"Come on, mom, let us go visit dad. You're the one who's always saying there should be more bonding in our family," Mark and Elsie pleaded. They feigned sad, puppy dog eyes and depressed, morose visages.

The 13-year old boy and 8-year old girl had been begging their mother for the past hour to let them visit their affluent father, who resided on Paradise Island in the Bahamas. After all, their parents had divorced years ago, when Mark was just a baby and Elsie not yet born, for reasons unknown to both kids. Because of that divorce, Mark and Elsie knew nothing about their father except what their mother said about him. Neither of them knew what he even looked like, since, coincedentally, there were no pictures of him in the house. All the kids knew about their father was that he was rich and fun.

They had attempted to unravel the answer to why their parents divorced multiple times in the past, but each time they asked their mother, she would quickly divert the subject. She would absentmindedly respond, "One day, when you are old enough, you will know. That day will come soon, but you must wait patiently." Both kids knew it was just a way for their mother to never have to answer the question.

The mother of Mark and Elsie, Liz Hollingsworth, continued to knit, pretending to not have heard the question. Her eyes remained entranced by the sewing needle as it weeved up and down, creating one thread after another. She desperately wanted to let the kids meet their father, as all children have a right to, but she knew something Mark and Elsie did not. She knew about... the monster.

Nevertheless, Liz was sick of her children's pestering, trying her hardest not to give in, but she simply was not that kind of person. She was the mom that gave her kids whatever they wanted, so long as they wanted it bad enough. Liz was too nice. After ignoring the same question for the one thousandth time, the kids asked for the one thousandth and first time, and Liz could no longer stand it.

"All right, all right, all right." Liz muttered. "If you kids want a vacation this bad, you can have it. Pack your bags. Your father's plane is waiting outside.”

“They’re already packed,” Mark replied cheerfully.

“Thanks so much mom!” the two kids cried together and began to sprint off to the plane.

“Wait,” Liz asserted sternly. Mark and Elsie froze in their tracks, hearing the sudden seriousness and urgency in her voice.
“Before you go, remember one thing: do not anger your father. If you pester him while he is working like you did to me, you will not like the consequences. Please, if you ever listen to one thing I say, listen to this. It will serve you well.”
However, the two siblings ignored the warning, like they ignored most of the serious stuff their mother said. They were halfway out the door by the time their mother had finished speaking, shouting quick byes as they skipped jocundly to the private plane. Not knowing that they were in for a vacation to remember.


The airplane roared one final time as it hit the ground running before its engine was silenced and the flying machine slowed to a stop. Mark and Elsie cheered at the sound of the plane finally touching the ground after a torturous 7-hour flight. They quickly unbuckled their seat belts which had been strangling their bodies the entire flight, grabbed their suitcases and sprinted out the door. The sheer beauty of Paradise Island and sudden bright sunlight caused them to stagger backwards as soon as their bodies were fully exposed to the mighty sun’s powerful rays.

“Whoa,” Mark gushed. “No wonder this place is called Paradise!" Elsie was too caught up in the stunning view to even respond.
Tall green palm trees dotted the island, casting long shadows to shade the island from the sun. The crystal clear ocean water surrounding the gorgeous island sparkled in the sunlight as bright as one thousand stars in the nighttime sky. Mark and Elsie basked in the warm sun, feeling the warmth travel across their body and to the smile of ecstasy written on their faces. Under their feet was golden sand, soft as cotton, as it warmed their feet to perfection. Looming high above them, a picture of wealth and affluence, was the Royal Towers, joined by the Bridge.

“This place is just… just…. amazing!” Elsie managed to finally express her feelings of awe through words. “What could go wrong? Mom doesn’t need to worry about us! We’ll be just fine here!”

“Yep,” Mark nodded his head in agreement. “Nothing could possibly go wrong! This place is the best!” Then the two took off for the Royal Towers, where there father resided, in the Presidential Suite on the highest floor.

Their father was waiting for them when they arrived at the Presidential Suite, gasping for air and hyperventilating from all the stairs on the way up. In all their excitement, they had not noticed the elevator to the left of the stairs.

Mark, panting, leaned on the wall besides his father, who stood outside the door to his Presidential Suite, studying Mark intently as if he

were an ancient artifact.

"Mark Hollingsworth,” his father said to no one in particular. “And Liz Hollingsworth.” He diverted his gaze away from Mark and to his younger sister Liz, who leaned on the opposite wall from Mark, tongue hanging out like a dog. His seriousness suddenly vanished like a magician, and a huge grin appeared on his face.

“I am your father, Fred Jefferson!” He opened his arms out, expecting a big hug from both of them. “Welcome to Paradise Island, and welcome to the happiest week of your lives!”

At first, Mark was taken aback by the sudden change in mood. However, his younger sister simply shouted with happiness and threw herself into her father’s arms. Mark shrugged his shoulders and reluctantly joined in the embrace.

The Presidential Suite was the most amazing thing Mark and Elsie had ever seen. It was like heaven on Earth. Growing up poor with not many fancy things, the moment they walked through the gilded doorway into the penthouse living room was eye-opening.

Everything was pure white: the walls, furniture, windows, carpet. It was whiter than anything Mark and Elsie had ever seen. It was also more spacious and clean than anything the siblings had ever seen. Mark could not believe his eyes. Neither could Elsie.

"This place is amazing!" Elsie shouted with joy. "How is it so...so...so...," she trailed off, unable to find the words to describe the mesmerizing beauty.

"Agreed." Mark nodded his head vigorously. "Now, when does the fun start?"

"Yeah, about that... You kids are gonna have to play for a little while on your own, ya here? Then tonight, we can go out, eat a good dinner, and maybe do something awesome?" Fred grinned cheekily.

"Now, where do we go?" Elsie inquired. "To play, I mean."

Without responding, Fred took off on a brisk pace, winding through the long halls of the pure white Presidential Suite, walking so fast the kids were practically jogging to keep up with him. He made multiple twists and turns, so fast and quick, as if he knew the place like the back of his hand. Finally pausing after a couple minutes, he stopped at a large doorway, with the letter G written on it. He turned around to face Mark and Elsie, who were gaping at the size of the suite.

Fred ignored their open mouths and informed them, "This is the G room. The G stands for garage. This is where I work. And this is where you will play, since I need to keep an eye on you kids. But don't bother me, ok? I got stuff to do. Important stuff."

He threw open the door and slammed it behind him, almost jamming Elsie's finger in the process. The sound of the door slamming made the halls vibrate like metal on metal.

"Um... Okay," Mark stuttered, perplexed at their father's sudden and irksome mood swings. "I think our father's a little wacko, don't you?"

Elsie, surprisingly unconcerned, replied happily, "Nope!" Then she threw open the door, and stopped. And stared, eyes wide, mouth open, a look of awe painted on her face. The door almost closed on her, if not for a last minute save by her older brother.

"Elsie, what's wrong? What is..." Mark stopped. And stared. Mesmerized, like he'd never been before. His eyes wanted to jump off his face. His heart was caught in his throat. He was unable to move his feet; they too were in petrification by the sight laid before them.

It was not until the door closed on the two siblings, knocking them into the hard garage floor (head first), did they move.

"Ow!" Mark and Elsie cried out in pain simultaneously. They furiously rubbed their heads, trying to make the searing pain go away. The two siblings writhed on the floor until their father austerely told them, "Shut up! I'm trying to do work here!"

"Well," Mark shouted angrily, "We are kind of in pain here! Wanna help us!" He continued to writhe on the floor as his heart rate sped up and sweat formed on his brow.

"I said, shut up!!! I am trying TO WORK! If you kids don't stop bothering me, we are NOT gonna do something fun tonight!"

Suddenly, Elsie remembered their mother's warning, to never disturb their father while he was at work. She harshly nudged Mark, inciting a howl from him that was a cacophony.

"Ow!" He cried out for the second time, and he briefly stopped writhing on the floor. "What was that for?!"

Mark's younger sister ignored the irate glare emanating from her older brother's face and, lowering her voice to a hushed whisper, reminded him of their mother's warning.

However, it was too late. Mark was already enraged past the point of help. Elsie could only sit back and watch as her brother's quick temper took control of his mind and body. His eyes narrowed, and she imagined steam rising out of Mark's ears, fire out of his nose. The damage was done.

Elsie's older brother ignored Liz's warning. He continued to scream at Fred. "Why won't you help us? You are the most lazy, worthless piece of trash! I am in pain, and you sit there, doing nothing?! That's your idea of being a father? Well, I can tell you right now: it's not mine!" Enraged, Mark stood up, despite the outrageous pain in his knees from banging the ground, fire in his eyes.

"I'm giving you one last chance!!! Let me work!!!" Fred yelled, his words dripping with animosity. “AND, I am not kidding!”

However, Mark was too vexed to care. He no longer cared what came out of his father’s disgusting mouth. All he cared about was piquing his neglecting father. The next word came out of Mark’s mouth before he could do anything to arrest it: “NO!”

As soon as the word flew out of Mark’s mouth, everything became a blur. Before Mark or Elsie could react, the things in the middle of the spacious garage came to life. The things that had the two siblings staring in shock, a myriad of wires bunched together. First, the combination of green, silver, gold, blue, red, and purple wires grew upward as fast as lighting. Then, once the wire combinations reached about 20 feet in height, they became compacted together like a sandwich. From there, the rest was obscure and muddled.

One minute, Elsie had been lying on the ground, praying with all her heart that Mark would calm down in time that nobody got hurt. That hope vanished as soon as she opened her eyes. Her eyes fluttered open, and the next thing she knew, she was up off the ground and sprinting for the door to the house.

Following her in hot pursuit was a monster. At the very least. Looming over Elsie, the monster was 20 feet tall and the scariest thing she’d ever seen in her life. Its face was irregular, like a broken face on a broken statue. Half of its face was streaked bright red, the other was wretchedly smeared blue. Its nose was cracked, and its left eye was missing. Where its pupil should have been was just a white blob. Its mouth was majorly deformed, the upper lip faced upward and the lower lip faced downward. Due to the deformed lips, there was a gap between them, revealing five rows of razor sharp teeth, streaked with silver and gold. The monster’s body was akin to a Tyrannosaurus Rex’s. It had two massive trunks for legs and two oblong shaped feet. Its toes pointed in all different directions, some pointed up, down, left, right and straight. The monster’s body shape was circular, but misshapen for sure. It was Pac-man shaped, a circle with a triangle cut into it. The body was splotched with purple. All in all, it was the most asymmetrical thing Mark and Elsie had ever seen.

The monster roared loudly, but it sounded more like a car horn combined with a fire alarm. Mark was just ahead of Elsie, running as fast as his two stubby legs could carry him. Elsie was faster than Mark, and almost neck in neck with him, when the monster attacked. It swooped down like an eagle attacking a salmon, aiming toward Elsie. The younger sister screamed in horror, and closed her eyes, waiting for the moment when she died, thinking her life was about to end. The monster neared her, and soon she could smell its hot breath upon her face, a blast of death. It reeked of rotten eggs, gasoline and garbage. Elsie would have fainted if not for the massive amount of adrenaline running through her veins. Suddenly, she felt the massive monster’s ice cold skin upon her forehead, and she was about to get eaten alive…

Then it was gone. The monster was gone. It hadn’t eaten Elsie. At first, she thought she was dead and hallucinating. Feeling herself to make sure she was still alive, Elsie rubbed the sweat that had formed on her brow and slowed her breathing. It was all going to be okay. She was alive.

However, her moment of happiness did not last. As soon as it began, it ended. She was thrown back into reality by an ear-piercing scream that made the walls of the palatial Presidential Suite shake and make Elsie’s ears cry out in pain. Oh no, the thought made her shiver. She recognized the sound of the scream, how it was high-pitched with a slight stutter. The monster has Mark.

A deafening roar came from the monster, followed by the reverberation of breaking glass. The monster has left the house, Elsie panicked, her heart creeping into her throat. That means… Mark has left the house! She sprinting towards the previous sound of breaking glass, without thought, praying dearly that her older brother was alive.


There was a large hole in the window that stood in front of Elsie, so she assumed it was the one the monster had broken through. She leaped through, careful not to touch the bottom of the window, for a few jagged shards of glass poked upwards. However, she did not look down before she jumped, which proved to be a costly mistake…

As Elsie had just vaulted herself off the balcony of the Presidential Suite, located on the top floor of the 16-story high Royal Towers. Too shocked and stunned to cry out for help or scream, she attempted to but no sound emanated from her wide open jaws. All Elsie could do was wait for the deathly free fall to end.

Meanwhile, Mark struggled against the monster’s grasp, to no avail. He pulled and pried, trying to free himself from the monster’s strangely warm hands. Again, to no avail. He thought he was going to die, die from either strangulation by the monster’s hands or suffocation by the monster’s foul breath. He decided to eliminate one of the possible ways he could die by breathing through his mouth. Although Mark was disgusted by the thought of letting in those nauseous fumes into his mouth, he had no other choice. Adrenaline pumped through Mark's veins and his heart sped as he prayed that his time had not yet come.

Elsie chased after the monster, despite her weary legs crying for her to stop sprinting, to take a rest. No, Elsie lectured herself angrily. I will not stop. My brother could get eaten by a mechanical monster at any moment!



The beast trampled over palm trees and people as it rumbled across the once paradiscal island of the Bahamas. Civilians enjoying a nice vacation left their picnic blankets and snacks, screaming at the top of their lungs as they ran away from the mechanical monster. The din and chaos were undescribable. A small glimpse of sympathy ran through Elsie's heart, sympathy for the people who's vacations were ruined by the horrible beast, which was, in a way, her fault. However, it was quickly replaced by fear and worry. Fear of facing the monster and worry about her captured brother. She prayed as she ran along, following the massive footsteps of the monster, imprinted in the golden sand.

Five minutes later, the entire beach was emptied. All that was left of the harmless, innocent civilians were the myriad of torn picnic blankets that littered the beach. The mechanical monster had paused, seemingly waiting for Elsie to come. It still held Mark, half dangling out of its enormous right hand, as it wheeled its massive self around to face her, not the least bit coercively. To add to the intimidation, the beast breathed a fume of fire and shot a jet of water out of its hand. Elsie gasped, tempted to run away, the only thing keeping her there being Mark.



Mark attempted to shout out, to do something, anything, but was unabke to move due to the monster squeezing him airtight, slowly suffocating the oxygen out of his lungs. He struggled to breathe; all he could think of was hope, hope that Elsie would face her fear of monsters and save him.

Elsie trembled as the monster loomed over her. It looked exactly like the monster she had seen in all her dreams, the one that ended up eating her every time. Sweat poured down her face, partly due to the strong, beating sun of the Bahamas, but mostly due to nerves and anxiety: her life was in peril. She did not want her life to end that way, not by the monster that had ended her life already in dreams and woken her up screaming night after night.



There is no way I can face that monster, Elsie shivered. But the only way I can save my brother is by facing the monster. It is the monster.... or my brother. The monster... or my brother. The monster... or my brother.

The thought ran through her head, imprinting itself in her brain like a staple. Her head began to ache; her knees began to buckle. Elsie did not do well under pressure. Nor did she do well at a crossroad, trying to make two impossible decisions. Her heart sped faster than it had ever sped before, like a sprinter full of adrenaline. She hyperventilated; the oxygen flowing through her lungs did not flow as smoothly as it did previously. Her world began to spin; she struggled to stay awake, to stay conscious. Elsie's eyes fluttered like never before, seemingly blinking once every nanosecond. In other words, it's me or my brother.

She felt herself wheeling with dizziness. However, before her world shut down, before her eyes blinked one last time, before her lungs suffocated from lack of oxygen, she said it. She had decided: “Take me. Instead of Mark.” Then her world shut down, and her mind was shrouded in blackness.



Suddenly, the monster holding Mark loosened its beastly grip and set him down gently onto the sand. As soon as it happened, Mark took off, stopping to scoop up Elsie into his arms, before continuing on his way. He did not know exactly where he was going, but he knew the first thing was getting off the island of the Bahamas. About 15 feet away from the monster, he was suddenly arrested by a voice that sounded strangely familiar. Refusing to turn around as he had been doing since the monster set him down, he was stopped again when the familiar voice announced, “Mark Wallace Hollingsworth. Stop running.”

Mark reluctantly turned around, wild fear in his eyes. He expected the monster to be right behind him, about to gobble him up. What he got was… their father, Fred Jefferson, standing beside his glimmering, private motorboat. Mark expected an explanation, something to contain his confusion. All that happened was his father snapping his fingers, and Elsie was suddenly aroused from her unconsciousness. She lay wide awake in Mark’s arms with a glorious smile on her face.



Fred patted the side of his motorboat with a wide grin on his face that matched Elsie’s. He inquired, “Who wants to go for a ride?”

Elsie squealed and practically jumped out of Mark’s arms, the first one getting into the motorboat. Mark slowly followed, still wrapped in shock, when his father whispered in his ear, “Your sister has true character, you should be proud. By the way, I was the monster. It was a test of your sister’s true character. She passed. PS - The monster doesn’t exist. It was all in your head.” Fred rapped his knuckle on Mark’s head and smiled.



Mark shrugged and climbed into the motorboat after his father, still extremely stunned. However, for the first time in his life, he did not let the worry affect his mood. He smiled, mimicking his father’s smile, and screamed, “This is the best vacation ever! It will truly be a vacation to remember!"