"Majora's Mask?" I repeated the words the blonde has spoken. What the heck is a Majora's Mask? (This symbol apparently.)
He took my hand in his and gently graze his finger against the skin. "It can't be." He mumbled out as his blood red eyes gaze into mine.
"I gotta go. I seriously gotta go." He said in a frantic and terrified tone. I nodded and in a flash, he was gone. Blinking away the confusion, my eyes gaze into the symbol tattooed on my finger. Majora's Mask..
-
I managed to hide this thing from my parents once I got home. Excusing myself to my room after dinner and locking myself in there.
My hands immediately glided through the keyboard. Researching things to know about this Majora's Mask. Apparently, it was a game. A Legend of Zelda thing that was released about a few years ago.
Its graphic couldn't be compared with today's generation, but it felt nostalgic looking at its edges. I scrolled through each articles the site presented me and saw something that caught my interest.
An article about the strange symbol. I clicked on it and it brought me to a page with a dark and spooky design. It showed a cartridge that looked old and abandoned. A paper sticker with the game's name was placed in the middle of it, looking teared and dried off from being wet.
I read the article thoroughly, but it only provided my insight of what the game was all about. Apparently, it was about this green elfin boy, Link, collecting a lot of masks. And that's about what I understood.
I clicked on the picture of the cartridge and felt a certain familiarity with it. On second thought, IT IS FAMILIAR.
I jumped off my chair and rushed to a chest seated at the foot of my bed. The chest where I stuff most of my junk that I rarely use anymore that I didn't want to throw away. I rummaged into it like a bounty hunter and at the very bottom of the chest, I saw it.
The exact same cartridge from the photo. With its torn paper sticker and cracked corners. My thumb grazed the side of the cartridge and along with it, I saw my old Nintendo 64(OMGOMGOMG).
"This . . . brings back a lot of memories." I gaped as I took the thing off the chest. Letting it sit on the floor. I glance at the television seated across the bed. "Imma play this thing like there's no tomorrow." I grinned and did just that.
After putting everything back into the chest except for the game and the console, I prepped it up on the television and crossed my fingers for it to work. Eventually, it did!
The game loaded with ease. As if it was brand new. It played the cutscene of the mask circling in and about until I pressed START and it instantly brought me to its homescreen.
There were two files that are SAVED in the game. One with the name AsRIeL in a shuffled lower and upper case. A complete doofus. And the other under the name BEN.
Ben?
Is that why his name was so familiar? Because of this? Could he be the same Ben, though?
Shrugging off the thought, my fingers clicked the file of BEN on its own. It brought me to this place where I don't recall but recognize. There was a clock tower, a round flying thing surrounding the green elf-looking character. Pressing the START, it brought me to its menu, showing me its collection of masks.
He completed it? Damn, this BEN guy must have been a complete addict. When I decided to finally exit BEN's game file and play my own, the screen flickered, causing me to flinch and curse out.
"ASRIEL, WATCH YO MOUTH." My mother hollered from outside my room.
"SORRY!" I hollered back and kept my attention to the game. Suddenly, the sweet transition of the background music changed into the sound of a familiar flute playing.
An ocarina's tune.
Observing the character in front of the screen, I realized that it wasn't even moving, nor does it have the ocarina in its hand.
Weird. Probably a feature you get when you're almost finished with the game, I guess?
But that wasn't it..
The music suddenly transitioned into an anomalous tune. As if it was playing the ocarina in backwards..
The hair on my body stood involuntarily. Creeping me out even more. Decided, I ejected the cartridge from the console. Gazing onto it intently. The screen on my television showed thay dialogue box that said 'No Signal.'
Satisfied now, I placed the cartridge on my desk. As I was about to reach and open my door, that same unsettling music resonates inside my room. The hair on my body stood once more as cold shivers ran down my spine.
Whipping my head to where the television is, I saw the screen was replaced by a pitch black one. Its speakers playing that unsettling tune. Swallowing the nervousness in my throat, I reached for its plug and pulled it out of its socket. The music ceased instantly as relief washed over my form.
Feeling a bit better now, I returned to my door to open it. When that familiar shlick popped into my air(the noise my television does whenever I open it) and that unsettling backwards tune of the ocarina played once more, I knew that something paranormal is already happening.
Pressing my back onto my door, I eyed the television sideways. That dismantling tune kept playing and playing and playing until it pushed me to insanity.
I marched in front of the TV just in time as the screen turned a dull grey color. Frozen in my spot, I peeked into the socket behind it and saw that it was, indeed, unplugged. I was starting to get the creeps. The creeps I didn't want to get. Oh, my gosh, the creeps.
I was hyperventilating a little bit. Just a teensy-weensy bit until the TV rattled. It. Friggin'. Rattled. Like a dense motherfu-
It rattled once more before I could finish my sentence and I scrambled to grab one of my acoustic guitar I never got to play. I raised it above my shoulder like a bat, ready to obliterate the TV in millions of shattered pieces.
Another minute has passed and it still showed me that dullness of its grey screen. Contented that nothing else will happen because of the minute of peace it has given me, a white spot suddenly formed at the center of the vast grey screen; giving it a strange, distorted look.
From the screen formed a pale ghostly hand that smacked itself at the other side. Rattling it once more. A gasped escaped my lips as I raised the guitar higher, readying myself to swing it.
Then, to my surprise, the ghostly hand hovered about the screen until it pushed. It pushed itself passed the screen that blocked him, it moved along with its hand; looking like an elastic object until it spit out the hand. Droplets of what seems to be tiny pixels fell from it to the floor, only it shattered into nothingness when it reached the carpet.
Soon, an arm formed, and another. Until a whole body sprawled its way onto the carpet floor.
A scream hitched at the back of my throat as a familiar body lay motionless on the carpet floor. Using the guitar in hand, I poked onto the head of its body, making the thud it made echo through the guitar's insides.
The body growled and I yelped, raising the guitar higher once more. "Owww." It mumbled and pushed itself off the carpet.
When I got a good look of what he looks like, my mouth hung ajar as a single name slipped passed my lips. "Ben?"
The man craned his neck, bloody red eyes meeting my cognac ones. "Asriel?" His eyes widened in realization as he whipped his head around my room, landing his gaze on the cartridge on top of my desk. "You have my game? What-I don't understand."
"So do I!" I shrieked, "What did . . . what happened back there? What're you doing here? Why are you here?" I demanded and Ben finally sat up straight on my carpet.
Scratching the back of his head, he began explaining, "Look, that game you're playing and that cartridge belongs to me. It's what I consider my," he paused, eyeing everything but me, "lifeline. Anywho, whenever someone plays that game, especially my file; I get dragged to whatever rancid place it is. Think of it like . . . summoning. Playing my games means summoning me, the owner of that game file. That make sense? Moving on. I've buried that thing somewhere long ago, guess I didn't do a good job hiding it since, well, it's pretty much still here."
Curious now, I eyed the cartridge sitting still at my desk and remembered where exactly I got it. "Where did you bury it exactly?" I murmured.
"Up a hill somewhere. Near a riverbank. Very secluded, if you ask me."
That's when it hit me. Literally.
Ben threw a piece of popcorn that was probably stuck at the carpet to me. "Do you ever clean this? This is gross," he pulled out a half-eaten chip from the carpet with a grimace.
"Oh, Chippy!~" I cooed as I took the chip from his hand, "I've missed you!"
"Don't tell me you're eat-" the sound of crunching stopped him as I ate the chip he found in the carpet.
"GURL, YOU NASTY!" Ben hollered and I clamped my hand on his mouth as I heard my mother holler from the living room.
"Sweetie, who was that?"
"Nothing, mom!" I answered back and Ben gave me a look, when I let go of him, I gave him another look that screams 'don't be noisy.'
"Mom? Your mom sounds like a du-"
"That's because he is, smartass." I barked and he shut up, "Not all mom's are woman, y'know? Some are men." I murmured, rubbing my arm uncomfortably.
I never really did like defending my family to everyone. It makes me feel like . . . well, as everyone calls me, a freak.
"I'm sorry. I didn't know. Does that mean your dad...?"
"They're both gay." I murmured, looking at my side.
"Then you're...?"
"I'm an adopted daughter of two happily married gay couple." I recited.
"Then they're very lucky to have such an amazing and wonderful daughter." This . . . actually brought a smile to my face.
"That's the most sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me, honestly." I told him, and it brought a smile to his lips as well, "Thank you, Ben."
He nodded at this and rubbed the back of his neck once more. "I'm really sorry for being all weird and stupid about the Mom part. That's very insensitive of me and everything." I shrugged and gave him an assuring grin.
"S'cool. It's honestly not the most rudest thing I've heard being said to him." His look gave me ideas of what's going on in his head as I said, "I don't wanna talk about it if it's cool."
He nodded, his eyes then lingered its stare at the tattoo on my hand. I hid it unconsciously, feeling a bit sensitive. "You," he cleared his throat, "You really need something to hide that with. I'm pretty sure with someone as pretty as yourself, your parents wouldn't like seeing you with a tattoo. Especially with something that looks like it came from the deepest corners of the underground."
I rubbed the tattooed symbol on my finger, "Yeah, you're right, they don't. I'll just use a bandaid, maybe. Or makeup. Makeup works, too."
Shaking his head, a smile spreads his lips as he dug his hand into his green hoodie pocket. Soon, he pulled out an object that twinkled under the light of my room. From the looks of it, it was very silver. Shining and twinkling as it kept moving in Ben's hold.
As he reached it towards me, I realized that it was actually-
"A ring?" The smile on his face assures me that I was, in fact, correct. He was giving me a ring. As he placed it tenderly on the palm of my hand, I immediately recognized the shaped of it.
Apart from the donut shape most rings have, at the center of it was charm that looked a lot like thise floating round thing I saw at the game. A . . . Tatl. Or was Tatl its name?
"Is this . . . a Tatl?" This earned a laugh from the boy and I smacked his shoulder to keep him quiet.
"No, its name is Tatl," he told me(I knew it), "It's a fairy." I nodded in understanding, eyeing the body of the fairy, unlike Tatl from the game that had a white glow, this ring charm had a cognac colored sphere in the middle with gold encrusted metal as its wings.
It was a huge contrast from the color of the ring itself(which was a bright silver), but nonetheless, it was beautiful. "Is this customized?" I asked in disbelief and Ben nodded. "Why?" I gaped.
Sheepishly, he answered my question, "When I saw that you bore that symbol, I realized that you're gonna have to cover it up. Y'know, for . . . safety reasons." He remarked as he squinted his eyes at the last part.
My fingers fumbled with the ring for a second before I slipped it on. Surprisingly, it wasn't a perfect fit. It was a bit too big and it kept slipping in and out of my finger. Seeing this, Ben reached his hand toward me, "If it doesn't fit, you can do this." His fingers poised atop the cognac gem on the ring, with a mellow tap; the gem glowed an aesthetical shade of brown, the ring suddenly shaped itself to a perfect fit for my fingers.
As the glow diminished, only then did I realize that my mouth was slightly open ajar. Awkwardly, I closed it and gaze unto the blonde boy in wonder. "That was . . . awesome."
Chuckling, he shrugged off his shoulders as if it was nothing. "It's the least I could do, y'know? Hey, uhm, you better take care of yourself, alright?"
"Why?" I inquired, curious as I saw a shadow loom above his eyes, "Being acquainted with me isn't a very pleasant event to happen." He was silent and I gazed at him more expectantly, "It's just-" he pause, sighing, "Here," he reached for my phone and dibbled with it for a second before giving it back to me.
On it was a new added contact list under the name BEN(again with the upper case letters). "You're giving me your number? We haven't even been on our first date yet." I teased with a smirked, and it actually caused his cheeks to turn into a lighter shade of pink.
"It's for emergencies only, okay?!" He barked, making me flinch but I chuckled it off. Amused by how flustered he could get by a simple flirting.
"You're adorable." The shade of pink on his cheeks grew darker, spreading on his face wider as he scoffed and turned his head away from my gaze.
"I'm gonna-" the doorknob suddenly clicked and both of our attention turned to my door. Thankfully, it was lock as a knock resonates afterwards.
"Sweetie, why is your door locked? What're you doing? Why do I hear a man's voice in there?"
I eyed the blonde wraith before me, he pressed a finger to his lips as he gave me a sly wink. "Well, I best be going, Girly. I'm pretty sure I'll see you soon." He whispered, "I suggest you turn around for this one."
I was about to question him why when a bright flash of light erupted me from doing so. Blinding me momentarily as mismatched colors clouded by vision.
The knocking intensifies as my mother's voice switched into his 'Endgame.'
"I swear to all things unholy, Asriel, if I see a butt-naked boy in that room with you, I will skin him alive!"