This is a Becky piece and although it's full of Becky's trademark silly style, it's somewhat different for a Becky piece.

 
Weird and confusing images drifted around in Becky Joy's mind as she slept, which, contrary to which you might assume, was not the norm for her. It really shook up Becky. Poor Becky Joy ultimately just really wanted to be liked, and to be in her home kingdom, hanging out with buddies and brushing her wolf friend Zanther's fur, and giving him bows and ribbons and treats.

Ya know, the Loathian Dream.

Becky rested there, semiconscious, but she knew she wasn't at home, and that made her very angry. And the angrier the ice mage got, the colder everything around her got!

Yet Becky Joy woke up in a sweat. A cold sweat, of course. She sat up like a bolt as her eyes shot open wide!

"Grrr, mad Becky! Oops, I mean, 'Angry Becky!'" she said. She paused, then giggled. "Heehee, angry Becky, I like the sound of that!"

She then shook her head. "Nope, don't like nufin'. That's just an angry Becky for you.. ohhh, I miss my Wolfie and Knobbies!"

Becky stood up and looked around herself. What she were her surroundings. Obviously. Becky's eyes watered but she wasn't sure if she was crying or not. Big girls don't cry but sometimes big Beckies did! Beckys? Whatever.

She didn't know what a train station was, so she didn't recognize it other than as a large, mostly metal building across a paved street from herself. It looked to have been abandoned for several decades.

Becky's body ached somewhat. She wasn't sure why but it upset her and made her wanna fight someone. She rolled over and stood up to see a large and much older looking theater building behind her, with a poster for some comedy play named Our Kingdom Cousin. Becky just shrugged. She didn't get it and that fact made her so mad that she felt like freezing someone's feet together!

A voice inside of her head sang, "Don't look back, you can never look back." This theater was probably so old that it was from four score and twenty years ago! Becky didn't have time for an old theater, even though she kinda-sorta wanted to go perform "My Little Pony" on the stage. That'd be cool. Zanther could come but oh no. She lost him back in that silly Honorburg Town. Was Aleenie here? Aleena was probably back with her friends, not needing to hang out with Becky.

Becky looked around. She just wanted to talk to someone, or have a shoulder to cry on, but something inside of her felt all twisted and wrong. It was bringing out emotions Becky didn't care for. Hate. Competitiveness. Violence.

She walked down the street. Her legs felt like they were asleep. Her nose was buggin' her and she kept sneezing. The dust and dirt around wherever she was didn't help much. She didn't even know where she was going but something was pulling her away from the point she started out at. Maybe she'd find friends, but she wasn't in the mood for needing friends. She just wanted to punch someone.

Strawberry punch would be yummy right now, with all this dry heat around her. Becky wondered if anyone had invented it yet. She felt herself wanting to be silly and nonsensical but she realized now wasn't the time. Two aspects of her personality were vying for the right to tell her what to do.

Angry Becky, of course, yelled that it was okay to beat people up because that's what Kwadlin wanted, and he put some drugs into her system to make her super strong, so why should she have to put up with people who just wanted to bully her, and who needed friends, anyway?

Grown-up Becky told her she had to behave maturely or she'd get sent to her room, and the drugs weren't an excuse. Okay, they were, but not a very good excuse, and that didn't matter because they had to properly represent the Feline Empire, in case Queen Kitty wanted to make herself a new town over on ... wherever they were at. Probably another part of the Kingdom, or maybe a Faraway Land island.

But Bad Becky came in and took Angry Becky's side and said Queen Catrina wouldn't want them if they were easy to beat up, so Becky would have to beat them up herself to see how hard they were to beat up. Prince Baby wasn't gonna want wimpy servants.

Then Giant Silly Becky came in, ate them all, and told Becky she wanted cake, so Becky Joy smiled and went in search for cake!

* * *

A dreary and troubled town greeted her down the long and winding road... of faith. Further down the road, Amy Anderson prided herself on her collection of porcelain and glass dolls, but with her family being forced to abandon their home and seek their fortune in a less certain environment, she had been forced to pick only her favorite five to travel with.

"Hurry up, Amy-anna!" her mom called out to her. "You know there's another swarm expected, and where there's swarms, there's bandits. We need to get out of here if you don't wanna end up being bug food of a bandit victim."

Amy shook her head. She'd already grabbed three dolls. Without time to think, she grabbed two identical looking ones. "I'm sorry to leave the rest of you behind, but I'm leaving Gor the ninja-dragon, because he's your leader, Trillia the garden fairy, because she can grow food for you, and Tah'Lin, because he's the most dangerous. I'm only taking the most helpless and youngest with me. I hope I see you all again, but we can't fight the bugs."

She lowered her voice past a whisper. "But maybe I'll find the staff of dolls and we will be able to."

"Come ON, brat!" her father called impatiently. "You're going to get us all killed!"

"I love you all," Amy called out to her doll collection. Then she stuffed the last two dolls into her leather pouch along with some snacks she found earlier for the trip, and ran down stairs.

Amy, her mother, father and older brother looked towards town. They'd always lived on the edge of DeRo near the Protection towers, ever since Amy's grandfather's grandfather moved into the house with his parents as children. The days of it being a prison were long over even by then. Even so, it was always a tough place to live, but it allowed Amy's father, like her father's father, and his parents, and more, to make their living as guards, merchants, and artists with virtually no taxes compared to the Empire and other local communities.

The bug invasion, however, made the situation, for the first time, truly unlivable. Amy looked at the house her friend Jamerica lived in. There were enough holes that the walls seemed ready to fall down any minute. Bloodstained holes. She wasn't sure if Jamerica or her brothers the obnoxious twins were okay. When the bugs hit, you ran the other direction; you didn't stay around to check on friends.

No matter how close those friends were, she thought as she winced in shame. She could have stayed, but against bugs that can tunnel through walls, what could you do? Trained soldiers found the bugs dangerous opponents. Foes who could not only dig through the best of armor easily, but also dig through the very ground to escape at the slightest hint of danger.

They weren't unstoppable but they were close enough that every one of the growing attacks left the city in notably worse condition. DeRo never was, and probably never would be, the kind of place you go to, or stay, if you got a legitimate option of going somewhere else, so the fact that the town was starting to be slowly abandoned spoke volumes of how badly things had devolved into.

With a little encouragement from her parents, young Amy rushed to keep up with them as they started down the dirt and rock road. At least it would take them by the old theater. Amy always loved that out-of-time oddity, even if some said it was a cursed building.

Amy's older brother, bigger than their mom physically and almost as big as her dad, turned to Amy, smiling weakly. "Don't fall behind, now. I don't want to have to carry you this whole trip."

He liked to tease her. Loved to, actually. Constantly and insistently. But it was obvious that he worried over his younger sister. Do anything to protect her. She knew that, so she nodded and rushed to keep up, not wanting to risk having to put him in danger.

The shadows didn't offer much protection from the sun. The original plan was to leave either early, when it was cooler and safer, or later at night, under the cover of darkness. They'd ran into complications that morning, having to aid neighbors who were trying to get out, and waiting went out the window when rumors of another swamp hit the town like a brick to the inside of one's brain.

The family didn't bother to look back as the scene slowly faded into the distance under the harsh light of noon.

"Where are we going, anyway?" Amy's older brother asked. In all the rush to get things ready, neither he nor Amy had even thought to wonder.

"There's a small settlement in the Faraway Plains that's been taking in DeRo refuges," explained their mother as they walked past what used to be a small shop used to be; it was reduced to rubble.

"How're we going to stop the bugs if they come to our new home?" Amy asked, her hopes sinking further at the thought. Her father turned to reassure her, but an unfamiliar voice stole their attention.

"You stomp on 'em! Like this, and this and BAM!"

Amy and her family jumped in shock at the odd voice then looked over, absolutely bewildered at the sight of a young woman jumping up and down like a rabbit, stomping imaginary bugs. Her father put an arm around her, making sure she stayed back from this oddity. Noticing they were starring at her anxiously, the woman stopped.

"I mean.. that's what I'd do.. I mean if there were bugs. And they invaded. I'd stomp on.. Yeah, sorry." She looked down to the ground, shamed. "I'm Becky Joy. Are you okay? Cause you don't look okay and if you're not okay, I wanna help."

"We're fine, thank you," her mom said. Her brother chuckled, confused.

"But you can't just stomp the bugs!" said Amy in a pleading voice.

"Why not?" Becky asked, frowning deeper. "What if I really wanna? Are they holy or something?"

"Come on, Amy, we have to go," her dad said, not wanting to waste any time on this crazy 'Becky' person. Her dad took her hand to lead her off but Amy protested.

"We need to tell her, she might get hurt!" Amy broke free of her dad's grip. "Miss."

"Becky," says the girl, smiling and kneeling down. "I'm Becky. What's your name, lil one?"

"Amy. Me and my family are running away from the bugs. They're really dangerous." Amy looked like she was about to cry so Becky hugged her. But Becky stopped when it upset her parents who didn't trust Becky.

"Sorry, I just wanted to comfort her," Becky said in a sad and serious voice.

"It's ... okay," her mother said with a sigh. "We're just not quick to trust strangers."

"I understand." Becky cheered up. "How comes?"

"Huh?!" Amy asked, not getting what she meant. "How come we don't like to trust strange people?" What a silly question!

"How comes the bugs are so dangerous?" Becky repeated, twisting her head a bit. She sneezed again. Her allergies- or reaction to the drug- made it hard to even smell the pine scent of the forest trees.

"It's details like this that help in understanding what your talking about," Amy's annoying brother said with a laugh.

"Haha, yeah!" Becky said.

"The bugs have super thick shells, and they can burrow through walls," Amy said, dropping her voice and she shifty eye emoted. "Even spears can't slow them down."

"I heard people try to stomp on them, they just burrow through your boots up into your leg!" her brother said, still getting a perverse kick out of the idea. "They spit this goo that'll turn your skin red and make it feel like it's burning off!"

"I'll protect you!" Becky said confidently, even though her eyes were burning intensely enough to bring tears. "I'll walk with you so you don't gotta stop for me, and I'll protect you," Becky repeated.

"Yeah, okay," the kids' father said, eyeing her a bit suspiciously. "Just keep your distance. If you're trying to pull a fast one, you'll be sorry."

The Becky woman looked totally confused. "Okay, I will not walk too fast. I'm sorry if I walked too fast!"

Amy giggled. Maybe for the first time in a while. "You haven't even started walking yet!"

The two talked a bit more before Amy's parents finally ushered her off. Becky followed, being careful not to attract too much attention. She couldn't help it, though. She felt like picking a fight, but this time, Becky Angel was on her shoulder, constantly reminded her she didn't want a fight with the family, but if anyone messed with them ohhh, were they going to be in trouble!

She almost tripped over the shorter Amy when Amy's father put his arm up to stop the family. His face paled noticeably.

"We need to turn around," he whispered. "I can hear their buzzing. The death bugs. They're here.. and they're feasting."

Amy wondered what- or who- they were feasting on and if her, her family and her new friend would be the dessert.

It's also pretty long for a Becky Joy solo.

It was quite fun introducing Amy and her family. We'll get back to this problem in a fairly unexpected manner, but that's later on. We've got some other territory - and a little over half a dozen player characters- to cover between now and then.