The Scaredy Yurble

Also by undeadfortune

To know Fear is to know one's limits.

     For many years the outskirts of Neopia Central were nothing but rich and prosperous farmland. The vast landscape was checked with fields of golden corn and berries of every color and flavor.

     The lush vegetation of years ago disappeared, perhaps with the onslaught of modern conveniences integrated into society by the Virtupets Corporation. Perhaps the modern Neopian had developed a taste for the exotic foods that exploration had introduced. Or maybe it was the terrible sandstorm that blew in from the Lost Desert... yes, a sandstorm can wipe out much more than just land. A particular sandstorm, decades ago, wiped out the happiness and security of a farmer Yurble who lived on that vast farmland outside of Neopia Central.

     That farmer was the only resident on that land now. He felt determined to remain, though his determination was tested by every farewell he gave. One by one, he watched his neighbors leave for more fertile farmland. At least the farmer still had his family of Yurbles, who lived with him on his farm in a large wooden house.

     A farmer nurtures his family and his field in much the same way - he watches them rise to meet the sun every morning, and he watches them sleep beneath the starry sky. He feeds them and he sings to them.

     They say, "A farmer's land is his heart."

     This farmer watched his farm, his field, his heart - he watched them wilt beneath an unmerciful sun, and helplessly he lived, unable to provide relief from the terrible sandstorms that continued to plague his land. But still he remained. A farmer must always remain close to his heart. Now he lived alone.

     In his solitude, he found himself following a daily routine, which helped him maintain a pleasant and sound mind. Sometimes, however, he would find himself staring sadly over his field, hoping some sign of vegetation would appear - it was the last hope of returning to the life he once had. The farmer never spent much time outside these days, mostly because of the sandstorms. They appeared without warning and sometimes lasted for hours at a time, with winds that could pick even the strongest of Neopets up off his feet.

     One day, after many years of solitude, the farmer Yurble found that there was less food in his cellar than he had thought. Either his memory was fading or his meager vegetable patch was producing less, but in both cases he still needed to eat. He sighed and climbed out of his cellar to look at the sky. It was clear, but he knew that clear skies did not have any bearing on when and where the next sandstorm would come. A weak breeze ruffled his fur, which was as green and mangy as the tops of the pine wood forest.

     As the old Yurble trudged toward the forests that bordered the barren farmlands, a faint glimmer of cheerfulness came alive in his chest. He imagined the lush green undergrowth of the forest and grew increasingly happy at the thought of scurrying through it in search of food. Perhaps he should have done this many years ago, instead of barring himself inside his little wooden farmhouse. The farmer had nearly reached the edge of the border when his fur began to prickle along his back. Turning around, he saw nothing behind him except for his clawmarks along the sand, and in front of him, the forest. He hadn't gone into the forest since he was a young Yurble, but now was no time to start being afraid. He'd lost everything there was to lose; there was nothing more Fear could take from him. Staunchly, and with a growling belly, the farmer Yurble proceeded into the dense forest, ignoring all senses that he was heading towards Fear.

     The forest was just as the old farmer remembered it, though the same could not be said for the places where the food was hidden. The Yurble quickly set to sniffing out the berries and nuts that were undoubtedly someplace beneath the foliage. Suddenly, the fur on his back prickled again. He paused and looked up, sniffing the air. He looked behind him, but there was nothing but the blackness of the forest. No matter how he tried convincing himself that nothing dwelled still in these forests, the farmer Yurble couldn't dispel the feeling that he wasn't alone. The darkness made him feel vulnerable. The farmer no longer felt the youthful joys of scrounging for food but now longed for the safety of his old wooden farmhouse. Quickly, he stuffed the nuts and berries he had found into his cheeks in typical Yurble fashion.

     He was about to return home when a rustle of leaves came from behind, startling him. Warily, the old green Yurble turned around, only to meet Fear face to face. As he stared into the darkness of the forest, a pair of round white eyes seemed to materialize between the trees. They stared back at the bewildered Yurble, unblinking. The farmer rubbed his eyes, but the two orbs did not fade - they were not a creation of his frightfully visionary imagination. It seemed like an eternity that the farmer and the two eyes were locked within their stares, but a plop! of water echoed through the forest, and the farmer, knocked out of his frozen, frightened state, scrambled out of the woods and ran for his life.

     The Yurble ran and ran and finally spotted his home in the distance. It was fortunate for him, too, since the wind began to stir and dust began to fly. When the farmer's worn claws clicked over his threshold and his wooden door was securely shut behind him, the farmer sank down to the ground in relief. Outside, the wind howled as yet another sandstorm arrived. The sky began to grow dark as the sand obscured the sun. The Yurble wandered into his kitchen and emptied his cheeks into a little bowl. Sadly, he contemplated how long the food would last him before he would need to go back out and confront Fear in the forests. With even more sadness, he contemplated his kitchen, where he once was able to feed his family with the riches of his land.

     Now, safe within his home and confident that even Fear could not reach him through the raging sandstorm outside, the Yurble's thoughts returned to what he had seen earlier in the forest. What was it that he had seen? He hadn't hesitated to call it Fear, but was Fear so real a thing? He had heard fellow farmers speak of Fear as such - but to each of them, Fear assumed a different form. For Thomas the Chia farmer, Fear was an overgrown Lupe with voracious appetite, whom Thomas had seen face to face one night while he was fixing a Babaa fence. And John the Lupe farmer had sworn that Fear was a Chia that devoured his entire crop of purple neggs and would next devour his family. Then again, Thomas the Chia and John the Lupe were always known to have been bad neighbors. The Yurble realized that he had no neighbors left to be confused with a monster in the night. Perhaps, then, the Yurble thought to himself, the frightening encounter in the woods was really just his imagination playing a trick on him.

     A crash sounded from nearby. The farmer jumped from his chair in surprise, only to look over and see that the sandstorm had blown out a pane of the window above the kitchen sink. He quickly scurried to board up the hole. By the time he had finished, large piles of sand had already accumulated in his kitchen. Sand still trickled in from between the boards, but at least now the majority of it was stopped up. The Yurble farmer sighed and began to sweep up the debris, allowing the task to distract him from his memories.

     The sky was still dark when he had finished, but the stars could be seen, twinkling alongside the waning moon. The storm had settled down and the sun had set beneath the horizon. The weary green Yurble stretched, feeling how stiff his joints had gotten, and decided to retire for the night. In spite of the events of his day, the farmer couldn't help but savor the warmth of his soft mattress and his worn blankets. Something about his locked bedroom door and his warm bed exuded a sense of security, that even if the rest of his house were to fall apart, his bedroom would always be safe - and even more safe he would be as he fell asleep, for sleep was the liberator of thoughts and therefore, of burdensome memories.

     The following few days were nothing more than ordinary. The Yurble surveyed his land after every storm, and perhaps nailed up a few loose boards here and there. Slowly his food supply began to dwindle, but the Yurble rationed himself, sometimes going to bed without supper in order to ensure breakfast the following morning. At times during the day he would hear little noises from all over his house, but it would turn out that a board had fallen, or the wind had found a crack through the walls, or the Yurble was just hearing things.

     One night, the Yurble simply couldn't fall asleep. The warmth of his bed was there but it didn't comfort him as it did every other night. He lay awake, his eyes staring up at pitch-blackness, until he could finally make out the various cracks of the ceiling, and then the dark forms of the furniture in his room. He stared and stared, until his eyes finally began to droop.

     Like a reawakened curse, his eyes widened as he saw two round, white eyes materialize out of the darkness. They were the same as he remembered them from the forest - two large, glowing orbs that stared at him, unwavering, unblinking. Was it a reflection of light from the moon? It couldn't be - there was no moon that night.

     Panicked, the Yurble squeezed his eyes tightly shut and drew the blankets over his head. Beneath the shelter of his blankets he told himself over and over again, "It's just a dream, just a dream, just a dream." To no avail, he tried convincing himself that it was all just a nightmare, some figment of the darkness. He could hear the soft breathing - fast at times and slow at others. His body went rigid when he felt something sniff at his ragged bed sheets. Something was in his room, sniffing hungrily around. He could hear it... he could hear the soft scratching noises of claws on wooden floorboards. When the sounds faded away, the old Yurble dared look with one eye from beneath his blankets. His pupil contracted in fear. There, silhouetted in his window, was a small monster with two bulbous, glowing eyes, and a tongue that dripped with hunger as it stared straight at the Yurble. With a small sigh, the old Yurble farmer fainted there in his bed.

     As the first ray of sunlight filtered in through his window, the old farmer sat straight up in bed, his eyes wide. Quickly he scanned his room and relaxed when he realized that he was completely alone. Cautiously, he crawled out of bed but froze when he heard a soft scritch-scratch, scritch-scratch. He was slightly relieved to find his window only partway closed. The remnants of the night's sandstorm blew in through the opening, brushing and scratching against the floor. It was all just a dream, thought the Yurble happily. It was all just a dream.

     His happiness melted away, however, when he glanced down at the window's ledge (where he had seen Fear standing the night before) and saw the faint outline of a dried puddle of drool.

     Weeks passed. Soon, the old Yurble found that he had no more food left. His once thick green fur lay limp and matted all over his body, and in some places, it had begun falling out in small clumps. His round Yurble body had become frail and thin, his cheeks gaunt and hollow. Wearily, he patched up the holes that formed in the walls of his bedroom. After that one night, so many nights ago, the holes had appeared and it seemed no amount of nails or wooden boards could keep them away. Finally, the wind smashed through the wall of his bedroom, leaving a giant, gaping hole. The second story of his dear farmhouse was inhabitable, and with a heavy heart, the Yurble blocked up the stairs and relegated his belongings someplace else. It wasn't as if he could sleep anyway.

     He couldn't help it, he was always afraid. It was as if a dark shadow was always looming over him. He knew it was Fear. He knew Fear was real. Fear's breath was always at his neck, that maniacal panting... "Heh, heh, heh, heh..." And whenever it rained, as rarely as it did, the farmer could smell Fear, hear every drip-drip-drip of his impending doom. The full moon excited Fear - the Yurble would spend sleepless nights imagining (or was he?) Fear's howls and high-pitched yip-yip-yips.

     The Yurble, imprisoned in his home by the raging sandstorms and Fear, passed his time simply sitting around, waiting for the next loose board to fall from the roof. His mind wandered from thought to thought, never staying for long on any single topic, for once he found a thought of comfort, that looming beast would invite himself into the farmer's mind. His memories were tainted by Fear - even the most peaceful recollections of his earlier life were not left untouched. He tried his best to recall the sounds of laugher and happiness that once filled his home... but those sounds were nothing more than echoes, overwhelmed and intimidated into silence by the howling winds and the pervasive noises that were undoubtedly caused by Fear.

     The old Yurble buried himself into one pure memory, one of happy summer evenings with his family, allowed himself to be carried away in it. He could feel Fear follow him in, and as much as he tried to warn his family to run, to warn them of the danger, they could not hear him. He waved his arms and called out their names, but they continued to laugh and play games, unaware of the monster that had invaded their place in frozen time.

     The Yurble called out one last warning, one last attempt at preserving his last cherished memory. A thundering crash broke his train of thought, snapping him out of his reverie. The poor farmer was thrown backwards out of his chair. Startled and confused, the old Yurble stared dumbfounded at where he had just been sitting, which was now covered in a pile of wood and sand. His roof had finally given in and caved under the weight of the storm outside.

     He scrambled backwards and shielded his eyes from the vicious winds. His ears could make out the now too familiar sound of panting, barely heard over the chaos of the storm that now invaded his house.

     Paralyzed with fear, the Yurble watched helplessly as the pile of wood and sand begin to shift and groan as something beneath it tried pushing and clawing its way out. The farmer couldn't turn away, couldn't move - his joints were locked, frozen in his fright. Two large, unblinking eyes appeared through the whirling vortexes of sand, and the farmer found himself once again caught within its stare. The beast was nearly free, and the Yurble shook himself free of his fright and scrambled away. The sandstorm was devouring his home - at every turn he encountered a pile of debris, a falling wall, a wall of sand. He turned back at his quickly disappearing kitchen, only to see that the beast had disappeared.

     The desire to survive can overpower any character weakness. The old Yurble made his way outside of his house, towards the door to his cellar. With an arm over his eyes he navigated blindly towards it, struggling against the sharpness of the wind, which scraped past his skin like sandpaper. He was almost there...

     The storm was growing in intensity. Sand whirled around and around the old farmer, enclosing him in a dark whirling mass of confusion. He could vaguely see the outlines of Fear emerging from the sand... the sand obscured everything. Then, he saw the two large bulbous eyes, the dripping tongue, that maniacal stare - his panic grew as he realized that Fear blocked his way to the cellar, and Fear was making its way closer to him. As the monster approached, the Yurble could see the form growing larger and darker, as more and more sand was attracted to it. The Yurble had no place to hide, no place to run to. He had to go through Fear to reach safety, or face trying to survive the storm in the open.

     He was an old green Yurble farmer who had no family, no home, no farm - nothing. He had nothing to lose. The old Yurble chose to brave the storm - the lesser of the two fears.

     A little black spardel emerged from the darkness and watched the Yurble disappear into the sands. His little drooping tongue was becoming caked with sand but he didn't seem to mind - his eyes, only a little, began to water, as he came to realize that his new friend and companion did not want to play. The winds grew stronger and it would seem that there was nothing left of the spardel's surroundings but sand, sand, and more sand. It whirled faster and faster around the little black spardel, until at last, even the spardel vanished from view.

The End

Psycho dedicates her half of this story to BC.