having defeated the champion, N then summoned Team Plasma's castle. Zorra watched in awe as the huge barricade surrounded the Pokémon League and shot out millions of stsirs so N could enter.
Before disappearing up the stairs, N called for Zorra to follow and have a final battle with him. But Zorra was brought out of his trance by his mother, shouting, "Zorra! Get ready for bed!"
"Bedtime's at 8!" Zorra replied.
"And have you seen what the time is?" came the answer.
Zorra glanced at his watch. It said 7:14pm! How long had he been playing on the game?
"You do realise you got back home at half past five, don't you?" his mother said, as if reading his thoughts.
* * * * *
In the evening, after getting ready for bed and turning the lights off, Zorra lay in the dark, his mind whirring with thoughts. Mother's getting worse than ever, said one. I've got to get ready for tomorrow's cross-country race, said another. And yet another wandering thought was wondering, when will I get to battle the Champion?
* * * * *
Several minutes later, Zorra was asleep - however, someone else in his room wasn't.
"HQ to Shade," a voice crackled through a portable radio the size of a small bowl. "Subject No. 448 is OK?"
"You've asked me that question for the last two years as I lie under the floorboards," a black fox with a red-tipped tuft on its head, a short, puffy tail, and a slicked bundle of hair around its collar sighed, switching off his portable gamer and taking a fresh supply of food that had just been warped to his position. He bit hungrily into the Victoria Sponge cake and licked his lips free of jam.
"The kid hasn't stumbled anywhere near our entrance and has no idea we exist," he mumbled, grinning through another mouthful of his favourite snack. "And the mum's always in the kitchen, burning all the food." The fox sniffed. "It disgusts me."
"Leave the humans to their own problems," the other voice said. "Just concentrate on keeping an eye on the inhabitants." Then the voice cut out and left Shade alone again.
Shade took another ravenous munch on the half-eaten cake and grinned again. "No sweat," he said to himself.
* * * * *
It was Friday again, and that meant a double PE lesson in rugby. Zorra was not that excited as he walked through the pedestrian entrance to Greenvale School, his heavy bags weighing him down into the floor. Luckily, he did not have to go round to the large playground as the registration bell went immediately after he deposited his PE bag in his locker.
Lucky me, Zorra thought as he found his form room and the surrounding area empty. He walked in and sat down in the chair that enabled him to get out quickest. Picking a book from his mini library in his rucksack, he began to read.
A minute later, the form teacher, Mr. Racky, came in and sat down. Another minute later, nearly the whole of the class joined. And finally, another ten minutes later, the Terrors entered.
The Terrors were a gang that went around every day troubling people from all years in the school - stealing their money, physically bullying all sizes of kids, arguing endlessly with the teachers - the list went on. The gang was made up of five people - Martin Thatcher, Rick Barker, Toby Walker, James Eclean, and Nikolas McGall. They were all hated over the school.
Ever day, the Terrors targeted a particular student. And by the way they looked at Zorra as they came in, he knew he would be the day's victim.
At the end of Chemistry, he noticed the Terrors hanging out just by the exit. Zorra knew they were loitering around to wait for him. Sighing, he heaved his bag onto his shoulders and walked calmly out to face them.
Zorra opened the door as he would if he simply didn't expect anything bad to happen.
"Hey, Zork-dork," Martin called out. "Where d'ya think you're going?"
Zorra stopped and turned to say something about his name to Martin, but the others broke ranks and walked slowly around Zorra, surrounding him.
"I'm sure you know who we are," Martin continued. "But I think you need to be taught about our motives."
Zorra cringed, not at anticipating a painful time, but at the sheer rubbishness of Martin's sentences.
"Prepare for our introduction! ATTACK!"
* * * * *
Zorra let himself become buried under the gang. He knew there was no point in resisting - he was not strong enough. However, there was still one part of him that felt that he had to fight back. This part struggled to be released. And Zorra was the one who released it.
Zorra was immediately overcome by a strange feeling in his fist. He pulled it back as far as he could, and then flung it into the face of Rick. Rick suddenly recoiled,
ZOROARK::UNLEASHED • Opuss № I