Love and Death: A Gamer's Thriller

I remember that night.. That night in my house in a quiet little town by the name of Early. I was up late one late, typical teenager business; Facebook, Games, etc, etc..

I got bored though, and I was having some.. uhm, 'issues' with a certain girl on Facebook. A girl with gorgeous brown eyes, long delicate brown hair, a smile that could make anyone's day memorable. I shall not name her though, for privacy and the fact that seeing her name brings back some pains and memories.

Back to the story at hand. I got bored and frustrated and put my laptop down to think, as I stared into the bright screen that provided the only light in the darkness of my small bedroom, I thought and thought. I then remembered I haven't played the Nintendo 64 system I found when we moved in to this house. I was very excited when I discovered it for I haven't played on a system on this since I was very very young. I stood up from my bed and walked over, first turning on my orange lamp to illuminate the room, then grabbing the controller and setting it by where I plan to sit to play the system, as I turned and looked at the 10+ games I also discovered with the console, as well. So many choices, including games like Mario Party, Mario Kart 64, Kirby and others. I saw a game that I was planning to play when I first found the system, but schoolwork and other problems kept me from doing so. A game titled: "Super Smash Bros."

As a small smirk spread on my face, I grabbed the cartridge and proceeded to place it in but I noticed a sketch on top of the cartridge as I paused and glanced over it. It only had 4 letters in it, in very poor and almost shaky appearing writing:

"L.E.I.D"

I pondered at this, but honestly? I was way to excited to play this game that I dismissed it and placed it in the console, and switched it on. I sat down as I grabbed the controller with glee, looking at the T.V.

The game started up as usual, with the flaming background and the bold title text read "Super Smash Bros." Nothing strange going on here. I then proceeded to press Start.

But a weird thing occurred.

I couldn't select any other option but Versus mode, and I was puzzled. Why would the Versus option be the only available one?..

I thought it was a bug in the console so I ignored it. But then another glitch occurred.. At least I think it was a glitch.. Before it went to Character Selection screen, a word popped up in typical N64 pixel text, except the shade of color was.. a dark red..

It read: "Love"

My eyes shot open at this 3rd weird occurrence.. But I just blew it off, as well as the others at this point, as my mind playing tricks on me, since it was about 1:45 in the morning and I was quite tired, but my curiosity and excited mind was urging me to play on. I then continued to pick Link, as I am a huge Legend Of Zelda fan, and a split second right after I selected him, the 2nd character slot selected Zelda. Fitting but.. still creepy as hell.

I chose the Hyrule Castle theme to fit, despite the weird occurrences. And the battle began. But right after the the countdown ended the words "Go!" appeared, the map suddenly started shaking, playing a song that sent a chill down my spine that felt like sharp claws running down the middle of my back slowly. The song was the reversed Ocarina of Time theme, but in a lower pitch..

I tried to ignore it and tried to move through the shaking map to Zelda, my opponent, but I noticed.. she wasn't ANYWHERE on the map! She was no where on it. It was if she had a invincibility power-up but.. permanently! As I ran around the map for a few minutes, I heard a high pitched giggle from the T.V. speakers, as it sounded like a little girl giggling madly like someone was tickling her sides or told her a really funny joke. It was a humored giggle. This continued for about 3 minutes I'd estimate from memory, and a whisper from that same voice said and including a text box, one that looked similar to the ones that appeared in the Zelda franchise games, that read:

"Ends."

I was shaking at this point. Why where these words appearing? Why were these weird glitches happening? Is my mind just playing tricks on me? I sighed and pressed A, to get the text box to move out of the screen. But it never went away, I pressed A again and all I kept getting were the little beeping sounds that go off when the box comes up. I pressed A again, and again, and again.. And finally after about 30 presses...

Link let out a piercing scream. This isn't the one that usually plays when he falls down a pit or something. This sounded more... pain-filled, horrifying, sounded almost feminine, like it wasn't Link. More like.. it was Zelda!

And then, after it ended, out of nowhere, Link flew of the map, and after he fell out of the screen and the flashing aura appeared showing he fell off and was defeated, I waited for Link to respawn. But...

He never respawned. The screen then began to go static. Slowly at first, then it completely went full static, filling the whole screen. I sat there, confused and scared out of my mind. So many questions flooded my mind. And then it went black. I stared at the screen for a few seconds, as another text box appeared in the middle of the screen, showing more text.. Only this time. The text was huge, and bolded, and in a blood stained almost realistic dripping font. It read:

"In Death."

I was so confused I rubbed my forehead and thought about this, looking at the floor. I looked at the T.V. and it seemed to have been stuck on the screen with the text box. I was thinking of pushing the A button on the controller to see if there's more, but I didn't want anymore of this. It was too much for me. I stood up once more and turned off the console, taking out the cartridge and throwing it away, never wanting to look at the game again. Not after this horrifying experience..

I sighed and placed the controller beside the console, turning off the lamp and T.V. as I laid down in bed, looking at the cieling. Thinking of what the words meant. I pieced the words together and eventually after thinking. It started to make sense:

The words make out a statement: "Love Ends In Death." I then thought of where this could have come from. Then I remembered the sketched lettering ontop of the cartridge. "L.E.I.D"

Love Ends In Death

I nodded and confirmed this. But more questions remained..

Why was this statement shown? Was this connected to my situation? Maybe this was just a hacked game.. Or maybe just glitched.

I still can't help but think..

Why, of all the game copies that could still exist in this world, is this one so demented? So disturbing? So nightmarish?

My answer came the next day. The girl I had issues with committed suicide sometime during the night. Death by electrocution. In the typical bathtub-water-with-toaster method.. Could she have haunted my mind and made me see these things? Maybe to see how much she was hurting? Could it just be a hacked game or a bootleg?

I may never know. But all I know is, I cannot play another Super Mario Bros game without remembering that horrifying night..