Opportunities
#5 of Spyro Stories
This story features Moneybags, the greedy bear from the original trilogy. I wanted to try my hand at writing what events led him to become the way he is. It's a little rough around the edges, but I hope you enjoy it either way.
"Never let them know that you're in pain."
That's what his boxing coach had said.
"Always look for opportunities to arise."
Those were the last words a young Moneybags had heard before getting knocked out, a powerful blow to his jaw wrenching his neck to the side too fast, shutting his consciousness down.
Opportunities, pah. There would be no such things in his life, he was certain.
When he had awoken from the blow, still laying face first on the training mat, that certainty grew.
He had been left alone; no one had bothered to move him or check his wounds, lights turned off in the gym. He had to pick his sore, flabby body up, jaw throbbing, and carry himself back to the locker room.
Once the door creaked closed behind him, his restraint snapped. Ripping off the bulky boxing gloves, tearing the string on the left glove, he hurled them across the room. They landed with a dull thud, making it just barely halfway across the extensive room.
Pathetic.
If any of the other students on his boxing team had thrown their gloves, they would've easily struck the opposite wall.
Shuffling his feet across the cold linoleum, the ursine made his way to the bathroom that was placed just behind a wall in the gym. He stepped up to one of the mirrors, wanting to see how bad of a bruise he was going to get on his face.
He leaned in close, moving the fur on his jaw away gingerly to get a better look at the discolored skin underneath. The bruise was varying shades of gray and purple, the two colors blending together to give a sickly look.
Moving his jaw around, he winced at the pain, but concluded that it was at least not broken.
Placing his hands on the counter, Moneybags sighed, looking at himself carefully. Well, judging would be a better word than looking.
He took a few steps back and took off his gym shirt. The bruise on his jaw would be the eleventh bruise he'd received so far. The other ones, although not visible beneath the fur and fat, made themselves present to him by the constant ache.
He didn't belong in this place. Here he was, a pudgy, short bear standing in stark contrast to the pristine walls and immaculate showers of the University's locker room.
His parents had urged him to take up boxing. His father was a champion at this place, pictures on the walls and everything, and they wanted Moneybags to have a chance in the spotlight.
But he could only find himself stuck in the recesses of his fathers shadow.
Everyone expected big things from him, but he kept disappointing.
A tear escaped the corner of his eye and started rolling down his cheek. He could leave, run away, do something to get away from all this. No one would miss him anyway.
Never let them know that you're in pain.
His coaches words shot through him, and he clenched his teeth hard enough to send another wave of pain from his injured jaw. Those words were empty.
Turning away from the mirror, shirt clenched in a white knuckle grip, Moneybags headed to his gym locker. He was upset and frustrated, sad and angry.
Opening his locker, he tossed his gym shirt inside and pulled out his neatly folded uniform. As he did so, something fell out and landed on the floor at his feet. It was a brown burlap sack with a green gem sewn onto the front.
His father had given him that sack before Moneybags had left for University.
"Fill this bag with all the money you earn winning championships," his father had told him. "And when it's full, keep it as a reminder of your first step toward making your mark on the world."
Bending over with mild struggle, Moneybags picked up the sack, the course threads making his hands itchy.
"Make your mark," he whispered under his breath. He didn't agree with his fathers boxing philosophies and how much he had tried engraving that passion into his sons brain. But that statement rung deep for him.
He glanced over at the boxing gloves still laying on the floor. Maybe it was time some changes were made.
He put the sack and clothes back into his locker and walked over to the gloves, picking them up and putting them on before heading back out into the gym and towards the punching bags.
A few months later, he won the championships.
Standing on top of the podium, sweaty and one eye painfully swollen (he would never be able to see clearly from that eye again), he raised the trophy above his head.
He smiled widely as people cheered him on.
But he wasn't smiling because of the attention, nor at how far he had come. No, he was smiling because of the prize money sitting in his burlap sack.
He had never held so much money in his hands before, and the thought of what he could do with it exhilarated him. He viewed that money as a testament to all his hard work being quite literally paid off. No one would pick on him for his size or because he was inadequate anymore. With money, he could stay above the rest and show all those that doubted him that he had the power.
A reporter came up to him and asked him what he wanted to do or where he wanted to go from here. He had told them one word: Avalar.
Avalar was the center-point for cultural diversity. If Moneybags played his cards right, he could easily manipulate the many residents that lived there to buy all sorts of things from him. And then it was a simple process of selling and trading the right way to earn him more of the one thing that had made him feel truly happy.
Everything was going well for the greedy bear. He lived his newfound life abiding by the second word of advice his boxing coach had given him:
Always look for opportunities to arise.
He kept his monocled eye out for such opportunities. And even if one didn't seem apparent at first, he would find one.
For example, if the Breezebuilders were fighting the Land Blubbers, than it was a simple matter of obtaining and selling supplies to either side without the other knowing.
And if a miniature red tyrant and his minions appeared and threatened to rule Avalar and it's inhabitants with an iron fist, well, all Moneybags had to do was simply wait for a small purple dragon to be summoned, eager to overthrow this self-proclaimed king,
And willing to give up as much money as he needed to do so.
Thank you for reading! Many your inner fire burn strong