1-2: Charlotte

Charlotte wasn’t expecting her departure to another world via octopus tentacles and a door shaped portal. No one does when they’re crying in the bathroom wearing an old, grungy bathrobe and shoving everything bagels into their mouths at one o’clock in the morning.

The sudden slimy and uncomfortable transition from the bathtub to a dark, dusty room put her mental breakdown on hold as she entered a state of shock and confusion.

How did I get here?

Why am I here?

Were those tentacles?

Something is touching my butt and I do not like it.

She moved to stand, not wanting whatever touchy-feely thing to get any more access to her behind when she heard something click. A second later, a booming, high-pitched robotic voice started talking in her head.

“Greetings, Paladin-Human #42426! Welcome to Thagua MB3! My name is Paladin-Human Android Trainer #462, but you can call me PHAT! You were chosen as a candidate to purge this world of the Naid, a parasitic race that has infected our beautiful planet for four centuries! You will receive a randomized weapon that will aid you in your quest for purification in 3…2…1!”

BANG!

The sudden noise, accompanied by bright, dizzying lights, startled Charlotte, who flinched backward, tripped, and fell on the floor. She landed at a bad angle, jarring her shoulder painfully.

“Be very careful, Paladin-Human #42426,” PHAT warned. “You don’t want to sustain further injury before you begin your purging efforts. Now, please claim your weapon.”

“My…my weapon? I don’t know where-oh, that’s…that’s a floating bat.”

Charlotte stared dumbfounded at the baseball bat hovering inches in front of her face. From cap to the knob, it was about 48 inches long and the girth of the barrel was 3.5 inches wide—way past regulation, but no one important was here to see that—and composed entirely of wood. The leather grip wrapped around the handle was, she guessed, good for keeping a steady handle on it. To top things off, there was a gleaming metal ring around the cap with pointy spikes.

She reached out and poked the barrel. As soon as her finger touched the wood, whatever magical energy that was keeping the bat afloat disappeared and it dropped to the ground. “W-what am I supposed to do with this thing?”

The robot in her head piped up cheerfully, exclaiming, “Claim it! Reach out with your anima and infuse it into the weapon! The universe will then recognize it as your property.”

“Um…my what?”

The response was a little less cheerful; PHAT was growing tired of her lack of knowledge. “Anima is the energy gifted to paladins by the Makers, in an effort to give them an edge against the Naid. Are Paladin-Human #42426’s mental capacities lacking for some unspecified reason? This is common knowledge.”

Charlotte flushed. “Excuse me, I just got here, like, five minutes ago! Some tentacles just grabbed me while I was in the bathroom and shoved me into this portal! I have no idea who these Makers are, or the Naid or-or anything!”

“You weren’t prepped?”

“No!”

“That’s too bad!” PHAT chirped. “Now, hurry up and claim your weapon! You have one hour to get situated before the cabin is invaded.”

“W-what? I-I don’t know how to do anything! How do I access my anima?!”

PHAT didn’t bother responding, instead opting to hum softly in the back of her mind. Charlotte, sensing she was on the verge of having another panic attack, forced herself to take deep breaths.

You got this, Char. You can figure it out. It-it can’t be that hard to figure out how to access my anima, right? I just have to…feel it…inside me.

She shuddered. Not using that terminology again. Okay, right, access my anima. I just need to look deep inside myself. Find my core.

Charlotte looked down at her stomach, hidden by her neon pink bathrobe. She unrobed it, lifted her tank, and poked her flab. It jiggled at the touch but nothing else happened. Core. How did she find her core?

Did she just have to close her eyes and push?

That sounds like a recipe for finding something else, she thought with a giggle. Maybe try to, I don’t know, push inwards? Whatever that means.

“Friendly reminder that you have fifty minutes until the invasion.”

“Alright, alright,” she muttered. “Just let me…try this…pushing method.”

She closed her eyes, filled her lungs with as much air as possible, and pushed. For a few breathless—quite literally—seconds, there was nothing but an overwhelming urge to fart and/or pass out. And then something shifted inside of her.

She gasped and fell to the floor, clutching her chest.

“Uh..uh, PHAT? Did I…was that my anima?”

“Correct!” it chirped. “You have successfully accessed your anima! Forty-eight minutes until the invasion!”

“Right, okay. It’s…I still feel it. There, in my stomach.” The energy didn’t feel like much; it was hot but the feeling was bearable.

“That’s where your core is, yes.”

“Great. Now I just need to figure out how to…take it, I guess.”

Charlotte closed her eyes and pushed again; the heat rose a bit from her stomach and she managed to carry it up to her rib cage before it faded. She tried again, this time with a harder push. The heat rose higher and nearly reached her heart.

I’m moving it, which is cool. I just need to figure out how to guide it out of me. Should I lead it toward my hands? That’s a good start.

She pushed and when the heat rose out of her stomach, she tried to nudge it to where she thought the path toward her arm was. She succeeded, but as soon as it passed through, the heat faded. Checking her core, she could hardly sense any anima.

Gritting her teeth, Charlotte pushed out some heat but didn’t try to guide it toward her arm. Instead, she grabbed the bat and pressed it against her bare stomach. With a grunt, she forced the anima to go out instead of up.

Her stomach burned something fierce, but she kept pushing. Slowly, and very painfully, the heat left her body and entered the bat, warming it in her hands. Charlotte sighed in relief; the whole experiment had tired her out and she wasn’t sure if she would have the energy to push any harder.

PHAT cheered loudly in her head and blew what sounded like a horn. “Congratulations! The weapon identified as ‘Spike Bat #420’ has now been recognized by the universe as your property! Now that Spike Bat #420 has been infused with your essence, take care to make sure it doesn’t break or get stolen!”

“But it’s my property,” Charlotte said. “How come it could get stolen? And who could steal it?”

“Other candidates, of course! Once someone overwhelms the anima you infuse into your weapon, it becomes their property!”

“There are other candidates? H-how can I find them?”

“There are approximately 1,296 candidates on the planet Thagua MB3, 500 of which are Paladin-Humans such as yourself.”

“You never said how I could-”

“Paladin-Human #42426,” PHAT interrupted, “it would be beneficial for you to prepare yourself for the incoming invasion rather than worry about socializing. There are forty-one minutes left until the invasion.”

“Fine,” she grumbled, getting to her feet. “How am I supposed to ‘prepare’?”

“Please look to your left. You should find a chest with proper clothing in it.”

The chest had magically appeared sometime during her experiments. She cautiously walked over to it and gave it a slight kick. She regretted it three seconds later when she was hopping around, holding her right foot.

PHAT sighed. “Do you have such little concern over the state of your well-being, Paladin-Human #42426?”

“My name is Charlotte,” she growled, limping back over to the chest. She threw open the lid with a huff then paused and stood up straight, putting her hands on her hips. “And I’d appreciate it if you called me that.”

“Thirty-seven minutes remaining, Charlotte.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” she murmured, tossing her bathrobe to the floor. She stood in only a pair of panties and a tank top for all the world to see.

She stared down at herself, PHAT murmured quietly that intense exercise to reduce her fat would increase her chances of survival by a great amount. She told it to shut up as she pulled the clothes out of the chest.

It was a simple grey one-piece uniform with a zipper in the front and pockets lining both legs. There were socks stuffed in the left pant leg and she slipped a pair on before squeezing into the uniform. It hugged her love handles rather tightly but it wouldn’t restrict her movement too much. She found a pair of boots that were too big for her feet, so she stuffed the second pair of socks in them.

Fully dressed, she picked up her bat, testing the weight.

“So, uh, PHAT?”

“Yes?”

She swung the bat down and nearly fell down when it kept going. Grimacing, she put it down and folded her arms. “Why was I brought here?”

“To purge the Naid!”

“Yeah, but like…why me?”

PHAT hummed. “Unfortunately, I can’t answer that at the moment. If you are ready to begin the invasion, please pick up your weapon and proceed to the cabin entrance.”

Lanterns she hadn’t seen hanging on the wall flickered to life, their light casting long shadows on the floor. With a sinking feeling in her gut, Charlotte realized she wasn’t ready to begin the invasion.

“W-wait!” she cried. “You never told me where I could find other people!”

“Your concerns should be focusing on the invasion!” PHAT scolded. “It’s not like there are other paladins in the same starting zone as-Oh.”

Her stomach churning with fear, Charlotte snatched up her bat and held it up awkwardly. “Oh? Oh, what?”

“Looks like the invasion came early!”

Before Charlotte could ask what that meant, an honest to God zombie burst into the cabin.