Chapter Text
“Let's go, open up. It's time for your daily parkour check.”
Here in Parkour Civilization, Parkour is your life. Every jump you take is a risk of life or death, or at least, it was.
“Hey kid, you ready to start the day?” Teddy spoke up, stretching his arms and legs, he seemed pretty ready and raring to go.
“Not like I have a choice…” I sighed, sitting up from my bed I started stretching. The bed wasn't all too bad. Though I do think they could have made the beds a little more comfortable. The bed was way too soft, too smooth, and not solid enough.
We headed downstairs and started preparing ourselves for the ‘question’, Teddy talked me through what to do, he’ll do the talking and I’ll watch. You know, for experience sake. We nodded to each other and Teddy opened the door. Outside was a Pro waiting for us.
“Ah, there you are! I was starting to wonder whether anyone lived here or if I was just wasting my time, haha!” he laughed at his own stupid joke.
“Hey man, let's just get this over with.” Teddy said, looking down from the doorstep. His glasses blocked his eyes but his gaze said it all. No funny business.
“Right, right.” He laughed again, geez for a pro he sure did seem pretty carefree.
Moving to the side he places a wooden block down, dropping a piece of raw beef then jumps over to place a piece of raw chicken down on the ground.
“You can jump for the raw chicken, or you could do the one block vertical jump for the raw beef.”
“Oh, and one more thing!” He adds, “since there's two of you guys in this house one person has to jump for the raw beef and the other gets the raw chicken. That is, if you make it.“
“Wait, if it was a house with three people, what would happen?”
“Oh, then one person doesn't get to eat. Pretty simple really.”
Out of everything, food is the one thing they can't decide to fix first?
“Kid, you jump for the beef. I'll jump for the chicken.”
“What? Isn't the beef better?”
“Exactly, it’s why you should take it. You're better than me, I've seen the way you jump, it's a high ranking Pro level at the very least. Besides, I've done this rodeo before and it's never ended well.”
Fine, that was enough to convince me to do it. I go for the jump first and… I made it. “Alright!”
Teddy goes next and successfully gets the raw chicken.
“Good job all around. You guys better not be late next time!” The guy says, still as cheerful as ever.
“Yeah, yeah, scamper off ‘lready…” Teddy tries to shut the door but the guy stops it with his foot and lets himself one block in.
“Hooold on, Grumpy, I have to tell you guys about the nearest ticket event.” He says, “It's on these coordinates, follow them carefully and you’ll be able to get there without any trouble. Good luck!”
He hands over a piece of paper to Teddy and speeds off to the house next door.
“A ticket event..!” if we get there, it would be my first ever one.
“Not so fast, Kid.” He faces the paper in my direction, “read it.”
“With pleasure.” I told him confidently, but I gotta be honest. I have no idea what any of these hieroglyphs say.
“You can't read it right?”
Shamefully so, I nod my head.
“There may be a ticket event happening but I think our first order of business is to teach you Parkour”
“I already know how to do parkour.”
“I— idiot! I mean Parkour, the language!?”
“Oh right, yeah.” It's really fun getting this guy all riled up.
“Today, we aren't going to the ticket event. It's only been a few days since the whole rebirth thing happened, and there's still a lotta people comin’ in getting revived and all. So, I think it'd be best if we wait it out and let the numbers trickle down.”
“I guess you have a point…” who knows, there might be a day where Teddy won't be there to read things out for me. “Alright then, teach me what you know.”
“Okay, let's get started then. Here we have a 1 Block Jump. Now a 1 Block Jump is…”
And then he went on, and on, and on…
Taking out pieces of paper from out of nowhere scribbling down different kinds of jumps, marking the difference between each and every space and block.
Teddy was meticulous, his handwriting was actually really good too… I could understand it for a whole minute, but no matter how much he taught I just couldn't catch up as fast as he could talk and write it all out.
“Ugh… no more… my brain can't take it.” I sprawled my body out onto the beds, they had pushed them together to make a makeshift table to use.
“C’mon Tabi, there’s no way you’ll be able to make it to a ticket event at this rate.” Teddy scolded me, placing the sheets of paper in front of the makeshift desk they’d arranged for me to use.
“You’re basically just stuffing me with knowledge.”
“Exactly, that's how you get it all in your head.”
“You’ve said ‘jump’ and ‘block’ far too many times for my brain to even comprehend which ones it's referring to!”
“Okay, if that was true you’ll be able to read this.” Again he pulls out the piece of paper.
“Uh... 4— something.”
“Oh my god…”
“I told you!”
“Fine, let's take a break for the day. We’re not getting anywhere at this rate…”
He let me go and kicked me out the door, told me to go out and explore the level while he cleared his head and thought out his lesson plan.
I guess his teaching was alright, even if it was a little too many of this and that. My brain was just… rejecting the information or something like that. I don't know, something about whatever it was that made me wanna leave. And I guess going out and seeing what the noob level has in store would also be a pretty good idea.
Heading out there wasn’t that hard but the amount of people outside was kind of overwhelming. Like the first day I was here a lot of them were grouped together, though now that I'm seeing them all it looks like there’s less of them than there was the other day.
Jumping through the neighborhood I saw a lot of the same houses with a few odd ones out here and there but they were far and few in between. Whoever was in charge of building these houses weren't very creative were they?
There also seemed to be some sort of game that they're playing down here. I asked one of the veteran noobs and they said that it was some kind of new minigame that they were trying to implement to lighten up the mood. Weird but I guess its pretty effective since it seems to be pretty popular with the noobs.
As I walked around further into the noob level I realized just how far the long line of houses stretched out, so much so that I didn't see the person who I almost bumped into.
“Hey, watch where you’re going!” The guy she bumped into said, looking at his boots it looked like he was a noob too.
“Sorry sorry, I was just looking around.”
“Anyways, can you read this for me?” The noob then gave me a piece of paper that had coordinates written on it.
I looked at it and raised an eyebrow, is he dead serious? “And you're supposed to take my word for it?
“Well, yeah? What else am I supposed to do?”
“Whatever man, do what you want.” I read out what the piece of paper said, coordinates to a ticket event.
The noob thanked me before hopping away and immediately falling into the void.
So much for being a kind soul.
"So you do understand what I'm teaching ya."
"W-When did you get here?"
"Just now, you know you could always just tell me the truth and say I'm a good teacher."
"Ugh." I try to hop away but he grabs my arm keeping me firmly in place.
He grins, "Since you're able to read guess we'll be able to go to the ticket event."
"Could be gone by now.
"Nah, heard a little something from a vet and they said that they hand out different coordinates for each level of the Revived."
He continues, "Since both of us died in the Prison our comp is full of noobs, its gonna be real easy so don't even worry about the ticket being gone."
"Listen, you go to the coordinates of the noob you just met and I'll go to the original coords."
"Why do you get to go to the original coords?"
"As your teacher I deserve it."
That made me grin and I began to hop away into the direction of the noob's coordinates. When I got there it seemed that Teddy was right, the ticket was still there. However there was still a long line in front of her waiting for the person in front to get to the end. She had to do something.
She hated to do this but…
"Look, it's Parkour Champion Evbo!"
"Where!?"
The hoard of noobs began to run towards the way she pointed towards. She took that as her chance to get on the course before they came back.
The Parkour Pro who was left in charge of this course chuckled as he saw her taking the chance but says nothing about it. Letting her get on the course.
It was always the first jump that was the easiest to her. Only a one block jump, so simple it was so odd to see the noobs struggle with it. Its after the first jump that she had to think of the rest of the jumps.
One jump after the other, theres no need to think of anything else.
Soon enough I was down to the last jump. Behind me the noobs were once again in line, this time though they were not too happy.
"Hey, you really think you can rank up?"
"Y-Yeah, you're just a noob like all of us."
Soon they were all venting out their complaints, I was losing my concentration as more and more voices began to get louder and louder.
And then when I fall, I'll be back where I began. So I can't drop now I—
What am I even doing this for..?
Go on, jump.
Jump, Tabi.
"Congratulations you made it!"
"Huh?"
Being so buried in my thoughts I hadn't even realized that I jumped and made it.
"The ticket is yours. Go on, take it."
I pick up the ticket and got off the course with ease. There on the other side was… Everything.
I took a stroll around the Noob level once more, this time I was really paying attention. The people down here looked… defeated, happy, relieved, and sad. It's different for everyone, but we all seem to share the same goal.
To reach the top.
But me? I don't even know why I'm doing this. Is it so that I can find Evbo again, or is it because of a completely different objective? That I don't know.
All I know is that, there's something I need to do up there.
I decided to make my way back home. Pack anything we have to set out for the tower tomorrow. It was going to get tougher as we go up, anything and everything could happen to them.
As I made my way back to the house I spot two people nearing the neighbor's house.
The man spoke loudly. "Dude, look at this." The man boasted. He held up 5 pieces of cooked beef. This guy is stacked, enough to be able to cook the raw beef.
"Omg, can I have some?" A girl asked. There weren't many girls around here were there?
"Sure, if you defeat me in a parkour battle."
"A parkour battle? What's that?" I said, walking over to join their conversation.
The beef guy obviously annoyed at me said, "I wasn't talking to you."
"But she's here now so why not tell her?"
The guy groaned but explained anyways, "it's a battle with parkour. Simple"
Not really but whatever, "So is it like whoever does the best jump wins or something?"
"Pretty much."
"Okay then, I'm in. If I win I get half of your cooked beef" I declared loud enough that a big group of people began to form around us looking at the commotion.
The beef guy scoffed but doesn't back down. Instead he said, "fine! Then as my prize, I want your ticket."
"Deal."
He began to declare the rules for everyone to hear. So much for keeping his cards hidden, must be the show off personality that got him this way.
Once he finished his speech he turned around and took one step back, declaring that the space between the two of us was to be our makeshift arena.
"Just so you know I was once a Parkour Master."
"Master, Shmaster, we're both noobs at the end of the day." I muttered under my breath the last part but it seems like he still heard me.
"I'll make you regret those words you— you..! nincompoop!"
He announces that he will go first as the person who started the duel and made his move. Doing a one block jump followed by another one block jump.
"That's it?" I said, deadpanned. I would have thought he was gonna do something way cooler than that.
"Uh, duh? we're in the noob level we can't do jack—"
"Okay enough." I moved to the side. He said that I could either contest the jump with the same jump or do a more difficult jump to even it out. I decide to do the same jump as he did. Better to keep my talents hidden for now.
He laughs, "Oh. That's it" repeating the same words I'd used for his jump.
"Same jump as yours. I contest it."
"Alright then, guess I've gotta make a bigger move to beat that!"
He does 3 one block jumps in a row.
Is he being serious?
"Of course I'm being serious!"
I thought I said that in my heead but whatever man. I decide that if he's going to continue on with this then I'll do something risky.
I jumped and perfectly performed a one block 360. As I landed I looked at his face with a smug look but when I saw his face that was filled with shock and utter disbelief I almost thought I'd done something wrong.
"What?" I said, trying to keep my voice steady.
"You… You did a 360." He said, shakily pointing at me. "I surrender, you can have the beef for all I care!"
He runs away, dropping the beef at my knees and the groups of people that once surrounded the two of us began to dissolve, however there were many who continued to stay and murmur about the recent events.
Was a 360 really that big of a deal?
Now done with that I had 5 whole pieces of cooked beef to share with Teddy. He's gonna be real surprised when I show this to him.
"What took you so long?" Teddy said, greeting her by the door. A grin etched on to his face as he wags the green ticket in his hand. Clear to show that he had been victorious in his endeavors.
"Traffic, but look at what I got." She placed the beef on top of the counter, along side the ticket that she had gotten earlier in the day. Teddy's eyes grew wide as he marvelled at her catch.
"How the hell did you get these!?"
"I won a match. Well, the guy ran away and gave it all to me so you could say that I won."
"This is enough for us to celebrate tonight. You hungry."
"You bet."
And so the two of us spend the night chowing down on some cooked beef. It was fun actually, sitting down and eating these with Teddy. I wondered if— when they had gotten up to the top, will their lives be just as good as it was down here?
I shouldn't be thinking of things like these so early on but I couldn't help but wonder.
It was now the next day, Teddy and I were already in front of the temple ready to place in our tickets. If she drops it wouldn't be like it was the end of the world. However she didn't have the time to think about that, or even if she was able to get another ticket if she fails.
As she got in the temple it was safe to say that she was in awe. The parkour course was, if she had to say it in other terms, a beauty. Whoever had been in charge of this wonderfully crafted work of art must be some sort of genius. Unless it was Evbo then she took it all back.
"You ready?"
"Ready as I'll ever be."