Inner Man Theatre

(All four hosts: Congratulations!  You finished the story!)

(Lu: Pff!  One way or another.)

(Katie: Even if you didn’t technically win, you still finished.)

(Elena: Congrats to those who did manage to make it here via the original story we were trying to tell.  So, did you figure out our quirky game mechanic?)

(Hyper: We started with the story of Lu Lu and Katie, but your answers to our questions determined whether you were reading about the duo that’s here in the game or another duo that were a part of the backstory for one of our other contestants.)

(Charis: In other words, one wrong answer meant you were actually tricked into reading the backstory of Sieben, or Tom and Mike, or Vahnna.  Neat, right?)

(Elena: Even if you got all the important questions right, I’m sure you’ll still want to figure out what answers you’ll need to give in the various replays to learn about all the other precious friends you see standing behind us.  Now, we can let you do that later.  Right now, we need to address the task we called you all here for.  Please don’t forget our multiverse is at stake.  In order to save all of reality, I need you all to…finish my grocery shopping for me. 😊)

(Sieben, Tom & Mike: *Loud groans*)

(Vahnna: Seriously?!)

(Lu & Kate: *Intense laughter*)

(Elena: Now, let’s go to battle!)

    And so, it began!  Elena and her heroes went forth to Fi’s Fine Food Fun, one of System Guard Fiona’s many grocery stories, to pick up the last few items on our hostess’s list.  You didn’t know that [almost] everyone’s favorite SG trainer had her own chain of stores, did you?  And the fact she has more than one is impressive.  Where do you think the System-famous cuisine queen Tea gets all her finest ingredients?

    Like the hovering grocery cart?  There are no squeaky, broken wheels.  As you can see, most of the shopping is just loading up on Cheeci Grin cheese popcorn, because how else would you describe our material other than cheesy and corny?  Oh, look!  The group ran into Jaqui Scar as she’s picking up some essentials to prepare for a battle against some monster.  You can tell she’s getting ready for a battle and not a date with her husband because she’s using an off-brand shampoo.  Don’t make the mistake of thinking she’ll mess up her good dress fighting that monster.  She’ll switch into her gray armor and makeup along the way.  She’s not irresponsible.

    I should clarify that the shopping took place in Storyboard XI, the home of the main cast of System Guards you fans are familiar with.  However, with the mission over, we return to Lu’s home universe to wrap up this tale.  With our new team of six, Elena and Charis felt something was missing, so they asked me to take some bags of the cheesy popcorn and turn them into a new character.  His name is Cheeci.  We’ll enjoy his goofy four-eyed look for a while before actually turning him into a fully humanoid character.  I just made this transitional state to get on Elena’s nerves, and because my idea of what he’ll look like when I’m done reminds me too much of Planet Yomawatup native Fun Sanchez, ha ha!  Trust me; they’re not related in any way.

    That aside, the group does a great job of establishing the System Guards in this universe, and they will defend this storyboard from many a fearsome foe.  I’ll also point out all the other storyboards you may have read about along the way had all their issues resolved, even teaming up with this one on occasion!  So then, that only leaves a few other things I want to address.

    While I’m sure you assumed correctly that Tom and Mike married their respective girls and brought them over to this new place, you may not have realized Sieben also married a girl you’ve already seen in the game.  Oh, Lu Lu wants me to point out that she and Katie succeeded in finding themselves some good husbands as well.  Yay, you!  Now, back to what I was saying, Sieben and Vahnna married and served with the team for several years.  So much time has passed since we finished that shopping route that, even with advanced SG health technology keeping the adults all young and healthy, the happy couple are actually grandparents now!  Of course, Sieben still has a kingdom to inherit, so he and Vahnna have decided to take their family back to Storyboard XII and live out the rest of their lives there.  Elena and Charis will work out the details so their families won’t freak out over the drastic changes that will have seemingly happened overnight, but one sad side effect of this noble decision will be the temporary erasure of their memories regarding these events for security purposes, as well as their ages taking their normal courses.

    The couple will still have a happy marriage, but I think you already know Vahnna will have to eventually face the sad day of saying goodbye to her wonderful king.  Don’t be too sad, however!  As the retiring queen leaves her son Adrian Acht to be the new king, our gallant gal will eventually find love again when some guy wearing an eyepatch and red armor comes into her life, bringing her back into the System Guard routine.  This is how the mysterious girl you met in this game will one day become the Lady Vahnna you know and love from the Bible Challenge.  See?  We did it again and tricked you into reading someone’s backstory without you realizing it, at least for a while.  So then, with the house clear, Elena and Charis can clean up and go on to the next adventure, right?

(Charis: Whew!  That took forever!  I’m going to start cleaning so I can kick my feet up and relax.  I’ll even change the living room color to something the guys can appreciate.)

(Elena: Alright, you start on that side, and I’ll start over here.)

(Charis: Teamwork!  Oh, by the way, I’m glad we included Vahnna in the game so we could address the age contradiction that will arise when her backstory is fully revealed.  Now, the audience won’t be asking where the extra twenty years came from.)

(Elena: Heh heh heh, oh Charis, that is naively speaking from the System Director’s perspective.  To him, he came up with this story to explain why her kids and grandkids are all older than they should be, but in reality, I specifically chose her to start all of this so he’d have to go out of his way to explain it in the first place.  Why?  Just to annoy our adorable goofy goober of an author.  Mwahaha!)

(Charis: *Slow train of snickers gradually leading to full laughter* That’s so awful!  I wish I had thought of that.)

And the train keeps chuggin’ along!

-Try again and follow a different character-

-Run like mad to the main arcade-