FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

The ghost of a thousand lost lives and spent continues haunted the dark, neon-lit space of Tim’s Arcade while the siren song of a dozen attract modes filled the air. Nostalgia hit Alex so hard he could almost taste the bubblegum. He hadn’t been in this place since high school and time hadn’t been kind to his old haunt. On one end of the room sat a Guitar Hero Arcade with a nicotine stained out of order sign where a controller ought to have been and on the other end, he had his choice of cutting-edge titles like Marvel vs. Capcom 2 and Frogger. Large indentations sat in the dusty carpet where games had once been, but those lucky cabinets had been spirited away to better homes during the liquidation. Even when Tim was still alive and running the place the arcade was cheaper than cheap, duller than dirt, and so uncool that the local drug dealers skipped it. Still, he felt the need to pay his final respects for at the stroke of midnight Tim’s would be just another labelscar on the stretch of road he used to walk on his way home.

Everyone else had already dropped by to offer condolences or the charm of broken air hockey tables and suspect change machines didn’t leave the same kind of impressions on others as they did for him. He was the only one in the building aside from the manager. Scuffs in the carpeting made him trip every other step he took and the ceiling had large spots of water damage. As he passed by a non-functioning Area 51 game, he spotted a half-smoked roach sitting above the light gun. For a moment he thought about picking it up, but he wasn’t that desperate yet.

As he walked past the row of pinball tables, he thought of playing a game for old time’s sake, but the FOR SALE and SOLD stickers plastered across the scoreboards changed his mind. None of them looked to be maintained and if something broke while he played, he’d be on the hook for it.

He dropped a quarter in Frogger, but it ate his money and when he went to find the manager he’d ducked out to parts unknown. He tried his luck with the one remaining skee-ball in the back and lost every single throw, not that he would have had enough tickets to win anything even if there had been any prizes left. Enough was enough, Tim’s Arcade could close now with his blessing.

Passing by all the malfunctioning machines and dimly lit walkways for the last time, he was almost out the door when out of the corner of his eye it caught his attention. A huge, bright red cabinet with rows of lights blinking in patterns called to him. The crane game, another relic of his past. Alex stood in front of the machine; his bored reflection stared back at him from the large window as he mused on the collective hundreds of dollars he wasted in the folly of his youth. All of these damn machines were rigged, he knew that, but the game seemed different somehow, cleaner, newer, and a lot bigger with an equally big, menacing looking claw. It dangled above the drop chute like it was just waiting for something to pass beneath it to be devoured. Yet, for all the trouble someone had gone to replacing the machine they didn’t bother replacing the prizes. Some of the plush toys inside looked as if they’d been there since the Reagan Administration and half-buried in the pile, he swore he saw a portable CD player still in the clamshell. His eyes scanned the assortment of worn plush toys and plastic crap like a kid trying to find that one, special prize, a memento.

And he found it. Among the dirty, unraveling stuffed bears and bunnies. A reptilian looking creature, sitting cross-legged on top of the pile as if it were resting. A pair of elegant, curved, black horns sat atop its smooth, scaly head. Fin crests adorned the toy’s face on either side, just behind the cheeks and a short, rounded snout made up its cute muzzle along with a pair of large, closed eyes. Alex marveled at the skin, white as snow and detailed down to the last scale. He’d never heard of someone making a stuffed kobold before and he imagined this was a one-off. Someone had even gone to the trouble of stitching clothes for it. A brightly colored shirt with the word “Prize” on the front adorned its chest and it wore a pair of denim shorts complete with pockets. No seams, no tags, and no clue who made it; entirely out of place with the rest of the loot. It looked so real Alex swore that it was breathing. “This thing is incredible,” he said, tapping at the window.

The toy opened its big, blue eyes and followed the source of the sound. It looked right at him, smiled, and waved.

“Jesus Christ, that thing is alive!” He leapt back, flailing his arms around like a fool. The kobold looked equally startled by his hysterics, but then it pointed at him and snickered.

“Glad this place is empty now.” Regaining his composure, he went back over to the window. She waved at him once more. He got the feeling that it was a she. Maybe something about the eyes, maybe something about the snickering, or maybe the Symbol of Venus next to the word “Prize” that he spotted on the second take. He waved back at her absentmindedly, but he was walking away. He needed to speak to the manager about this.

An octagonal kiosk sat in the center of the arcade, once a place for exchanging tickets. Now all of the displays were empty, cleared out ahead of time. A middle-aged man with a permanent sneer leaned against the counter, toying with his phone. He smelled of recently smoked cigarettes with just a hint of cheap beer. His faded Tim’s Arcade shirt reflected his fading hairline. The old guy didn’t notice Alex approaching.

“Hey, did you know that you have something in your claw game?”

“That so?” The manager asked, not looking up from his phone. “What?”

“A kobold. “

“Well, I’m not the one who stocks it so if that’s a problem…”

“I’m serious, there’s a—“

He heard an audible pop from the old guy’s neck as he looked up from his phone to glare at him. “Look, son. I don’t care. In ten minutes I’m out of here for good. If there’s a problem then call the company, the damn thing is a rental.” He shook his head and went back to his phone. “Hope they don’t expect us to haul it off…”

Alex shrugged and went back over to the claw game with a clearer understanding of why the arcade was shuttering. He turned his attention to the kobold who greeted him with that big smile and another wave of her claw. She had an infectious charm that made him smile back.

“How did you get in there? Are you okay?”

The kobold pointed upwards. Alex followed her claw until he saw the lock above the panel. His eyes trained back to her and she pantomimed the turning of a key and then a set of hands lifting and putting something down.

“And you just let someone put you in there?”

She nodded, without a care in the world.

“Why?”

The kobold looked a bit worried and shrugged at him before shaking her head.

“Why don’t you just climb out of there then?”

Her eyes turned to pinpricks as she shook her head and then pointed at the drop chute which had a high plastic wall around it. He imagined it might be to keep prizes from falling out, but not to keep them from escaping. With a beckoning claw she drew his attention to one of the upper corners on the inside of the cabinet where he saw what looked like a tiny camera, pointed right at them.

“Are you kidding me?” Whoever ran the machine obviously wasn’t a fan of theft, or their prizes wandering off. Now Alex was having second thoughts about even talking to her, but her blue gaze kept toying with his feelings. “Have a name?”

The creature pointed at her shirt proudly and grinned.

“No, I mean your name.”

She pointed at it again.

He smirked; eyebrows raised in disbelief. “Prize is your name?”

She nodded enthusiastically.

“Alright then. Can you talk?”

A large, toothy grin covered her face. Prize gave him a thumbs up, but said nothing. As much as he wanted to continue the amusing conversation, he didn’t really have time to play twenty questions with the arcade closing soon. He also had little time to go over the ethics of winning a living, sentient creature to take home. Was it legal? What about food? Alex stroked his chin as he looked at her in there, alone among a bunch of crappy plush toys. If her reaction was any indication, whoever put her in there wasn’t too nice. For all he knew he was being watched right now by some sinister kobold trafficking cartel. Who knows what would become of her once the place closed down? His fingers started pinching around at the loose change in his pocket, he had to win her, it was as simple as that. He took a quarter out when he noticed the machine only had an acceptor for paper money.

“Five bucks?!” He looked back up at the white kobold behind the pane. She shrugged and shook her head. He opened his wallet, all he had was fifteen dollars to last him until payday. Fifteen dollars for everything from food to drink. Fifteen dollars and just three chances to win his very own kobold. The fiver felt leathery in his hand. He turned it over a few times and looked back at the kobold. Prize held her claws together and nodded towards him. “Ramen and water it is,” he said to himself. The edge of the bill slipped into the acceptor and then the whole thing disappeared inside.

His body tensed up in expectation of something, of what he wasn’t sure, but he held his breath nonetheless. All at once the game sprang to life. The bright lights became brighter, blinding Alex with their hypnotic patterns, forcing him to shield his eyes. A vibrant rendition of “Entry of the Gladiators” on a grating, ten second loop blasted out over a cheap, hidden speaker. He rubbed the glare out of his eyes and looked down at the controls where a small LCD counted down the time remaining. The rough texture of the joystick tugged at his hand as if it had been designed to be as uncomfortable as possible. He gave it a slight push forward. The motors on the huge claw whirred in response and the metal hand shot towards the back, slamming against the other end hard enough to rattle the whole machine. The claw struck the back panel a few times as it swayed like a pendulum. Prize looked at him with a worried expression.

“The controls are a little sensitive,” he shouted to her over the noise. Alex tapped the stick, the claw jolted and jerked with each prod of his finger. The seconds ticked away; Prize flinched at each movement as the claw drew nearer. Sweat formed on Alex’s brow while he tried to line the thing up with her. It swung around so much it was hard to tell exactly where it would fall and it looked heavy enough to do some damage if it came down wrong. “Who the hell approved this thing?”

5…4…3…he tapped the button and the metal fingers came down, completely missing Prize. She watched it grab a stuffed bear by the head and lift up. Stuffing bled from the ursine toy’s neck as it dangled on the end of the claw. The machine jerked, the motors whined, and the two of them watched in horror as the body of the stuffed animal tore away, leaving a trail of stuffing before falling back into the pile. The metal monster dropped the head into the chute and the game fell silent.

“Don’t look at me like that, I haven’t played one of these things in years. I don’t suppose you could move?” he asked. She tilted her head and gave him a sad look. “Figures.” He reached into the chute and tossed away the decapitated bear head before he took out the next five-dollar bill.

“Give me luck, Mister Lincoln.” The machine greedily swallowed up the money and the whole thing started again. Alex shielded his eyes just in time and then got straight to work lining the claw up. He stepped away from the controls to examine the claw’s position from every possible angle. The sides, the rear, up, down, and all points in between. Prize looked dizzy as she watched him do several full laps around the machine trying to get it picture perfect. “Ok Alex, you’ve got this, you’ve got—“

An obnoxiously loud buzzer deafened the both of them. Alex put his hands over his ears while Prize covered her tympanum. The noise stopped a few seconds later and the claw returned to its resting position over the chute. He’d run out of time.

“Damn it!” He slammed his hand against the window, startling Prize and making her fall backwards onto a stuffed turtle. “Sorry,” he said as he rubbed his hand.

“Don’t hit the machine!” a gravelly voice shouted from the middle of the arcade. Alex noticed the back row of games had gone dark, unplugged. The place was closing down around him. He pulled out his last five dollars, his last chance.

The music scoured his ears once more as his eyes burned with the light, but he lined up the claw like he'd been doing this all his life. Prize sat up and stared at the claw like she was waiting for some divine judgment, or salvation. Alex gave the thing time to stop swaying so much, made one quick assessment from both sides of the machine and then he tapped the button. The metal fingers came down right over her, bonking her on the head in the process, but that didn’t matter. He’d got her, he’d won. The claw started to rise.

But it didn’t close, it slipped around her and went back up empty. All of these damn machines were rigged, he knew that. He stopped his fist just short of slamming into the window. The claw released its reward of nothing over the chute and he turned away, not wanting to see the look of disappointment on the kobold’s face. Another row of games turned off forever as the lights went out one by one. He heard a frantic tapping on the window behind him. Alex turned around to see Prize sitting there, holding another five-dollar bill in her claws.

“How? Forget it, just give it to me.”

The kobold wadded up the bill and flicked it over the chute. Meanwhile, the row of games behind him blinked off, forever. “Come on, damn it.” The machine kept spitting the bill back out. Alex slammed it against the window, flattening it as much as possible.

“I said don’t hit the machine!” The manager shouted.

Prize pointed towards the money, gesturing at him to hurry. “I’m trying, I’m trying!” At last, the fiver vanished into the machine. The heavenly loop of low-grade music graced his ears as his retinas burned with the scintillating colors. With care and cause he coaxed the claw closer and closer to the colorless kobold. Blessed with artisan grace, he lined up the claw and prepared to hit the button. All of these machines had a payoff, a certain number of times it needed to strike before the claw would actually close. This time it would, he could feel it in his bones. He pushed the button.

But it didn’t. Alex pressed his face against the window, watching it rise in defeat. He looked down to express his condolences to the kobold, but Prize was looking over her shoulder at the camera up in the corner. She snarled and gave it the finger before leaping up and grabbing hold of the claw with both hands. A loud, ringing alarm sounded as the kobold struggled to hang on. The motor groaned under the strain, trying to return to the chute with the kobold hanging off of it. Alex could only watch her dangle. She lifted up her legs, barely clearing the protective wall around the drop chute and then she let go, landing in the bottom with a hard thud.

“The hell is going on out there?!” Alex didn’t wait to give the manager an explanation. He pushed open the chute flap and yanked the kobold out, hoisting her over his shoulder like a knight of old before bolting out of the door and down the street, sprinting a full block down the road before stopping to catch his breath and then he remembered the kobold over his shoulder.

“You alright?” He asked between gasps, holding her in his arms. The white kobold laughed and nodded. She leaned forward and gave him a small kiss on the cheek and batted her blue eyes at him. He had no idea what he was going to do with a kobold, but he felt like a real hero in that moment and she seemed sweet on him. “I guess we should go home. I hope you like ramen,” he said and the two of them continued down the street.