The Search for Bubbles
Shall We Play a Game?
Hero’s Journal Bubbles Fan FICTION
This is a work of fiction. It is entirely a product of my imagination. Well, other than the people. The places are mostly real. However, the circumstanced are entirely FICTIONAL. And time is an illusion.
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Before we start … this was all Cheyenne. I just put some words around her ideas.
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Nick and Kyle looked at each other and then at Ryan.
“Should we show them?” Nick asked. Both Ryan and Kyle shrugged.
“They could be testers,” Kyle suggested.
“Testers of what?” Mirjam asked excitedly.
“Go ahead,” Zach chimed in.
Nick leaned over and pulled a long flat-ish rectangular box out of a bag.
“That looks like a Monopoly box,” LL said. “Are we playing Monopoly IMA edition?”
“Close,” Nick replied as he open the box. “It’s Istoria: The Board Game.”
A collective “Oooo” went up from the Bubbles Raiders.
“Wait a minute. Is THAT Bubbles?”
John, Kyle, Nick, Ryan and Zack just laughed. “We’ll never tell,” said Ryan.
Tacie looked over the top of her glasses at them. “Yet,” added Kyle with a grin.
‘Let’s play,” Angela said. “Maybe we can help work out any kinks.”
“This is just a prototype,” John said. “Ryan is still working on all the graphics.”
Skye, looked at the board Nick had pulled out of the box and asked, “Is that the map that MistyBee drew for you?”
Ryan nodded. “We had her modify it for the game.”
“It looks amazing,” Cheyenne said tracing her finger over the Wildwoods. “Oooo and it had texture too.”
Nick pulled the tokens out of the box and laid them on the table. “Those are so cute!” Mirjam gushed as she picked up one of the tiny pewter figurines.
“I love the Climbers!” Tacie said picking up one of the other figures.
The figurines were passed around as Kyle, Nick and Zach explained the rules of the game.
“I have an idea.” Tasty suggested. “Since there are too many of us, why don’t we split into teams. That way you guys can help lead us gals through the game. I’ll sit out and watch and take notes on what things go right, what might need to be modified, and what really needs to be changed. And why.”
“You wouldn’t mind?” Kyle asked.
“Nope.” Tacie, waving a dismissive hand. “That will give each player a coach. And you can let me know what happened and what you think should have happened as the game goes along. I brought my notebook,” she said holding up a Companion Journal.
The dice were rolled, play order was established and Zach said, “Let the games begin.”
Shortly after the game start, room service arrived with snacks and sodas. Angela shrugged and said “I thought we might need something to snack on.”
On her next turn, Cheyenne drew a card and read it aloud. “You didn’t journal yesterday. Loose a turn to catch up on your goal.” Everyone laughed. The next card drawn by Skye read “you finished your first act, move ahead 3 spaces.”
As the game continued, there was much laughter and discussion of game play. There were suggestions for graphics and ideas to enhance game play.
As a game came to a close the last section read, “You finished your journal 1st. You win.”
“Oh!” said LL. “I don’t think that’s right. This isn’t about finishing a journal. It’s about finishing a quest.”
“I was just going to say that,” Cheyenne said nodding.
“I agree too,” Skye chimed in.
“It will probably take most of us more than 1 journal to finish our quests.” Angela stated. Everyone nodded in agreement.
“You could change it to “Yew finished your quest 1st.” Cheyenne suggested.
“Celebrate with the next quester to finish,” LL added. Everyone nodded some more.
As the game ended, everyone was a little sad. Fun was had and much progress was made on the game, but it also meant that their time together was ending. Soon the Bubbles Raider would be flying home with their newfound knowledge of what Bubbles really was.
Or was this another decoy?