Dungeons and Dragons Cartoon Stories: Neverending Story: Looking Back

Letting herself into the house by the back door, using the key she'd been given some years before, the black-haired girl stopped on the threshold. She covered her mouth, holding back the sob as best she could. Tears filled her eyes, and she couldn't see the blurred kitchen before her, too lost in her grief to care.

A woman with strawberry-blond hair, dressed in the clothes she'd worn to the magazine editorial office where she worked, stood up, frowning, and went to her. Slipping her arms around the crying teen, she looked silently towards the door, waiting for the girl's companion to enter. He didn't, and a sudden welling of instinctive fear took hold of the waiting mother.

"Terri? What's happened? Where's Bobby?" She shook the girl, her voice on the verge of tears. Fighting the worry and fear, the woman shook her son's best friend again. "What happened to Bobby, Terri? Where is he?"

Terri shook her head, lifting blue eyes to the woman. "I... he... he..." How could she explain? How could she do this to this woman who'd already lost one child. How did she explain that Bobby voluntarily left? "Bobby... said he was going to find... Sheila..."

It was the best she could do, but still it drew a scream of disbelief from the other woman. With a sob, Terri wrapped her arms around the older woman, knowing the doubt and confusion would eventually evolve to anger then acceptance then grief. She'd lost her son that day as sure as she'd lost her daughter eight years before.

The entrance of the blond man in the baseball jersey and sweat suit drew both females up sharp. However, as it was an older man with confusion in his eyes, the woman sobbed again. She broke away from the teen and went to her husband, sobbing into his chest and babbling something which sounded like "Bob... run... way... Sheil..."

With a frown, Mr. O'Neil looked to Terri, and she sighed, nodding sadly. "Bobby said he knew where Sheila was and was going after her." It was the truth, but it still tore Terri up inside to tell them it. It felt like she was lying, giving them false hope or something. Absently, she started playing with her heart-shaped locket. "I... should go."

Moving slowly towards the kitchen door, knowing there was nothing left for her there, the young woman sighed feeling suddenly more bereft than she had when Bobby had gone into the ride. She paused, though, thinking of something. "Um... I left some things in Bobby's room... could... could I take them with me?" She couldn't look the older couple in the eyes, guilt playing across her features.

"Why? Oh, Terri... you're always welcome here, dear!" Mrs. O'Neil's voice sounded desperate. The girl might not be her own child, but she was the last link to her son... the girl who'd been coming over practically every day for eight years, the girl she hoped might marry her son and give her grandchildren to love. "You don't have to..."

Terri turned and nodded, sorrow in her eyes, laced with determination. "Yes, I do, Mrs. O'Neil. I... I've got to... deal with this on my own. I... please? Can I get the stuff?"

"Of course you can, Terr." Mr. O'Neil nodded towards the kitchen stairs. "Go up the back way. Get whatever you need. And... come back as soon as you've thought things through. You are welcome here anytime, Terr." He added as he hugged his wife, but his eyes relayed the truth of his words.

Using the second key Bobby had given her years ago, Terri tried to unlock the silent bedroom. Her hand shook and she had to take a break twice before she'd calmed herself enough to get it into the mechanism. Then, she turned the key and heard the click. With a deep breath, Terri slipped into Bobby's darkened bedroom, knowing that even his parents didn't come in here unless invited.

Walking in, letting the door swing shut, at first the teen left it dark. Instead, she stood just inside the door and felt. She could smell him still, the leather jacket he loved, the after shave he'd started using, even the faint smell of laundry in the hamper in the corner. With a sigh, knowing she had to move before one or both parents came up to offer her help, Terri turned and flipped on the light.

She slowly turned back, facing the surprisingly youthful looking room. The walls were decorated with unicorn paper, something one expected to find in the room of a nine-year-old girl rather than a seventeen-year-old boy. The dark haired teen smiled softly, touching one of the mythical beasts, letting herself recall the days she'd helped him put up that paper... without the knowledge or permission of his parents. It had taken months, but they'd even managed to paint all the manes and tails flame colored in remembrance of the unicorn Bobby had left behind in the Realm.

Turning, she sighed as her eyes fell on the desk, where Sheila's yearbooks had been stacked. He'd sneaked into his sister's room and stolen them, carefully rearranging her bookshelves so his parents wouldn't be aware of it. Then he'd photocopied the pictures of his five missing friends, placing them in a scrapbook with all articles and clippings he could get his hands on; he didn't just save the information about the kidnappings, either. Instead, Bobby had gone to the library and copied anything he could find, including sports awards for Hank and Diana, academic achievements for Presto, society articles on Eric, and the birth reports that went along with each teen, too.

Now, those scrapbooks and Sheila's yearbooks sat to the side of the desk, near the last notebook he'd been busy filling with adventures from the Realm. The rest of his notebooks were in a box under some abandoned clothes in his closet. That's where Terri headed.

She held back tears as she sorted through the debris of a teenager's misspent youth: clothes, sport's equipment, comic books, and old board games were piled haphazardly on the shelves, marking Bobby as the world's most normal teen. It was the box marked "Do not touch on pain of death!" that had her worried. She didn't want his parents to find out just how obsessed he'd been with what they termed fantasy. She had to get his books out of there before they started looking through the room for old memories.

Getting to work, Terri drug the heavy box from the closet past the rack of weights in the corner, letting the debris of childhood fall to the floor with a clatter. She hurried over to the desk and swept up the yearbooks and scrapbooks, stacking them next to the box. Looking in the closet, searching for a gym bag to carry the other books in, the girl became aware of a gentle tapping on the door. They'd come looking for her. "Yes?" There it was! Terri grabbed it up, not bothering to dump the light weight bag, cramming Sheila's books into it as fast as possible.

She whirled as the door opened and Mr. O'Neil stopped dead, looking around his son's room in shock. He'd not seen it since the day Sheila had disappeared, respecting his son's privacy. Now he wondered just what had gone on in his son's life that he'd not seen... and if it had anything to do with him running away. The man sighed deeply and looked at Terri.

He noted the "Pain of Death" box and the stack of notebooks on top. Looking back at the girl's guilty eyes, he nodded and moved over to pick up the heavy burden. Quietly, he asked, "Where did you want these, Terr?" He met her eyes.

She cringed, seeing the knowledge in his face. He knew they were Bobby's, not hers, and yet he was willing to play along. He'd just lost his second child, and yet he was willing to let her take a big piece of that child's life out of the house, perhaps forever. Terri hung her head. "I'm sorry, Mr. O'Neil. Bobby didn't want anyone reading his books. He... he has a bunch of personal stuff in there that... that I'm not supposed to tell anyone." Flushing, she looked up at the tall man with pleading eyes.

Mr. O'Neil nodded and set the stuff back down, slipping onto the bed with a sigh. He patted the dark lilac quilt and turned to her. As she sat, absently thinking the color matched Sheila's magic cloak, he sighed again. "Terri. I want the truth."

The father turned and looked over the wallpaper, seeing the amount of work invested in painting each of the unicorns. He looked around the dark lilac theme of the room and back to the cheery paper on the walls. Slowly, his eyes fell once more on Terri. "He didn't go looking for Sheila. He ran away because he felt he didn't fit in anymore, didn't he?"

The girl's head shot up, surprise in her eyes. "Did... didn't fit in?" She felt bewildered and confused. What was he talking about? Did he know something she didn't?

With a nod, Mr. O'Neil stood up and picked up the heavy box. He headed slowly for the door. "Don't tell his mother, Terr. It'd kill her to know her son was... gay." He left the room and a stunned teenager behind.

She wanted to laugh, to protest, to cry. How little they knew their own son. How little his own trials had made an impact on their lives. To think that his father would come up with such an answer to the question of Bobby based on the room he lived in was odd to say the least. Dark hair swinging, she stood and collected the gym bag, frowning as she went downstairs. It was an odd world in which a father could write off his son with a simple label.

Terri left the house and got into her car, not even able to look at the man in the eye. She couldn't deny the assumption, but she didn't feel right leaving a lie behind. Finally, just as she was about to start the car, and Mr. O'Neil was about to go inside, she looked up. "Mr. O'Neil... no matter what, Bobby still loves you both." It was small consolation to a grieving father and girlfriend.

Alone in her own room, having spent the last several minutes slowly lugging the heavy burden up the stairs, Terri sat, exhausted, on the floor. She reached for the box several times, but hesitated and dropped her hand every time. She couldn't look at those horrible notebooks! They held three years of Bobby's life in minute detail, but she never even wanted to see them again. Finally, she turned instead to the gym bag with Sheila's yearbooks.

Unzipping the bag, taking a deep breath, the black-haired girl tried to steel herself for the coming ordeal. She would force herself to look through the books, finding brief snapshots of young teens before their lives had changed completely... before they had even gotten to their final year of schooling. She would make herself recall those five teenagers she'd been avoiding thinking about while trying to help Bobby return to a nightmare he’d been forced from.

Reaching in, the first thing Terri's hand fell on wasn't a hard covered book. It was something soft and squishy, wrapped in paper. Tilting her head, the teen drew out the object, instantly seeing the tag with her name on it. A birthday present!

She started crying, holding the present in her lap. Bobby had obviously planned on giving this to her when the time came around. He'd been thinking ahead, at least a little, believing he'd still be there. Somehow, the knowledge that Bobby had at least thought he might not go back comforted the girl. Hugging the squishy present, Terri sobbed.

It was many long minutes before she gathered herself together and debated whether she should open the gift, despite it not being her birthday for almost a year, or wait for Bobby to return to give it to her. He might never return, after all, and this was one last piece of him she could have. Shaking her head, Terri tried to dispel the idea that Bobby wouldn't return. He had to! And... when he did, he could get her a new present.

Smiling at her decision, and the defiant reasoning behind it, the teen slowly unwrapped the gift. It was a stuffed dog, much like her old Freddie had looked years ago. Her dog hadn't made it back from the Realm, getting lost somewhere between here and there, but Bobby had eased the pain of losing Freddie. Terri smiled, though tears again welled in her eyes. She turned the dog every which way, examining the stuffed bit of fur. Surprised, she noticed it had a locket around its neck: a big, gaudy children's piece of jewelry shaped like a heart and made of silver-coated plastic.

With a wistful sigh, Terri fondled the heart. Bobby was broody and obsessive, but he'd always had a sentimental side... even if he kept it hidden. He didn't like big public displays or confessions, but every once in awhile he'd do something sweet. She felt the clasp on the heart and tilted her head, curiously. She flicked it open.

Inside was set a picture of her at nine and him at the same age. Loosely placed inside were pictures of them at seventeen. Both sets were in the shape of a heart, and sized to match two very different lockets: the young ones for this piece of children's jewelry, the smaller ones... Terri picked them up with a shaking hand and reached for the tiny heart around her neck. Holding her breath, she flicked open her own locket and fit the pictures in... a perfect match.

"Oh, Bobby, it's beautiful!" She collapsed onto the floor, cuddling the stuffed dog and crying.

With a sigh, the teenaged girl forced herself off the rug to flick on the light switch. Looking around, red-rimmed eyes burning and puffy from her bout of tears, Terri held back a sniffle. She dragged her feet as she walked over to the stack of books and the box. The stuffed dog remained clutched in her arms, though she seemed unaware of the fact.

Sinking down to the carpet once more, becoming slowly aware of the sounds of her parents moving around downstairs, the dark-haired girl reached for the box. She hadn't wanted to read these horrible books earlier, but something drove her to it now. Pulling one out at random, she started idling flipping through the yellowed pages. It was a good three years old, and listed the many weapons Bobby had come across in the Realm.

The Dragon's Graveyard seemed to be a source of many weapons, and the story of their time there was set right after the listing. It was easy to get lost in the writing, despite the obvious mistakes of a teen uncaring of grammar and spelling. Idly, Terri recalled that Bobby would have been thirteen while writing this, though he'd actually lived sixteen years in total. She turned the page.

Eyes widening, her breath caught. Was this true? She flipped desperately through the book, stopped, and hurried to lock her door before once more sitting on the carpet to read through Bobby's notebook. It couldn't be possible... could it? Would it help?

She flipped back to the list of weapons, leaving it open, then pulled the rest of the books out of the box. Flipping through one after another, Terri's heart nearly froze in a mix of dread and excitement. There... she'd found another... and another. Eventually, she had each notebook opened to a different list Bobby'd made: weapons, enemies, allies, locations. It was all there! He had pretty much a listing of anything important in the entire Realm, a listing that would be very valuable to anyone trying to end a war... or start it.

Glancing back at the first notebook, the one with the Dragon's Graveyard in it, Terri started flipping pages once more. She had to find it, had to... It took several hours, but she located what she'd sought. It was something Bobby had mentioned once, long ago, something she had deliberately forgotten all these long years. And she found herself reading avidly now that she'd recalled it.

Slowly, once she'd finished, she flipped back to the weapons listing and started studying each open book around her. With a slow intake, then outtake of breath, the teen nodded to herself. She clasped her small locket in one hand and closed her eyes, concentrating on what she must do. If what Bobby had written was true, then this would work.

A rush of wind screamed through the room slamming the notebooks shut, but Terri kept her eyes closed. She concentrated harder as a roaring noise filled the air like an angry dragon. Heat and cold swirled round her in alternating patterns and the trembling girl found her hair being lifted, then her limbs. Without looking, without breaking concentration, she kept repeating in her mind what she wanted. Then, with a ripping sound followed by the rushing of the air, Terri disappeared.

All that remained of the seventeen-year-old was an abandoned stuffed dog with a dully-gleaming child's locket, two children's pictures smiling up from the gaudy toy.

To Be Continued in Chapter Ten: Regrets and Repercussions

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