EarthBound Drabbles
A Random Collection of Writings Based on Mother 2/EarthBound
by SakuraMota

01. Homesick

"Ness!  What a surprise to see you and your friends!" Ness' mother said with delight as her son and his three friends, Paula, Jeff, and Poo, came in the door.  She wasted no time to close the distance between her and her son and pulled him into an embrace.  "Why didn't you call and say you were coming?"

"Well, it was kind of a sudden decision," the red-capped boy said, muffled by his mother's overpowering hug.  He pulled away and stared at her for a long moment, a sad, betwixt smile on his face.  He felt the knot in his stomach that he'd been feeling for several days ease slightly.

Ness' mother caught the odd expression on her son's face, and her eyebrows raised in concern.  "You okay, baby?" she asked, taking hold of his face with both hands.  "You look a little pale....have you been eating properly?"

"I'll say he has," Paula said with a giggle from behind Ness.  "He eats just about everything in sight."

Ness blushed, and he brushed his mother's hands aside as Paula giggled again.  "Can't fight zombies, insane cultists, or hippies on an empty stomach, now, can I?" he grumbled.  Paula gave him a knowing wink and smiled, and he flushed again and turned away.  "Anyway, Mom, I was wondering if maybe you could..."

"...Make your favorite dish for dinner?" his mother finished with a smile.  "I don't know how I knew, but it just so happens I took out the ingredients for it just a little while ago."  She turned and headed toward the kitchen, adding jovially, "Who knows, maybe your dear old mom is becoming a psychic, too!  Come make yourselves comfortable at the table, and I'll start cooking.  Oh, and you should let your sister Tracey know you're here, too..."  She trailed off as she disappeared into the adjacent room.

Ness observed his mother with an affectionate grin as she bustled away, and he closed his eyes and inhaled deeply.  Home.  He was home.  He could eat his mom's cooking and sleep in his own bed.  Home...

"Feeling a little better now, Ness?" Paula asked, suddenly at his side.

He glanced at her peripherally and nodded slightly.  "Mm, yeah.  I think I'll be back to normal after a good night's sleep."

"Good thing, too; you've been completely useless the past few days," Jeff said with a grin as he ambled past them toward the dining room.  "Paula, Poo, and I were getting tired of doing all the work around here."  As he passed he gave Ness a playful shove, who returned the gesture with a laugh.

A hand touched Ness' shoulder, and he turned to find Poo standing behind him.  "Worry not, Ness," the Dalamian said.  "I too find myself longing for my homeland from time to time; there is no need to feel shame."

Ness nodded.  "Nn, thanks, Poo."

"Come then, friends," Poo said, putting an arm around both Ness and Paula and guiding them forward.  "Let us go and partake of Ness' mother's cooking."

Ness grinned.  In his home back in Onett, surrounded by his family and friends, he felt safe and content.  True, they'd have to set out in the morning to continue their quest toward the eight Sanctuary points, teleporting them far away from the suburbs he called home, but at least for one night, for one moment, he was warm and cheerful again.  He felt the uneasy, melancholy sensation in his stomach melt away completely.  He didn't feel homesick any longer.

---

03. Happy Happy

Cold.  Dark.  Alone.  The stiffness in her neck and back from sleeping on the wooden floor was unbearable.  Water trickled in some place in the distance she couldn't see, and the metal bars that separated her cage from the rest of the small cabin were as harsh and uninviting as they ever were.  She leaned her forehead against them; they were cold even against her already cool skin, and she shivered and pulled away, regretting the action.  Rubbing her shoulders, Paula pulled her knees up to her chin and gave the Teddy Bear in her lap a squeeze.  If she had any tears left, she imagined she would cry, but the time for tears had long since passed.  Kidnapped from her home, dragged blindly into some unknown place, such had been her life for the past several days.  She often wondered if her parents were worried; if her psychic gifts were more powerful, she'd reach out them, but as it was....

The only person she could contact psychically was him.

She'd seen him before, in visions in her sleep.  The boy she was connected to, the boy she was destined to meet, Ness.  She'd seen herself travelling with him and two others.  Ness was important.  That much she knew.  Most crucially of all, he was the only one who could save her.  Of that, she was most certain.  However, even though she had faith Ness would come, she still doubted, in a small corner of her mind....after all, she didn't have much to go on other than her visions.  Perhaps Ness hadn't heard her desperate calls to him?  Or maybe he'd disregarded her as a dream?  She might never be saved, and even though she was very gifted, she feared her captors' numbers were far too great for her to handle.  No, she was trapped.  Everything hinged on Ness.

The faint sounds of approaching footsteps and the creak of the floorboards signaled someone was coming.  Probably one of the cultists bringing her a meal....she wondered briefly what time of day it was.  The door opened, but she didn't bother to look up; they'd leave the meal and then exit, and she didn't feel like talking to whoever it was delivering it.

"...Paula?"

She glanced up at the mention of her name, and her eyes widened.  Black hair, a baseball bat over his shoulder, wearing a yellow and blue striped shirt and a red hat....

Tears welled in her eyes.  He was just like she'd imagined him.

---

04. Ness, Customer Ness...

All light in the Fourside Department Store vanished instantly.  Peculiarly, there were no screams, no reactions from the surrounding people to the incident.  Ness tensed and listened for a moment.  A power outage?  Or was it...

A rush of air as something raced past him and a shriek from his side confirmed his fears.

"Paula!" both he and his companion Jeff cried in unison.  Both boys fished blindly in the darkness where she'd been, but they only found each other.

The loudspeaker above them screeched and squelched with feedback and scuffling, then a gurgled, menacing voice spoke.  "Your attention please...would the customer from Onett, Mr. Ness, please proceed to the office on the fourth floor...That was customer Ness, fourth floor office...Gwaaaaaaaaagh!"

Ness' fists clenched.  He turned in Jeff's direction, though he wasn't quite sure if he was facing him directly.  "Jeff, let's go."

"Right behind you," Jeff said with a nod.

The two set off for the escalator to the second floor, arms outstretched to feel their way through the darkness.

"Ouch!  Ugh, Jeff, that was my heel!"

"Oh!  Sorry, I can't really see..."

Ness' fingers brushed the rail of the escalator, and he stopped briefly, causing Jeff to plow into his back.  Something clattered on the floor, Jeff's glasses, Ness assumed.

"Perhaps we should think of a better way to communicate in this blackness," Jeff said as he leaned down and groped about for his glasses.

"We'll manage, now come on," Ness said impatiently.  "Paula could be in serious danger."

"Right, sorry....just give me a little warning when you stop, okay?"

The two made their way to through the store, which was eerily devoid of people despite all the shoppers they'd seen before the blackout.  Possessed coffee cups and other oddities deterred them only briefly, but Ness was unfazed.  Paula had already been kidnapped once on their journey, and he wasn't about to let it happen again.

"Fourth floor, let's hurry!" Ness shouted as they charged up the halted escalator.  Dashing in between rows of arcade machines, the two boys reached the other side of the room, where Ness wrenched open the door, expecting to find Paula and her captor on the other side...

Instead they found only their target seated at a desk, a green tentacled alien befitting of the role of Giygas' minion.  Wasting no time, his eyes well adjusted to the darkness, Ness charged at the alien and smashed him in the face with his baseball bat before the creature could get in a word edgewise, hurtling the creature  out of his chair.

"Why you...!" the monster growled, motioning to pick himself up from the floor.  "You insolent little--"

"Shut up!" Ness roared, brandishing the bat in the creature's face with one hand and readying a burst of psychic energy in his other, illuminating the room with an odd blue glow and casting menacing shadows across Ness' uncharacteristically fierce face.  "Now I'm going to ask you once, and only once: where.  Is.  Paula?"