"Picky couldn’t quite remember when the weird letters had started coming in. Maybe three or four months after Ness and his friends saved the universe."
at least half of this was written late at night so sorry if none of it really makes sense. i also apologise for not knowing how american schools work i'm just a kiwi
edit: apparently i forgot that there was a letter from porkey right at the end of earthbound. oops.
Picky couldn’t quite remember when the weird letters had started coming in. Maybe three or four months after Ness and his friends saved the universe. Porkey never came back. Ness had told him why. It upset him to find out, but it upset Ness just as much telling him. He felt he deserved to know the truth. He was Porkey’s brother, after all.
The first one arrived like a invitation to a mystical land would arrive in a fantasy novel. Picky was just getting settled into bed when a piece of A4 paper fluttered through the still-open window. It landed on the floor like a leaf falling from a tree. Picky looked at it with bewilderment for a few seconds, then cautiously peeled the sheets off him and tiptoed to the paper. He picked it up, then hurriedly returned to the comforts of his bed. He turned the paper over to find there was something written on it. Only four words, hastily written on the paper. The handwriting, he didn’t recognise.
“I’M NOT GONE YET.”
Picky, initially, had no idea what it meant. But whoever- whatever- had sent this, it seemed to know him. And he didn’t want to know how. He hid the letter under his pillow and went to sleep.
The next morning, he woke up dishevelled. He had a hard time going to sleep that night, what with the ominous letter and all. He knew there was no way he could possibly keep the letter under his pillow, lest his mother find it, so he scrunched it into his school bag and hid in his desk drawer.
It was at the same time that night that the second letter came fluttering in. Again, Picky was already snuggled in bed. He was initially going to ignore it, but fear of who or what sending it doing something horrible overwhelmed him, and he picked up the letter and scuttled back into bed before reading it. It was another short message.
“DON’T BELIEVE HIM, PICKY. I’LL COME BACK SOON.”
How did the sender know his name?!Did somebody tell it? Or had it been spying on him the entire time? And who was “him”? Did he know “him”? The second letter only left Picky with more questions than answers. He placed the letter under his pillow to be hidden away at school and hoped for a decent night’s sleep.
The third letter came a couple of nights later. Picky had thought that whoever was sending the letters had just given up, but sadly, this was not the case. The third letter had come earlier than usual, as it was already sitting on the floor when he arrived in his room. He approached the letter, picked it up and turned it over in his hands.
“NESS. HE TOLD YOU THAT I MIGHT NOT COME BACK, DIDN’T HE? DON’T BELIEVE HIM. I WILL BE COMING BACK.”
It knew Ness. Oh God, it knew Ness. If it knew Ness, then surely it couldn’t have been a good sign of things to come. He shoved it under his pillow and tried to fall asleep. Earnestly, he did. But he couldn’t.
Thankfully, he managed to remember to take the third letter with him to school. All that day, he couldn’t focus. His teacher told him to go to bed early that night. Picky said he’d try.
Admittedly, he had no idea why he didn’t of that. If he went to bed early, then maybe he wouldn’t get the letter before he went to bed! And he didn’t.
But the fourth letter was lying on his floor the next morning. It wasn’t a very good way to start the day. In fact, it was one of the worst. All of Picky’s common sense was screaming at him to not read the letter that had been delivered while he was asleep, but despite that, he picked it up and turned it over anyway.
“HAVE YOU SERIOUSLY FORGOTTEN ABOUT ME ALREADY?! IT’S ME.
“ - PORKEY.”
It couldn’t have. That wasn’t his handwriting. His was much messier, even if it was done with effort. This was the opposite. Why didn’t Porkey just write the letter himself? What exactly happened back then?
The first sentence repeated itself in the corner of Picky’s mind. He had been trying to keep Porkey at the back of his mind, and he tried not to think about him nowadays. He knew that if he did, he’d never be able to focus at school. His mum would punish him pretty badly, too. And it soon dawned on him that it was already.
He was snapped out of his thoughts by his mother practically screaming at him from downstairs, “Picky! Get your damn breakfast!”
He hastily grabbed his school bag, shoved the letter inside and rushed downstairs.
That day at school seemed to lurch by. At least four people asked if he was okay - he said he was fine. Nobody pried further.
The fifth letter never came that night. The only difference this time around was that Picky had waited for the letter to arrive. He watched the window for Porkey, or whoever was delivering the letters on his behalf. Maybe it was that very fact that caused the letter to not be delivered that night. After a couple of hours of waiting, Picky’s eyelids grew tired, and after closing the window, he settled himself into bed.
A closed window would not stop the letters from being delivered.
Picky had managed to leave home a little bit earlier that morning, which he was grateful for. For the first couple of minutes of his walk to school, he just admired the trees. They weren’t special or rare or anything, but with everything he was going through, it was nice to just be able to look at them.
He almost jumped when he heard Ness call out, “Hey, Picky!”
The older boy ran up to him, then stopped to catch his breath.
“Sorry if I scared you,” Ness apologised.
“Oh… It’s alright.” That was one of the few times of his day-to-day life where he didn’t lie.
Ness held up an envelope as he told Picky, “This came in the mail today… It’s got your name on it for some reason? I figured it must be for you.”
As Ness handed him the envelope, Picky figured out exactly what was in there. The same rushed handwriting, the same pen.
“Uh… I’ll open it when I get to school. Thanks,” he murmured.
“No prob!” Ness smiled.
The two of them walked the rest of the way to school together. They parted ways as Ness headed to his form room. Picky, however, snuck to his secret spot. It was in a bush a short ways away from the boys toilets, and he was genuinely surprised he hadn’t been found there yet. The leaves couldn’t have been that thick. In there, he peeled the envelope open, dreading what was inside. Just as he suspected, it was another letter. It had been folded in half to fit inside. Picky pulled it out and opened it.
“GO TO SATURN VALLEY. IT’S NOT ON ANY MAPS, SO I’LL TELL YOU WHERE IT IS. IT’S NORTH OF THREED.”
It was nice of Porkey to tell him where Saturn Valley was. Unexpected, too. Obviously he wanted something to get done. It was at that moment Picky thought to himself, ‘There’s still time. You don’t have to do this.’
He wanted it to end. He wanted the letters to stop coming, he wanted the ominous messages to go away. But would ignoring the letters really bring that? Picky wasn’t sure. And he didn’t want to disappoint his brother…
It was a risky move, but it was one he had to take if he wanted to get to Threed. His mother’s wallet was on the kitchen table, he just needed an opportunity when he was sure no one was around to catch him. He had never done anything like this before, though he had watched Porkey do it a few times before the meteorite crashed. Only two of those attempts were successful.
Picky worked on his homework as he waited for his mother and Mr. Prettyman to head up to their room. He had long since finished it when they did. After hearing the click of their door closing, Picky carefully got up and tiptoed down the stairs and into the kitchen. His eyes immediately locked onto his target - the wallet. He skittered over to the table and cautiously lifted open the wallet. Inside were two $1 notes - exactly the amount he needed. He hesitated for a moment. He was still second-guessing himself. But he had already made it this far, he felt he couldn’t turn back now. He hastily pinched the notes from his mum’s wallet and ran out of the door.
He ran. He ran and ran and ran and ran. He knew he had to run far to get to the nearest bus station. He doubted if it would even be open by the time he got there. Those thoughts passed through his mind like the world around him. The only thing he could focus on was the sound of his feet hitting the pavement and his shallow breaths.
The roads gave way to dirt tracks. Picky stayed on them as best he could. His shoes ended up being soaked in the nighttime dew nestling on the grass.
His legs were more than eager to collapse on him when he got to Twoson. No one was out, and there no cars, either. It was all so dark. It scared him, being all alone in a town he had never been to before, in the dark. He slowed his run down to a jog as he went down the footpath. His eyebrows had turned up in fear. He felt the footpath end and the road begin as he passed by a wide building he couldn't make out the features of. He stopped there and backed up a little. In the distance, he saw a pair of headlights. They belonged to a large vehicle that appeared as no more than a black blob as it drew near. It passed by Picky and went further up the road, the to the right. The motor stopped after a few moments. Picky ran after it.
The lights on the vehicle were still on. Picky picked up his pace a little seeing this, and ran around to the other side of the vehicle. A man well into his forties sat at the wheel, smoking a cigarette as he gazed into the distance, waiting for something he thought might not come. The lights of the vehicle illuminated some of its surroundings, and in this light Picky saw a sign. He could barely read it with how little of said light there was, but he managed to make out “bus schedule” written in red at the top of the sign.
“You lookin’ to get on, kid?” the driver’s voice grumbled. “You’re lucky. This is the last ride for the night. It goes from here to Fourside. Two dollars if you wanna get on.
Picky handed the bus driver the two dollars he nabbed from his mother, then clambered onto the bus. The bus restarted with a heavy roar, then slowly backed out of the station. Soon enough, it was on the road.
Picky blinked as the bus entered Two-Three Tunnel. The lights blinked as they lit up the tunnel, but their light did not invite warmth. If anything, it just made Picky more nervous than he already was. He soon had to readjust himself as the bus exited the tunnel on Threed’s end.
The bus pulled into the Threed station.
“The bus keeps going to Fourside. You wanna get off here?” the bus driver asked.
“Um… yes please,” Picky squeaked.
He climbed out of the bus and into the cool Threed air.
“Alright. Stay safe, kid.” The bus driver restarted the bus, then drove away. Picky watched it go until he couldn’t see it anymore. Which wasn’t long, admittedly.
Now he just had to head north.
The journey to Saturn Valley became a blur. He just barely remembered walking there. He remembered the sound of a waterfall, but not much else aside from that.
He woke up in a round, white room. He was lying on a sleeping bag, and a strange, tan creature with a big round nose and a bow in its one strand of hair stood near him.
“You kay-o?” it asked, cocking its head.
“Uh… I… think I am…” Picky mumbled as he sat up.
“You pass out here! Had us all worried!” the creature explained.
A new voice, clearly human, joined in the conversation. “It was awfully late, too. Usually I’m the only one awake at such hours.”
The boy who spoke sat near the strange creature, and looked to be around Ness’ age. He wore glasses with lenses so thick Picky couldn’t see his eyes, and he was awfully pale, too.
With a flick of its head, the creature said, “That Jeff. I Dr. Saturn! We do check-ups on you while you sleep!”
That cleared up something for Picky, at least.
Jeff stood up and said, “I’ll go get Dr. Andonuts. He did hear about this, didn’t he?”
“News all over Saturn Valley! Saturns are very chatty,” Dr. Saturn told him.
Jeff simply nodded, then left. Picky and Dr. Saturn sat in silence for what seemed like forever. Another creature identical to Dr. Saturn walked in, inexplicably holding two envelopes.
It looked directly at Picky as it asked, “You Picky?”
Picky simply replied with an “mhm”, and the creature waddled over to him and handed him the envelopes.
“For you! Delivered by strange pig…” the creature told him before leaving.
Dr. Saturn watched the creature leave, then hopped into a blue trash can Picky hadn’t noticed until that point. He supposed he was too tired to care.
Both envelopes had his name hastily written on the front. He took the top one and opened it, then folded out the letter inside.
“HAH. YOU MAKE A GOOD DISTRACTION. KING P REALLY LIKES YOU, HUH? I’LL NEVER KNOW WHY. HE LIKES TO KEEP THINGS SECRET. HE MADE ME GO THROUGH ALL THAT TROUBLE OF WRITING AND GETTING THOSE LETTERS TO YOU.
“…THAT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE BETWEEN HIM AND ME, BUT I GUESS YOU CAN KNOW, TOO. JUST DON’T TELL KING P.
“- NOT KING P”
That answered why Porkey’s handwriting wasn’t the same. But Picky couldn’t help but notice what the anonymous letter-writer had referred to his brother as. “King P”. Picky wasn’t sure whether he should have been happy for his brother for making it so far or scared of what he’d done. He decided not to dwell on it, and instead open the second envelope. The second letter was more concerning.
“WOW, PICKY, YOU ACTUALLY DID SOMETHING USEFUL FOR ONCE! ALL YOU HAD TO DO WAS PASS OUT, AND EVERY MR. SATURN AND THEIR GRANDMA CAME RUNNING! I GOT WHO I WANTED HERE THANKS TO YOU. I WOULD ASK IF YOU WOULD COME WITH ME, BUT I KNOW WHAT YOU’LL SAY.”
Thanks to you, I got who I wanted. WHO he wanted. Whatever Porkey wanted with this person, it can’t have been for a good reason. He just knew it.
Picky slept as much as he could for the rest of that day. It was around sunset that Ness came to Saturn Valley in a panic. Jeff had called him, apparently, to take him back home to Onett. He didn’t question Picky too much, thankfully. He was more concerned about his wellbeing. He went back to the valley when Picky got home, but didn’t say why.
His mother and Mr. Prettyman weren’t happy at all with him when he got home. Mr. Prettyman was nicer than his mum, at least.
That night, Picky couldn’t sleep. He had made sure that the window was closed, but he still couldn’t rest easy. He felt as though he was being watched by that person who wrote the letters, or Porkey. He tried reassuring himself that no one was awake. No one was outside. There was no meteorite on the hill. Everything was how it used to be.
It didn’t work, but he managed to fall asleep, at least.
i want to believe that mr. prettyman is nice. please. picky deserves a good parental figure.