Mark

## Overview

The Shack's pet orangutan, he sleeps on the duvet in the lounge and is fed twice a day.

## Backstory

Mark started off as a human boy with a promising future, spent his days frolicking in the fields as young boys often do. The woods in Portugal are a dangerous place, and it just so happened that Mark wandered into the dangerous territory of The Ancient Amongo of The Lake. He was a carefree lad, and he could not read as of yet, so he was blissfully unaware of all the signs directing him away. He ran further into the abyss of the woods, unbeknownst to the creatures with their eyes on him, whispering to themselves.

He continued on the carved path, happy to see the funny woodland creatures. He didn't bother looking at them any longer to see the twisted bones of them all, entwined together like a sick macrame.

It was beginning to get darker in the forest, the trees were hanging low and whispering to him to leave while he still could. No such thing could deter him, though.

It seemed his travails had finally come to a halt, for in the gentle fairy-illuminated light, he saw an unknown mass laying in a bog. He couldn't see the size of it, but what appeared to be it's eye gazed down at him.

It spoke backwards in a language he couldn't understand, but for a brief moment a few words became clear in his mind.

"If you answer my riddles three, freedom I will grant to thee."

The voice hurt his head, he didn't want any more of this. But it was much too dark to see the exit now, so he had no such choice.

"Okay... I'll do it." He shakily cried.

The Ancient Amongo of The Lake silenced itself for a brief moment, basking in Mark's prolonged terror. It finally uttered, in its despicable throaty voice, "Do it fart?"

Mark choked on his words at such a ridiculous question, but he was still terrified to mess up all the same.

"N-no?"

The eye-like thing adorning the creature began to glow and shift like a kaleidoscope, brightening the forest that was previously enshrouded in darkness.

"That is the wrong answer."

Mark felt himself changing and it hurt more than anything he'd ever experienced. His bones compressed on themselves, organs twisting into new shapes. His previous anatomy reformed where it shouldn't be, torturously contorting his limbs to the point he was unrecognizable as a human.

He felt so thin and empty. His vision went red and he collapsed onto the wet grass with nothing louder than the sound of a leaf being crushed under one's feet.

He woke up in a musty hospital bed, but found himself not being able to look around or even move any of his bones. 'I must be in a coma!' He thought.

His mother was sobbing over him, eyeliner running down her cheeks. "Meu menino.... Please come back to me..."

Mark did his best to comfort his mother, afraid that he'd have to watch his mother mourn the loss of her son while he was powerless to stop it. He used all his willpower in order to move the fragile architecture that was his body. He finally heard a snap as his arm jerked to his mother's side. Or, what he could assume was his arm. The agony consumed his whole body and it took everything he had not to collapse.

His mother stirred, and looked at him with pure disgust and more importantly, terror.

She held in her cries for a moment, "Is it really you?"

Mark did not have vocal cords any longer, so he could do nothing but shriek in silence at his miserable mother.

He had been turned into a cardboard cutout.

Throughout his adolescent years, he was sat in the dingy, small hospital room with little means for entertainment. A lecturer came in every Friday to teach him about all the things a child would learn in normal school. He couldn't move, he couldn't eat. He yearned for death, surely it would be much more freeing than the hell he was forced to live in. His mother persistently tried to figure out what shows he liked to watch best, and ended at the conclusion of Sonic Remixes. It was the only thing he could listen to in order to soothe his pain.

His mother took care of him every day, praying at his side that something would cure this horrible curse her poor son was burdened with.

She wanted to do everything in her power to relieve his suffering, so she got in contact with all of his favorite Sonic Remix Musicians and asked if they might pay a visit to her unwell son. Only one responded to the inquiry, and that was Luan Maziero.

He took it upon himself to come to Mark's hospital and play his epic jams in person for him. It softened Mark's cold, dead cardboard heart just enough that he shed a single tear from the beauty of it all.

After the final note from his serenade, he looked Mark's mother in the eyes and whispered, "I think I know of a way to help him, but I want your blessings first."

Her eyes hopefully welled up, and she enveloped Luan into a hug.

"Oh, anything! Anything you can possibly do, we will be grateful!"

And so, Luan wrapped up Mark's fragile cardboard body in some tissue paper, and they embarked on a journey to reverse the dreadful curse that plagued him all those years.

## Trivia

• He has at least 3 cats, one of whom is homeless and occasionally sleeps with him at night.