As the sun beamed its harsh rays onto their skin, sweat fell down on each of their faces as if they were in a hot shower with the sun as their faucet. Three friends, May, Regina, and Tai, sat in May’s garage trying to chill out.
“Ugh,” said Tai lazily, “It’s too hot to do anything! How do you two stand being in this weather?” She cried. “I can’t believe how easy it is for you to stand this, May. This is like paradise for you.”
“Well if it’s so hot, Tai, just change the weather.” Said May.
“I can’t,” said Tai as she clenched her hands into an imaginary rock, “I need to have moisture in the air for me to bring in any clouds.” She panted, “It’s so dry!”
“Let’s go watch some TV to get our minds off of it.” Said Regina.
“Guys, guys!” a little voice said. It was Pandabug, May’s cyborg pet. It was a baseball-sized bug and also a fuzzy panda.
“Hey Pandabug. What’s up?” said May.
“You need to help Paul, he’s in danger!”
May’s eyes grew wide open, shocked.
“Hey, isn’t Paul the really socially awkward kid that you hang out with May?” said Regina. “Umm, I think he prefers ‘socially impaired’.” May replied.
“Ha-ha! Yeah he stutters a ton and his voice squeaks every other word.” chuckled Tai. “He can shift, right May?”
“Yeah, he does. But he’s really cool you guys! He makes tons of inventions!” May said. His inventions always had steel beams, silver wire throughout the outside and spread throughout the floor as if he just finished making it this morning and hadn’t bothered to clean it up. “He stutters less and doesn’t squeak as much when you get to know him.” May tried describing him optimistically, but ended up feeling like she was beating a wall. “He’s like my best friend guys…” May said sadly. A tear began to run down her face, but acted like it wasn’t there.
Regina said “Awh, We’re sorry May. We know he’s a great friend. We’ll help you save him. We need to take a break from this blistering weather anyways.”
May looked up to see them with soft grins on their faces.
Immediately, the ground vibrated beneath them as the concrete began to crack.
“An earthquake?” said Tai as each of them struggled to maintain their balance. “Regina, stop it!”
“What? I’m not doing anything, I swear!”
They fell through the crack in the concrete of May’s garage, and landed in the middle of a forest. Strangely, that didn’t worry them in the slightest. They weren’t confused or shocked. They were ecstatic, really. “It’s raining!” exclaimed Tai, “I miss you rain… Why couldn’t it be like this back home?” she continued. Regina danced along the logs and wet grass, twirling and leaping as if she knew how to dance. May kept grinning, tilting her head up at the trees, sticking her palm out of her sleeve, and letting the raindrops touch the tip of her fingers.
“Uh, May?” hesitated Pandabug.
“Mm… Not now Pandabug” May said calmly, “I’m enjoying this. Everything here is so… peaceful…”
“Umm, but May, My radar is going insane. It says there are tigers coming—”
“Shh… PB… You’re worrying too much, you need to relax. There are no tigers in forests.”
“Oh my ga—Just look!”
May finally looked and saw trees being knocked down. She quickly warned the others while analyzing an escape route before the tigers caved in. There were none. The tigers, whom were a lot larger and deformed than usual, surrounded the team in a full circle. Regina formed a smirk on her face, clasping her fists,
“Oh. Let’s go.”
Her bracelets grew from her wrists and quickly crept up her hand, covering her knuckles with rock and stone. “Showtime.” She said. She jumped up into the crowd of tigers, and punched into the ground, creating ripples around her. As she did so, May hung onto Tai’s hover board 8 feet above the ground.
The tigers fell like dominos throughout the increasing diameter of the ripples.
May jumped down from the board. She pulled out her katana from her left side, making that sound of metal against metal. Shing! At the end of the blade carried of what she called a scorpion blade—a long chain with a dagger attached to the end.
At once, all three of them charged at the tigers with everything they got. May impaled them with her Katana while whipping her scorpion blade at surrounding tigers with such grace and precision. Her hair and hands light into flames as she threw balls of fire and molten rock at the flesh of the tiger’s skin.
Regina rose rock stalagmites from the ground with one hand while jabbing every other tiger with her other.
Tai, on her hover board, shot the tigers with the sniper rifle built into her board. She clenched her hands and rose them to the sky, intensifying the rain, creating lightning in the clouds. Strangely, that caused the tigers to twitch.
“Huh?” said Regina. The hesitation of the tigers’ aggression made the team astonished.
They fought left and right, but the brawl seemed endless. All their powers and weapons weren’t enough to kill them all. As May blocked a paw from her face, Pandabug flew out of May’s bag “Five o’clock May, an escape route! You have about three seconds ‘til it closes.”
This way! Hurry!” said May.
They all moved west, continuing to fight off all the orange and black stripes that come near.
As they started to lose more tigers, they stumbled upon a run-down house. “In there!” said May.
Closing the door, they all leaned their backs against it, catching their breath.
“Okay… What. Where. Those. Things. They were like, tigers? But, not?” Asked Regina.
“Well s***, I don’t know! The bigger question is how do we get back?” Said Tai.
“Let’s all calm down a bit. Our mission is to find our way through this forest, get home, and save Paul wherever he is… First things first. Pandabug! What’s the deal with these tigers?”
“Yeah! They wouldn’t die and definitely didn’t look like normal ones.” Said Tai. She was right. They each were 5 feet tall and had 3 tails.
“Well I scanned them. They’re not just tigers. They’re cyborgs.” Pandabug said. “They were mutated to be larger to implant the robot in them. Not your ordinary cyborg like me.”
“That’s why they were going crazy when the rain got heavier and lightning struck them...” said Regina.
Pandabug added, “And according to the information I’m gathering, we’re not on Earth—”
“Wow, PB, you’re so clever like always, aren’t you.” A voice said from the middle of the room.
The old, run-down house instantly formed into a high-tech lab.
Behind him were large machines with sparks flying everywhere with wires whipping in the air. They had steel beams, silver wire throughout the outside and spread throughout the floor as if he just finished making it this morning and hadn’t bothered to clean it up. It was like a blistering storm in a large lab.
With His back to the team, He said “It didn’t take you long to get here at all.” His voice cracked on that last vowel. Immediately, May’s eyes grew large and she gasped.
His face turned to them, and it was…A person they’ve never met before. “I’m pleased to meet you all. Oh wait, I already have.”
“What? I’ve never seen you before in my life.” Said Tai
“Oh, but you have, Tai.” His body shape shifted into Paul.
“I created this planet guys. Earth is so happy, yet so full of judgment. I hear giggles and mocks of me from others about my puberty changes and my social imparities. I wanted to ask you to come live with me, but I knew you wouldn’t say yes. Come friends. Just you three, pandabug, and I is all we need. No more judgment. No more. Stay here with me, and we’ll be happy.”
“PB, you told us that Paul was in danger.” Said Regina.
“That’s the feed I got in my system though! I’m sorry.” Pandabug replied.
“That was me. I sent it to Pandabug so you all would feel so bad for me.” He said. “Join me!”
“You don’t have to do this Paul. Just trust me everything will get better, I swear.” May said helplessly.
“No May. Don’t you understand? This is who I am, and if people can’t handle that, then what’s the point standing their naïve minds?”
“No, Paul. All the teasing and your social imparities will go away when we get older. I promise you—” said May.
“No! I can’t stand it… This planet is an outlet, an escape route for me. Come on, please May?” He reached out his hand gently.
May’s eyes watered up and tears fell down her face as if she was the shower faucet this time.
“You’ve always been such a softy. You act so tuff with your katana ‘n scorpion blade and your fire powers, but when it comes to this, you act so harmless. If you won’t live here, I guess I’m going to have to make you.”
He shape shifted into a cyborg tiger, and shadows grew from the creases of the walls.
“Stay away from the dark.” Pandabug warned. “They’re creatures that’ll kill you!”
Paul strikes at them with his claws, but Regina blocks him with her rock fists.
Shooting into the dark, Tai said “Hey Guys! Follow me!” She saw a machine labeled in all caps EARTH TELEPORTER.

They moved towards a machine as they fight off Paul and the darkness.
May, however, kept running towards the machine, continuing to have tears fall down her face. Each step got heavier and soon turned into stops as she struggled to reach the machine.
Her extreme sadness quickly turned into rage as fire slowly crept up from the roots of her hair.
When they got to the teleporter, Regina pushed random buttons on the control panel while May whipped her scorpion blade at the shadow creatures and Tai made it hail in the lab.
“Hurry up Regina! May and I can’t hold ‘em off much longer.” Exclaimed Tai.
Paul jumped at May with his black and orange striped claw, leaving a scratch that bled from her left forehead.
“Get away from the teleporter! Stay here with me!” Screamed Paul.
Paul shifted his paw into a hand and grabbed May’s arm, pulling her into the dark creatures. May then shot fire bolts at Paul. His skin melted through layers and turned blistering, bright red.
Tai then pushed his shoulder back.
“Got it! Get in!” Regina said. The teleporter flashed a vortex that had a visual of May’s garage. Tai went through first.
May stuck her foot in the machine, but hesitated going through.
“Go May!” Regina said.
“What about you?”
“I’ll be there in a second.” She replied. She went around the lab destroyed all his other machines with her rock fists, then ran into the teleporter with May.
“Don’t go!” cried Paul.
They all left in the teleporter before Paul could get to them, and the lab was destroyed along with Paul who was caught in the explosion.
They came back to earth in May’s garage with bruises and black ash all over them. They sat there in silence, contemplating.
“Hey, I’m really sorry about Paul, May.” Said Regina.
“Ah… It’s okay, he always had that insane-vibe to him.”
“Yeah, I think so too. But on another note, it’s still so hot out!” Exclaimed Tai
Sighs from all of them came, and silence grew again.
“Damn…”