[EP] When Real World and Comics Collide - Open

[st_oryboard]

Mack caught about ten hours of sleep total since his arrival. Unlike others that had arrived, his was due to excitement. Yes, he missed his grandfather and his friends. But the Changer world wasn't in a war any longer and he viewed this as a vacation. Besides SERIOUSLY, he got the best welcome to a weird place gift ever. No, not the toothbrush and other stuff (no offense Caroline) but what was in his egg.

He'd been given a Clip Studio EX software and a Graphic Drawing Tablet, PLUS pens and colored pencils. Mack didn't waste any time in setting up the software and trying to figure out how it worked. His first couple of attempts weren't the best, but then his character began to look like it did on the paper and he was satisfied. He stuffed everything that had been in his egg, plus he own graphic novels, comic and notepad into his backpack and headed down toward the cafe.

There was plenty of room on the table at a booth to spread out all his stuff. It wasn't busy so he didn't feel guilty about doing it. Soon he was lost in trying to transfer his comic to the tablet and thinking of new adventures of a Kitsune stuck in another world. SO TOTALLY COOL!

Comments

[st_recuerdame]

"Really? You would do that?" Miguel's eyes went wide with please surprise. "I would love a comic with me and Dante."

[st_oryboard]

"Yeah, I like doing this kind of stuff. One day, I'm going to really do comic books for real." He knew his grandfather thought it was a stage and that he'd outgrow it, but he wouldn't.

[st_recuerdame]

"I'm going to share my music with the world!" It seemed they both had big dreams. "Maybe we'll both be famous one day." Miguel smiled and looked down at the comic book. "What kind of adventures do they go on?"

[st_oryboard]

"Save the world kind." Mack was enthusiastic, "well they also stop local criminals and bad guys, but their main story is saving the world kind of superheroes."

[st_recuerdame]

"Cool! Do they have superpowers, too or just like regular people that fight crime?" Miguel liked both kinds of superheroes, but more the regular people since he didn't know anyone that really had super powers. Well outside of the Inn.

[st_oryboard]

"Super powers. Well not like Superman or anything, but they're magical shape shifters so they have magic, too." Mack looked at Miguel from the corner of his eye to how he was taking the shape shifting and magic part of the comic.

[st_recuerdame]

Miguel debated as he listened to Mack tell about his comic, then took a leap of faith. He'd only told one other person, Carlos. "Dante isn't just my dog, he's also a spirit guide. He followed me to the Land of the Dead last year."

[st_oryboard]

"Woah! Seriously? Wait, what's the Land of the Dead? You mean like the Underworld?" That could be added to the comic which would make it really neat.

[st_recuerdame]

Miguel wasn't sure exactly what the Underworld was. He kind of remembered stories from school about mythology. "Um, I think so. It's where our dead go. They're all skeletons, not like ghosts or anything."

[st_oryboard]

Close enough that Mack understood what Miguel meant now. "That is so cool. I thought changing was the coolest thing." Mack mentally winced, he had not meant to say anything!

[st_recuerdame]

Miguel knew about changing, Dante changed and so did Lilith. He wouldn't tell Lilith's secret, that was hers, but he didn't mind sharing about Dante.

"Dante changes, too." He tried to meet Mack's eyes. "When we were in the Land of the Dead, Dante changed to a spirit guide. He has wings and he's really colorful. Like different colors all over his body."

[st_oryboard]

"So he changed when he's in the different worlds or all the time?" He flipped through his comic until he came to the kitsune changing to human. "He's a shapeshifter. A human that can change to an animal."

He watched Miguel to see how he took that news.

[st_recuerdame]

Huh. That was a question, he didn't know. "Um, I don't know. When he was in the Land of the Dead, at the end, when he became a spirit guide, he changed and when he came back to visit on the Dia de los Muertos, he was Dante again. Here he is, too. Maybe he can change when he wants."

He leaned in and spoke in a whisper, "but if he can, he might not know he can." Miguel loved Dante, but he wasn't really bright.

"So, the kitsune is like a werewolf?" Miguel knew about those. "I mean not a full moon change, but he can change when he wants to? That's pretty neat. Do they have them where you're from or is that just a story in your comic?"

[st_oryboard]

It was so ingrained in him not to tell people outside of the Changer world, but Miguel clearly knew about Changers if not like him. In that instant he made a snap decision and hoped he wouldn't regret it.

"They're in my world." He lowered his voice, "the kitsune in the comic is me."

[st_recuerdame]

"Woah, that is so cool!" Miguel lowered his voice only because Mack did first. "I've never met a Changer before, except Dante of course." He got curious because he couldn't ask Dante this, "does it hurt when you change?"

[st_oryboard]

"Nope. It's not like the movies when a werewolf changes and it looks like it hurts a lot. It's just one minutes I'm me, and the next I'm a kitsune." It hadn't been that easy at first but it had never been painful.

[st_recuerdame]

"That's how it was with Dante. I don't know about changing from the Land of the Dead, he was already changed when I saw him but when he became one, it was like that."

Miguel thought it was the coolest thing ever.

[st_oryboard]

"I wonder if I can talk to him." Mack wondered for a minute. "I mean I never tried talking to an animal before but Changers can talk to each other when we're in animal form."

[st_recuerdame]

"Sure! I mean you can try. Any time you want to. You can come by my room, it's really big and fancy." At least to Miguel it was. His whole house could fit into it.. practically. Okay, maybe not the whole house but a lot of it.

[st_oryboard]

Mack wondered if he was the only one or if Miguel had one, too since they both seemed to have big rooms. "Do you have a ghost roommate?"

[st_recuerdame]

"Nope, it's just me and Dante. It's round though." Which he thought was awesome! He'd also heard of others having ghostly roommates and Miguel had been a little disappointed that he hadn't.

"Is your ghost roommate nice?"

[st_oryboard]

Since Miguel asked the question, Mack assumed he wasn't the only one with one. "He's actually pretty neat." Then he confessed, "I was freaked at first, I didn't sleep in my room the first night. But the last two nights, I have. Now it's kind of comforting. I've never been on my own."

[st_recuerdame]

"That's okay. I really freaked when I saw my first ancestor as a skeleton. Then it just was normal." Well it helped that everyone was skeletons except him when he crossed the marigold bridge.

[st_oryboard]

"Woah, you saw your ancestors as skeletons?! That would be both cool and freaky." There were so many ideas for a comic for Miguel that they were kind of tripping over each other.

[st_recuerdame]

"It was." Miguel nodded. "Dia De Los Muertos is all about skeletons. I didn't think they really were like that, but it made it a lot easier to not be as freaked out."

To be honest, he was more freaked that he'd gone invisible and could actually go to the Land of the Dead.