“Aubrey!”

“What are you doing?”

“Aubrey! We need to leave! Now!”

Susan frantically tugged on her friend’s cherry red parka as she stared off into the distance with glossy eyes.

“Hey! We can’t die here,” she exclaimed urgently.

As she tried to hoist Aubrey over her shoulders the heat from the blazing wreckage around them rose to more motivating levels. Sweating bullets, Susan successfully extracted them both from the flaming helicopter that had been toppled to an incorrect side. She hopped down to a grassy footing besides the belly of the doomed machine.

Dark storm clouds brewed to the east and sent ever-intensifying weather cascading towards the girls. Susan’s lucky party hat had been blown to one side of her face from gusts of wind while she struggled to readjust her grip on Aubrey’s torso.

“Did you really have to wear those ridiculous parachute pants,” Susan scowled, “I don’t care for your gaudy flair when it’s taking full advantage of my face!”

“You’re one to talk,” Aubrey snapped back as her trance finally resolved, “Maybe we would be doing better if you hadn’t eaten those ridiculously colorful mushrooms you just insisted on having!”

“Mushrooms?” Susan dropped her friend to the ground with a newly scrunched expression on her face.

“What are you talking about,” she projected quite assertively, “this isn’t a tangential mushroom trip.”

“You still don’t remember?” Aubrey growled matching Susan’s energy.

She propped herself up on wobbly arms as she regained feeling in her various limbs.

“You claimed it was an ‘essential Easter egg’ that you’ve ‘never finished with before,’” Aubrey made mocking googly eyes while flashing air quotes. Only to realize she made a grave mistake and whooshed down to a face plant before her still recovering body could save her.

“Bleh,” she continued after wiping dirt from her lips, “yeah, after eating them you started forgetting a bunch of stuff and I started losing feeling in various parts of my body,” she began to ramble more anxiously, “that pilot said it would wear off but I think he’s dead now. This is not good, why did I let you convince me to come here…”

“HEY!” Susan interrupted, “listen, it doesn’t matter. The fog will be rolling in soon and we can’t be here when…”

Suddenly, a thunderous voice boomed overhead and sent volts of surprise through both of the girls.

“Are you ladies gonna be having supper, or what?”

The ominous voice of a much older individual pierced through the simulation.

“The food is getting cold and this is no way to act if you want the same service next time,” the godly voice of a mother pushed groans to the back of their throats, “now get your sweet tuchuses down here now!”

Susan blushed before turning the dial on her wrist clockwise, initiating the gradual crumbling of their surroundings.

“Gotta do what mama says,” Aubrey shrugged and flawlessly broke from the chaos of their previous setting.

“She would be so much worse if you weren’t here,” sighed Susan, “let’s finish after dinner.”