A Cursor Story

Chapter 1: Race of cursors

VirtualSpace, 2025

Chris the Cursor ran galloping in the vast green undulating meadows of VirtualSpace. Instead of admiring the vastly expanded beauty of the green meadows almost the same as the standard Windows XP wallpaper Chris continuously looked backward as if somebody had been following him. Seeing Parry the Pointer, who was his competitor in the race still away, Chris slowed down a little bit. A bright greenish light illuminated the landscape. Chris wiped his tiny bar-shaped forehead drenched in his own sweat. The sweltering heat was produced either by the semiconductor junctions or because of his own mental state. The exact reason was not clear to him.

'Irri, Irri ... I am going to win this time, dear friend, you are going to lose,' Parry the Pointer came flying from behind and chuckled at his friend Chris, 'Chris, I always get defeated by you. You are thin and long. You look like a thin long bar with a pair of hands and feet that look like small tentacles, an elongated humanoid bar.' Chris and Parry had been close friends since they could remember.

Chris the Cursor frowned at Parry the Pointer in fear.

'So what. You are also a cursor, just take an arrow and tilt its head...by the way tell me does your head ache? Since you keep it always tilted. '

Chris's fear evaporated along with his sweat and he once again marched ahead onto the straight lined racing track of the VirtualSpace to compete with Parry the Pointer.

'I don't like body shaming. My arrow shaped head doesn't ache. I like to fly with my slanted head. A feat you cannot achieve. This is the biggest point, Chris.'

'See a Pointer is making a point.'

Chris the Cursor decided to ignore Parry the Pointer and again took the lead in the race.

However, Chris the Cursor was running out of steam, he asked, 'just wait for me Chris, I have been flying for so long.'

'So long? you were running only for 10^14 clock cycles. Or in simple words only for 41 seconds.'

'I know Chris our VirtualSpace runs on a 2.4 THz computer, which makes time move so fast.'

'That's why don't waste it in foolish arguments, I am on my way.' Chris zoomed leaving Parry the Pointer behind.

Chris had taken a winning lead in the race, it often looked backwards and blinked for a millisecond to check how far he had come from Parry the Pointer.

A squealing sound, like a sudden breaking of tyres on the road, screecheds suddenly. Looking at the huge box shaped structure right in front of him, Chris the Cursor jumped away and emerged on the next straight line located just below the previous straight line on the vast green meadows of VirtualSpace. Yes, the racing track was marked with straight lines like a kid's notebook.

Drawing of the racing track

Parry the Pointer followed Chris the Cursor to the next straight line. 'Watch your step, you were about to punch through Tom the TextBox'.

Parry the Pointer turned his arrow-tip shaped head towards Tom the TextBox and warned Chris the Cursor, 'Tom the TextBox has a rectangular tummy and once you bump into it, you will just keep blinking there. You will not be able to come out of its rectangular tummy without the help of our master- the User.'

Chris the Cursor had narrowly avoided the TextBox by jumping to the next straight line.

'Thanks dude, I was about to bump into Tom the TextBox. Tom is also a strange creature, first it does not move without commands of the User and then it has a large tummy where I often get stuck during work,' Chris's eyes were fixed at the mustaches of Tom the TextBox though he was talking to Parry the Pointer.