Okay, I tried posting this a few minutes ago but it didn't post, so if there's two of these, I'll ask a mod to delete one.
I've been working on this story for almost a year now, but I totally forgot about it. I would like some input on how it is so far, and what I should add. I have writer's block.
Stanley Eastman had been working very hard all morning organizing his books and toys. He was confined to his room for talking back.
"It's Saturday, and I should be outside playing, but no! I'm working myself ragged." he muttered to himself. Boom!! Sound reverberated off the wall as he kicked it.
"Alright Stanley, that's an extra half hour of chores!" his Mom shouted up the stairs, "You can start with vacuuming the carpets."
"Man!, It's just not fair, Dad always does stuff with me on Saturday, but he's been too busy for months now, with his stupid super secret project," Stanley shouted, as he shuffled slowly down the stairs.
His mom's tired face peered around the corner at him, "Stanley, we haven't been getting along lately; I'll call Dad on his cell phone and ask him to take some time out. We all need a break, and he needs to get out of the shop for awhile."
Stanley was really missing his dad. He wished they would spend more time together, like they used to. Lately his inventor dad was spending long hours working in the shop out behind the house in top secrecy. Stanley could hear all of the whirring, grinding and pounding of tools, as his dad worked on some mysterious new machine. At night the windows would light up with the bright flashing of an arc welder. Strange sounds and weird lights were coming out of the shop at all hours of the night and day.
Stanley had been forbidden to enter his father's shop while he worked on this new project. It was far too dangerous for a ten year old.
"Are you ready to shoot some hoops?" Stanley's dad, Ryan Eastman, stood by the basketball standard bouncing the ball. Every time he would bounce the ball, dust would fall off his clothes. Stanley rushed at his dad and knocked the ball away and began to expertly dribble circles around him. "You must mean, are you ready to be beaten by a ten year old?"
Flashing by both of them and stealing the ball from Stanly, Jamie Eastman made a basket, almost from the half court line. "You must mean, are you ready to be beaten by a girl? Or should I say, Mom?" She quickly made three more baskets and strutted back toward the house. "Well, if there isn't any serious competition, I guess I'll go fix dinner."
"Well that took the wind out of our sails! She did play college basketball," Ryan stated. They played, until it was lunch time, and Stanley won every game.
Later that evening, Stanley was helping his mom with the dishes when he saw strange lights through the window, coming from his dad's shop. The floor began vibrating in the house and the shop appeared to be disappearing in a haze of purple fog. Suddenly there was a huge flash of light followed by a shock wave that knocked Stanley off his feet.
Stanley scrambled up and ran out of the back door. He sprinted toward the shop. The shop was still there in that weird purple haze, but the doors had been blown open. Stanley peered in through the open doors and could hear a deafening roar coming from a huge machine in the center of the floor. Purple smoke belched out of the top of it in loud puffs. Strange lights were spinning in the air all around the shop. Stanley could feel the hair on the back of his neck standing up in apprehension and fear.
"Dad!" Stanley screamed in panic. His father was nowhere to be seen. The shop was empty, except for the strange machine. Slowly, the loud roaring subsided to a dull hum. The unearthly lights disappeared and the shop became quiet. Stanley stood alone in the open door looking into his father's empty shop.
"STANLEY!! GET BACK HERE!" his mom shouted, strained with fear.
Suddenly the ground began shaking again. Stanley tried to run from the shop, but the floor wouldn't hold him. He was being drawn into some sort of vortex, between the walls or under the floor. He seemed to be nowhere, neither floating or falling, almost like being in water, but nothing was touching him.
"STANLEY!" he could hear his mom scream, but he couldn't see her. That same otherworldly purple haze surrounded him. Above him, the light was brighter and below was complete darkness. It felt like he had always been here, like time was standing still. Gradually Stanley could feel himself being pulled upwards and the light was changing to an orange red glow.
Chapter 2 - A Topsy Turvy World
Suddenly, he was standing on the ground. "WOW!" Stanley cried out in a loud voice, this was the craziest landscape he had ever seen. The sky was a bright crimson and the sun was impossibly huge and red. The ground appeared as if it had been stirred with a giant spoon. Huge boulders poked out of the ground at every angle imaginable. The trees and bushes were twisted in all directions, nothing was straight or orderly. It looked like the whole world came out of a Dr. Seuss story.
"Stanley, what are you doing here!" boomed the familiar voice of his dad. Stanley turned in anticipation and jumped backwards in fear, before him stood a very strange looking man. His skin was the brightest shade of blue imaginable, and his hair was jet black, yet his voice and facial features were that of his dad.
"Hurry, Son, I don't have time to explain right now just follow me.RUN!!" His dad's voice was full of stress and urgency. Stanley began running behind his weird blue dad trying to keep up, over the rough and uneven terrain. The air was hot and heavy, and Stanley's feet felt, heavy as bricks.
"Dad, I can't keep up, slow down," he cried out. The stench of sulfur burned his throat and he thought his lungs were about to burst. His clothes were drenched with sweat, yet his dad looked cool and normal in this heavy, oppressive heat.
"Jump on my back and I'll carry you. We don't have any time to lose. The tremors will start again very soon," his father replied.
In one smooth movement he reached down, swept up his son, threw him over his shoulder and began running. Stanley held on for dear life, as his dad ran effortlessly over the broken ground.
Stanley never thought of his dad as being athletic, yet he was moving faster than any Olympic runner.
"That was a river, last week," his father pointed to a huge steaming spout of water. It was shooting straight up out of the ground and small muddy lakes were forming, and rapidly draining off into the fissured ground. Stanley began to realize this must be some bizarre hallucination.
"Look Stanley, straight ahead is the only town left on this planet." Stanley looked over the tortured terrain, and there right in the middle of it all, was a small town, looking neat and tidy and completely out of place.
Just as they were about to enter the town the ground began to rumble, a crack appeared and began to widen right in their path.
"Hurry, jump!" shouted a bright blue boy with jet black hair, he was watching their approach from the top of his perch on the playground jungle gym.
"We're not going to make it!" Stanley screamed as he watched the crack widen to an impossible distance. His dad didn't even slow down for a second. Just as they were almost at the edge of what was now a small canyon, a giant boulder tumbled off of one side and wedged itself into their path. Stanley closed his eyes and expected the worst. His dad leaped onto the boulder, scrambled up its face and dove into town; just as the boulder crashed on the side of the canyon and fell away.
"Wow; that was way too close!" Stanley's dad panted, as he sat down on the soft grass of the playground.
Stanley looked back over the path they had taken and the ground was heaving, cracking and buckling, everywhere. Nothing could survive an earthquake like this. But just a few feet away from this total devastation, it was absolutely calm. Stanley knew this was not a hallucination, No, he had completely lost his mind, and none of this was even close to possible.
"Hey, that was some fast moving, Mr. Eastman," said a boy's voice from behind them. "This must be your son, Stanley. He is as pink as you were three weeks ago."
Stanley turned around, and there in front of him was that same very blue boy, who had been on top of the jungle gym seconds before.
"Hi! I'm Blarnock," the boy held his hand out to Stanley, who was stumbling backwards, in shock.
"What's going on here, Dad? We were playing basketball a couple of hours ago. This Blarnock says you have been here for three weeks."
"Son, I'd like you to meet Blarnock. Shake his hand, this is a historic moment. It is the meeting of an Earth boy and a Mirithian boy."
Stanley felt everything beginning to spin around him. There were some bright flashing colors and popping sounds, then darkness.
Chapter 3-Stanly Meets the Mirithians
"Mom!" Stanley shouted as he sat up in bed. The bedroom was darker than he usually kept it. "Wow, that was some wild dream." He thought, as he turned and put his feet over the edge of the bed. "That's weird, I'm still wearing my clothes instead of pajamas." He noticed as he looked around. This wasn't his room, where was he? The door opened and there was the silhouette of his father.
"Dad, I have to tell you about this really strange dream, I had last night." The lights came on and there in the room was his very bright blue dad.
"Stanley, you must have passed out from all of the excitement. Come out here and eat something, I'll explain all of this to you."
They walked out of the bedroom, into a large room full of bright blue people. There was that boy Blarnock, again. He had a smile on his face as Stanley approached. Stanley smiled back and held out his hand, "I'm very pleased to meet you, Blarnock."
The boys shook hands and Blarnock led Stanley over to the table. The table was loaded with all kinds of delicious-looking food. Everyone was watching the boys as they sat down to eat, getting to know each other.
Stanley must have been sleeping for many hours, because he was ravenous. The food tasted better than anything he had ever eaten.
The man at the end of the table was eating a banana, except the peel was purple and when he peeled it; the fruit was bright red. It looked like a long water balloon. He made an awful sucking noise and rude slurping sound as he ate. Stanley picked up one of the bananas and peeled it. He took a bite and his mouth was instantly filled with a sweet liquid and his face and shirt were covered. The fruit had exploded all over him when he bit into it. The guy at the end of the table exploded into laughter. "Ha! Ha! Ha! He bit a flarp, instead of sucking the juice out!"
"Come on Stanley, the bathroom is over here, you can clean up," Blarnock said, motioning him over.
Stanley looked in the mirror and everywhere the juice had splattered was now stained a bright blue color. "That's weird, my freckles are turning blue also." He looked down at his hands and his fingernails, they were a very dark blue, and the color was going up his hands.
"It's the food, Stanley. It turns your skin blue and your hair black." Stanley's dad spoke into the bathroom from the door. "I didn't want you to panic when I saw you starting to change. Don't worry. You will change back to your normal color when you are back eating Earth food. I have been here many times now. Come back to the table and eat, I'll explain it all."
The boys returned to the table. Blarnock, talked all about school and sports, while Stanley finished eating.
"My favorite game is Fudgelly. It's so exciting to play, and I'll have to teach it to you. Your dad told me your favorite game is basketball. It's kind of like our bucket ball, only the rules are different."
Stanley stopped eating when he heard this. "What's Fudgelly?"
"Lets go outside and I'll show you," replied Blarnock.
"Hold on a minute boys," a very old looking man spoke up. "We need to let Stanley finish eating, and then he needs to hear what is going on here."
"This is my grandpa, his name is Blornook," Blarnock cut in. "He has raised me ever since I can remember. My parents were lost when I was a baby, and grandpa found me, and took care of me since then."
Ryan sat down with the boys. "That machine in the shop is a folding machine. It folds space like a piece of paper, and you just step through a portal into another place. In this case, it's a world in another galaxy. I was trying to send some plants from this world back, when you stepped through instead. I have been coming and going for some time now, but I usually try and do it while you are at school," Stanley's dad explained.
"This planet, Mirithia, is spiraling inward and being pulled apart by the sun; which as you saw, is a red giant. It has grown so large that its gravity will tear this planet apart soon. We, in this town, are the only survivors left on this world," said Blornook. "My grandpa built a machine we call the magnetic resonator. It keeps this small patch of ground stable." Blarnock cut in again.
"Blarnock, it's very rude to interrupt someone, when he is talking," Blornook cut off Blarnock.
"When I left Earth it was yesterday to you, Stanley, but I have been here three weeks. You and I can stay here for as long as we like and return any time after we left, we just can't return before we left. Time doesn't work that way," Stanley's dad continued.
"We can bring everybody back through the portal, Dad! This planet can fall apart, but all of the people in this town will be safe on Earth," Stanley returned.
"That is what we are working toward. There are a lot of things to consider. Will Earth germs; kill all of us upon arrival? What will the government on Earth do with new alien emigrants?" Blornook questioned.
"I am an inventor, like Ryan, your father. My invention the magnetic resonator came too late to save most of the planet, but it has kept this town stable and alive. Now your father has arrived and we all have a new hope, a new life on a new home."
The whole room came alive, as everyone began to speak at the same time. Stanley looked at his new friend Blarnock, and had to shout over all of the voices.
"Let's go outside and play fudgelly, or basketball, or bucket ball, or whatever your call it." Everybody began laughing as the two boys, bolted for the door and ran toward the school playground.
Chapter 4: Life on Mirithia
Blarnock gave Stanley something like a golf club. "You hit the floating saucer with this fudgelly stick, and try to make it go into the net. The other person tries to block or intercept it, and hit it into their net. The first one to make five goals wins the round. There are three rounds to a game, so let's play!"
Stanley felt much better after eating. The Mirithian food gave him so much energy. He was able to put up quite a game, but Blarnock's experience won out, and the game was soon over.
"How about a game of bucketball?" Stanley asked
"Sure!" replied Blarnock. "I'm having so much fun; it's great that you showed up here. You may have noticed, Stanley, there aren't many children left on Mirithia. In fact, we had almost lost all hope of surviving much longer, until your dad arrived."
"Let's go ask your grandpa and my dad if you can come back to Earth with us, after we play a game of Bucketball," said Stanley.
Bucketball was a lot like Basketball, except they had a bucket mounted on a pole and the backboard was smaller. When you made a bucket, the bottom would open and release the ball.
"Oh Yeah!" Stanley shouted as he made his first bucket. "This is more like it!"
Blarnock was no match for Stanley. When the game ended, Stanley was ahead by a score of fifty to twelve.
"Whoa, you're awesome at Bucketball," Blarnock complemented Stanley.
"Thanks, I'm one of the best players at school, but we will be no match for my mom, when we go back to earth and play her," Stanley replied.
It's a work in progress. PLEASE give me feedback, and ideas on how to continue the story!
