Lights Out

Percy isn't a huge fan of thunderstorms. Not for the usual reasons, but because the rain hisses and stings against the lava that makes up his body. Here though, inside the building, there's nothing to fear. Not from the rain, anyways.

So when the lights go out, Percy is calm. His body glows very faintly with red-orange light and watches as Parish begins to organize a group to fix the generator. "Would you like any help?" he asks. "I may not be staff, but I am pretty handy!"

Soon, Percy is officially invited to join the mission. As he lumbers to the entrance and peers down into the darkness he begins to feel uneasy. Stairs don't normally stretch down into infinity, right? But Percy offered to help, and there's no way he's going back on his word now! His body shifts uneasily, then settles into burning resolve: Percy will not let a little darkness spook him!

"Beginnings are always delightful; the threshold is the place to pause," Goethe said. So Parish does so in the open door to the basements. Wide stone steps spiral down into the rooms beneath the B&B. It was pretty tame compared to the rocky tunnels that led into the Nome King's mountain fortress or the Caves of Destiny that would show your future for those brave enough to face them.

Still, this is a quest and people are counting on him. Parish found himself smiling with a greater spring in his step than usual. "I am pleased to have any boon companion aid with the task." Parish invites Percy and any other to join him. Once his band of heroes is assembled, Parish strides boldly down the stairs.

Amelie had been idling in the corner of the room when the power went off. They'd also had most of their systems shut down, with little else to do and the place mostly cleaned up where humanly possible. Or not humanly possible, robotically possible? So when things blinked out and their emergency mode kicked in, they were slightly out of it. If possible, they were what humans might describe as groggy or half asleep.

It took some time for their programming to boot up in emergency mode. Ironic, really. Yazeba had intended to look into that, as she always intended to look into everything but never did. Emergency mode activated so rarely, after all, that they never really needed it to be resolved. Now though, it would've been nice.

Amelie discovered some candles and offered them around to the questing party. They could see in the dark, with their headlamps, so they didn't need any. They made sure everyone had what they were looking for, and then set off with Parish. With any luck, they'd keep their footing. Their motor functioning hadn't come back properly, yet, and the stairs were very steep.

Neutron Gal was their favorite thing ever, they had seen every movie, every episode and had a whole lot of the toys. Hey Kid was standing ready to shout the catchphrase and then, right then the power went out. "Noooo! Come on!"

They shook the TV a few times but that didn’t work and apparently the rest of 5he power was out too. Hey Kid was upset and they wanted everything fixed. So, when they saw a party gathering to go down into the basement to fix the power they decided to jump right in. They practically hopped with excitement, "I’ll come, oh oh, pick me. I’m not afraid of nothin. I’ll be like Nuetron Gal and pew pew anything scary."

Sal stared down at the piece of paper he had been writing some lyrics onto. He had moved from the front desk once the storm had really gotten going, since there was no chance they'd have another guest in this weather. Instead, he had the opportunity to work on his latest song. It had been a week, and he still hadn't found the right rhyme to follow "under all this pressure". He took a candle from Amelia, but it was no good--it was too difficult to write, hold the paper against his knee and keep the candle steady. He usually found writing in the rain quite peaceful, but this kind of booming thunder made it hard for him to hear the melody in his own head.

He looked up as Parrish. Sal wasn't afraid of the dark, but after the incident with the witch...well, it didn't bear thinking about. It was enough to say he was a little cautious of deep dark basements. Still, with others following, he would feel bad leaving them to do the hard work. And who knew, maybe doing something that scared him would knock some lyrics loose.

"I'll come!" Sal called, getting up from his seat and following the little band of compatriots out of the living room.

With Percy, Amelie, Hey Kid, and Sal following in his wake, Parish boldly leads the way down into the foreboding basement...And it would seem that the frog-knight's confidence and bluster pays off! Almost immediately upon entering the labyrinthine complex beneath the Bed & Breakfast, you come upon the fuse box. Parish was sure the emergency generator was being stored here... but it is nowhere to be found.

Getting the lights back on will not be so easy!

"Ah yes, this seems familiar. Should be just around this corner!" Parish announces as he turns said corner into a storeroom full of boxes and crates. The confident smile skips from his face as he scans the room. "By my troth, I was sure it was here." He murmurs. Spying the fusebox, he springs up onto a nearby crate and prods the door open with the handle of his room. He inspects the tangle of connections and announces. "Well this confirms our problems come from without. We must continue our search."

Hey Kid follows softly singing a song as they go along, "Neutron Gal, she's the best, Neutron Gal, saves the rest. Power and fury, righteousness and flame..." This is actually fun an adventure even!

Parish finds the fuse box but not the generator. She jumps right up where Parish was and copies them, opening the fuse box the same way Parish did. Then Hey Kid also looks through the fuses and says, "Yep, yep that confirms it. Our problems come from without. We must continue our search."

As Hey Kid takes the lead, you press on through a series of dank, gloomy cellar rooms. Spiders and other less identifiable shapes skitter through the shadows.

Ahead, you spy a musty coffin. Hey Kid peeks inside, revealing a cackling dracula, with sharp fangs and nothing better to do than to scare you! "Bwah ha ha!" the dracula cackles, leaping out and wiggling his fingers. "BooOOooOO!" He hisses and bares his fangs!

"Ahhhh!" Hey Kid cowers as the dracula keeps coming by to scare them silly.

Percy is so intent on searching that he nearly misses the dracula situation. He is bound and determined to make himself useful, and trails behind Hey Kid's rapid pace to complete a much more thorough investigation of every nook and cranny in the impossibly large basement. His ashy skin is a network of shifting cracks, like tectonic plates, which allow the light of his inner lava to project snaking patterns on the walls around him.

"Not here," he mutters to himself as he checks an unusually large closet. "Hmm, not here either," he continues happily as he peers into a large vat of what may once have been wine. The act of searching is almost meditative. And better yet, the scale of the basement utterly dwarfs his large, awkward body. It's easy to pretend he's human-sized here, with the correct body plan to interact with the world without bumping into the clutter of furniture and knick-knacks humans insist on filling their lives with. So, ignoring the screams from above, Percy remains in this transcendent moment where his purpose is clear and his body is right for the task.

As Percy revels in mundanity, thunder shakes the foundations of the house, a reminder that there is still a storm raging outside!

KRAKKA-THOOM!

Percy is violently startled out of his reverie while waist-deep in a chest of brewer's gear. As he jerks out, the rubbery aprons contained within melt and fuse to his skin.

"Aw, heck," he 'curses' as he tries to extricate himself, although if anyone is close enough to hear, all that makes it past the apron strap stuck to his face is a muffled "awhk."

As he spins around, he becomes further entangled until he is nearly totally restrained. He stumbles forward, crashing through the doorway to the room with his companions and lurking dracula before crashing to the ground in a melting, oozy heap.

Thunder boomed so loudly that Sal felt the crack of it in his chest. It's like a deep bass magnified to a million, and not in a good way. His whole body is covered in goosebumps. Then Percy goes flying past him, making him jump back. And all of this on top of just having heard Hey Kid screaming with what appeared to be actual Dracula chasing them? It was too much in the dark and spooky basement!

But as much as Sal's heart is racing, he's meant to be cooler than this. A chill, easy-going guy whose faced scarier stuff than this, for goodness sake!

So, instead, he musters all his bravery, puffs out his chest and says, "Pfft! It was just some thunder! No need to lose our heads about it!" He is quite pleased with how little his voice seemed to quaver. He then marches towards Hey Kid. "Don't worry, Hey Kid! I'll sort this vampire problem right out."

He doesn't have a plan, of course, but how hard can it be?

"Bleh bleh bleh! Boogie boogie boogie!" the dracula says, continuing to caper around Hey Kid in a menacing fashion. Sal confidently (?) marches forward, searching for a way to drive away the hooligan!After traveling through a series of dark and dusty rooms, Sal spots the generator! It is tucked into a crumbling crawlspace...

Parish aids Sal in the search pausing every so often to sweep the dracula to side with his broom. When Sal finally spots the generator, Parish claps Sal on the shoulder. "Well spotted my friend! Now that the grail is in sight, let's see if we can grasp it, eh? Parish lowers down, sticks his broom ahead of him, and crawls into the space.

The dracula cackles and dances away from Parish's broom, swooping back each time to torment Hey Kid further.As Parish crawls ahead to get to the generator, he accidentally knocks over an old mason jar! The top pops off, and an ancient and powerful ghost emerges, wrapped in a sickly white sheet. "OoWooOOwoo!" the ghost moans as it flies past Parish, in search of an unlucky victim to terrify! Parish is able to drag the generator out of the crawl space.

Hey kid hears the thunder and drops to the ground screaming, then they grow, and grow, and grow until they literally explode *KABOOM* after the explosion Hey Kid is a puddle on the floor and it takes a bit of time before they collect themselves.

Of course, once Hey Kid, has collected themselves the Dracula is back at their old tricks and Hey Kid tries to hide behind Sal. Then whine pitifully, "Go away! We don't like you Dracula!"

Parish lunges for the mason jar but can't catch it before the ghost is released. Honestly, why does Yazeba stash these things all over the place? This was the haunted pancakes all over again. Parish sighs and hauls the generator out into the open. He checks the fuel gauge and it reads a disappointing E. Their quest would have to continue.

After extracting himself from the tangled mess of aprons, Percy is eager to prove his worth. So when Parish drops the mason jar, Percy is at the ready! His body is hot enough to melt glass, so he rushes forward, planning to absorb the glass shards and protect his more delicate friends.

He doesn't see the ghost until he's moving through it. Its unearthly chill makes his skin feel tight and clumsier than usual. With a start, Percy realizes that if it freezes him up at the wrong time, it could trip him down the stairs into the indeterminably deep depths, or worse, cause him to fall on top of one of his companions and injure them!

"I'll just be here," he tells Parish faintly. "I don't need to eat or anything, so I'll be fine until you find time to come back someday."

The ghost moans and wraps its incorporeal arms around Percy, clinging to the lava elemental and refusing to let go. The dracula shakes his butt in Hey Kid's direction, laughing with delight! Who will be brave enough to press on through the basement to find the generator's fuel?!?

Sal watched the chaos unfolding around him, and thought he had not seen so much chaos since his old job. This, though, was compounded by the darkness and the storm that continued to rage outside. He was dusty, and a little afraid, and quite ready to return to his guitar upstairs. It had been a mistake to come down here.

Then his eyes caught on Dracula, who was in the middle of twerking, and the pure ridiculousness of the situation hit him square in the gut. What was he getting all worked out about? He couldn't help it; he began to laugh.

In the wake of Sal's laughter, there is an uneasy moment of quiet...

Parish is starting to get a little flustered. His friends were beset by fiends and Sal appears to have come unhinged based on the laughter. He had to press.on! Shifting from exit to exit, Parish boldly strides towards the darkest, steepest most cobwebbed passage he can see.

Parish blusters forward through the cobwebs, batting them out of the way. Something large looms in the shadows ahead! Egads! Is that an enormous monster?!?

Shining his flashlight on the shape, Parish discovers that it is, in fact, only the water heater. Phew! But you are no closer to finding the fuel...

Parish knew what had to lie at the end of this webbed passage. Segmented body, eight legs, cousin to Shelob the great spider!. Parish would not be fooled by the clever arachnid's water heater disguise! Sometimes windmills are giants! With a great battle croak, Parish starts slamming his broom handle into the hot water heater. At the first metal clang, he thought, "Gadzoooks, the spider is armored!" After the third or fourth, he realized that couldn't be right. He lowered his broom, peered forward again, and sheepishly hoped he had not broken the water heater.

The water heater is a bit dented, but still intact, luckily. And say! What's that in that room over there? Parish looks closely and spots the gas canister he has been looking for--clutched in the bony fingers of a skeleton slumped against the masonry.

Hey Kid is so sick and tired of all this! Clearly the grownups are doing it on purpose. They yell at Parish, "You did that on purpose just to scare me. You’re just leading us to scary things because you don’t like me. That’s what this is all about!"

They get about that far before the blood sucker dive bombs them again and makes them scream and scurry for some sort of safety.

With Sal laughing at him, Hey Kid dealing with their own spooky situation, and Parish rushing on ahead, Percy assumes that his role is indeed to wait for help to arrive.

"I don't know you very well, but I care about you," Percy tells Hey Kid as he settles into a more comfortable sitting position. "It was real nice of you to invite me to that game the other day. And hey, if we're stuck here at least we're stuck together!"

He shivers violently as the ghost makes another whooshing pass through him. "Besides," he muses, "us flammable folk ought to stick together!"

Parish frowns at the skeleton holding the gas can. Did this poor wretch perish from touching the gas? Or worse did someone drape this skeleton over the gas can as a sick joke? Either way, Parish did not want to disturb their slumber if he did not have to. He would have to search elsewhere. He retraced his steps in time hear Percy comfort Hey Kid and almost absent-mindedly bats away the ghost and dracula with his broom. He makes a note not to have his flammable friends carry the fuel when they find it.

Despite the continued menacing antics of the cackling dracula and spooky ghost, Percy decides to comfort Hey Kid. And as Hey Kid begins to calm down a bit, they spot something in the corner of the next room. It's a cardboard box filled with baby clothes that the devilish child used to wear, topped with a macaroni picture of the Bed & Breakfast.

Yazeba's B&B is Hey Kid's home, and the basement is a part of that home. The box is a little reminder of that fact. Seeing it makes Hey Kid feel more courageous. Courageous enough, maybe, to finally stand up to that annoying dracula with too much time on his hands...

Parish smiles at the discovered baby clothes. He lifts out one shirt and a classic Neutron Gal stared out. Parish chuckles. He'd forgotten how early Hey Kids fandom started.

He shows Hey Kid the shirt and points at the Dracula. "Is it pew pew o'clock? Parish asks, completely misremembering the iconic catchphrase.

Hey Kid does their best to find courage. Parish hilariously get the catchphrase wrong but that’s okay. Hey Kid stands tall, hands at their sides, "It’s fighting time." They can almost imagine the breeze flowing over their imaginary cape as they monologue just like Nuetron Gal.

"You made a mistake today. You attacked my home, my family. Well for that you’ll pay. It’s fighting time!" They stand boldly ready to fight off Dracula.

The dracula regards Hey Kid and their newfound confidence with annoyance. "Bleh, it's no fun anymore if you're not a scaredy-cat!" he laments. With a swoosh of his cape, the dracula transforms into a bat and flies away!

"OohoohOoOoOH!" moans the ghost still menacing Percy.

"Well done," Percy praises Hey Kid warmly. Or as warmly as he can with a spooky ghost still chilling him. "Maybe you can help me scare away this ghost, too!"

He leans back against the door behind him, trying not to let the others see how scared he is of getting left and forgotten down here. But it's all he can think about! What if he's left down here for a week? A month? Until he burns out into nothing?? He reflexively flares to warm himself, but greatly underestimates how scared he really is and goes up in a WHOOSH.

"Oh Nooooooooo," he moans as he burns through the door and falls down the staircase beyond. He tumbles down, down, until he at last comes to an oozing stop at the bottom. "Don't worry! That didn't hurt!" he calls up to his companions. But instead of the reassuring faces of Hey Kid and Parish, it's the ghost who comes rushing down to him.

The ghost sweeps down the staircase to follow Percy, its filthy sheet flapping in an unseen wind. As Percy collects himself, he spots a terrifying silhouette... that turns out to be a dress form with Yazeba's old wizard school robes and hat on it. Can you believe she used to wear anything so... silly? That sight makes Percy laugh, and that laughter fills him with warmth and courage.

As he turns around, he sees something else--EEK! Is that a goblin? No, no. It's just a weird watering can! Nothing to be alarmed about. Not like that ancient ghost, over there.

"OOhhhhoohoOOOOH!"

Hey Kid sees Percy and takes their hand. Hey Kid gives Percy a big smile and says, "It's okay. I'm right here and we're friends, right? Friends don't care if someone makes a fire or is a bit clumsy. I know because Gertrude told me and she's, my friend. Plus, she's like lots older than me."

Hey Kid then looks up to Parish, "Thanks Parish, you helped too. Didn't you used to be a real knight or were you like a regular frog and some princess kissed you?"

A faint blush comes to Parish's cheeks as he remembers a long ago kiss. "You have it a little jumbled. The princess was cursed to be a frog and I took her curse upon myself." Buoyed by the memory of his noblest deed, Parish once more marches forth in search of what they need to bring warmth to the B&B.

Parish boldly leads the group through the dark and twisting tunnels. After several minutes, he finds himself back at the skeleton that is still clutching the precious fuel tank. But this time, Percy might just be brave enough to retrieve the fuel! How scary can a skeleton be compared to the ghost already haunting him? And if the lights come back on, the ghost will probably fly off anyway, right?

Parish pauses for only a moment. Is he Lancelot fated to see the Grail but have it denied him. No! He is Galahad and he will claim his prize. Walking forward it the comfortable right radiating off Percy, Parish kneels by the skeleton. "Rest well noble guardian. Your time to guard this is at an end. Be at peace." Parish gently moves the fuel can out of the skeleton's embrace. "Let's return to the world above and bring warmth and light once more."

The skeleton remains silent and unmoving as Parish retrieves the fuel can. He finally has what he needs to start the generator and restore power to the B&B!

Parish has Percy and Hey Kid light the way with cheery flames while entrusting the generator to Gertrude and keeping the Grail for himself. The ghost flaps off in a huff when none of the happy party pays it the silent attention. The generator is muscled into place out on the patio, fueled up and with the chug of the generator and a flip of the switch, the lights snap back on and the voice of Neutron Gal peals out loud and clear from the TV. Parish retires to the kitchen and soon bustles out with a celebratory feast of hot chocolate and cookies. Not his most dangerous quest, but satisfying none the less.

Percy lies on the ground, confident that Parish and Hey Kid will go on without him. He closes his eyes and imagines the lovely things outdoors he won't get to see for who knows how long: The clear blue sky, the soft green grass he has to be so careful not to burn, and the birds that sing through his window every morning at the inn. Other staff and patrons of the inn have helped Percy learn some of the birds' names and songs, so Percy distracts himself from the ghost by listing the birds in his head: Sweet little sparrows, clever crows, and (his favourite) the rambunctious robins with their fiery chests.

He only makes it three birds deep before the strangest thing happens: Parish and Hey Kid don't leave without him! Parish collects the fuel can, then comes back for him, and still trusts him enough to help light the way home! Somehow, making mistakes, getting haunted by a ghost, and burning a door down didn't make them like him any less! And if they can still see the best in Percy even if he makes mistakes and isn't as helpful as he'd hoped, maybe it's time for him to change how he sees himself as well!

Percy thoughtfully heads back to his room as soon as the power comes on. It's time to take a good long look in the mirror and figure out how to find the good in him that the other people here clearly see.

Hey Kid sits back on the couch following along with her favorite. Nuetron Gal movie and for once they feel like a true hero too. Just like Nuetron Gal!

And that is the story of the night the lights went out at Yazeba's Bed & Breakfast!