A Tale of Heroic Running


One night, the trickster Marco was deep in sleep. He began to dream of swimming through the cosmos, rolling around in the great belts of stars. He began to feel a chill, so he made a course for the closest sun. However as he approached, the sun turned to him and spoke, "Child of eternity, I beg of you. Please help me for I soon will perish to the clutches of the Great Lost Space." Marco could see the despair in the sun's eye and he heroically nodded."Don't worry my friend, I will face this beast" The sun hugged Marco with warmth that gave him strength and then pointed out a space devoid of any light. "There it is Child, please reason with it, or else I fear we all will be lost to it's grasp. Marco soared over to the Lost Space and hailed it, "Great beast, leave this place and never return!" The blackness bellowed back at him, "who are you to stand against me? I am the Great Lost Space, consumer of all that lays for all eternity! I will not be deterred by such a small entity as YOU." With that the great beast growled and lashed out with an arm unseen. Marco quickly dodged the attack and spoke up, "I wish to prove to you, the power that I myself do hold. Offer me a task you fowl abomination, and if I succeed, you must forever leave space!" The blackness chuckled to it's self and said, "Let it be, small being. I challenge thee to do the impossible. You must run through four things in Your world of reality. Then, I will depart." Marco nodded casually, "I accept your challenge".

Marco awoke and sprang out of bed. "I have to save the sun" he thought. But how? He must find four things to run through by the end of the day or else the Great Lost Space will eat his world. He raced out of his tree fort and swung from vine to vine, he must get the help of his friend Olivia. Quickly traveling between trees, he slid down a vine to the forest floor. There was the entrance to a huge cave, closed by two heavy oak doors. Marco hastily knocked until he heard movement from behind them. Out of breath, Marco greeted her. "Olivia, I have terrible news. A great beast is coming to devour the sun. If we don't meet his challenge, we'll all perish!" She nodded determinedly and the two set off, Marco explaining the challenge as they went. "Run through," she mused, "what an interesting phrasing." Marco looked at her confused. "The term 'run through' leaves this very susceptible to our interpretation." "What do you mean interpretation?" asked Marco. "Follow me" she said starting to run.

The two ran until they came upon the great metropolis, Watercity. They jumped and landed on top of a parking garage in the heart of the city. "We can 'run through' this parking garage!" she said smartly. The two high-fived and began to run and dance through the concrete levels. One down, three to go.

As they reached the bottom of the parking garage a sudden bang stunned them. The skies turned to night and a hush enclosed the city. All the people had vanished. A rip in space appeared and sucked Olivia in. Marco tried to grab her, but the rip soon closed. A great voice bellowed in his ears, "GAH! You tricked me! For that she is mine! I will not tolerate this insolence!" Marco shouted back, "A deals a deal, and I'll beat your challenge! And when I do, I want everything back the way it was!" The voice chuckled and then went silent.

Marco's mind raced, there was little time in the day and three more things to run through! Then the thought struck him. He must go to the Great Cartographer Luke. He would know of places to run through. He clicked his heels three times and closed his eyes. When he opened them he was outside the gigantic sky castle of Luke. He raced through the doors and up the stairs to Luke's laboratory. Bursting through the doors he found Luke and his assistant Stefan observing the ground below through a golden telescope. Luke turned around, "Ahhh Marco, what brings you here?" Marco hastily explained the challenge and what had happened in the city. "It captured Olivia and everybody in the city? We have to stop this." said Stefan. "That's where you two come in. I need places to run through, and you guys know places". "Hmm, Yes," mused Luke as he looked through his charts, "Let's see. One may run through a field. Possibly a street?. And I have a theory that one could possibly run through a bush." "Yes, excellent." said Marco, "Lets do all three".

They all flew back to the city and landed in a park, quickly parading through it's large open field. Then traveled to the vacant street, racing along between it's deserted cars. Finally they found a bush and, not sure at first, ran thought it's slender branches. "That did it!" cried Marco, "I have run though four things!"

A terrible cry came from the sky, "Noooooo! This can't be- ARGH!!!" The people appeared back in their cars and and Olivia climbed out of another rip in space, "Thanks for rescuing me fellas." "We couldn't have done it with out you" said Marco and the four jumped up and had a super high-five.

And that night the sun cradled Marco, both gently floating through space.