Cheat! Night

     “Who dares to come bother me at this hour?” demanded the Darigan Aisha as he got off his very painful gothic black chair. He trotted to the door and looked through the peephole. What he saw nearly made him do a double—no—triple take.

     “Can I come in?” asked Little Timmy the Tuskaninny as he looked back into the small peephole.

     Marik-sama twitched his right red eye. Why was this tub of lard standing in front of his house? And why in the name of Lord Darigan did he want to come inside?

     “No,” Marik-sama answered coldly. “There is no reason for you to do that.”

     “Actually,” interrupted Little Timmy, “there is.” The little punk-rock poser was quickly pushed aside by none other than the dance king, Branston.

     “Yo man,” the yellow Eyrie said, “we need to use your house for the Cheat tournament.”

     “Why my house?” the confused Aisha asked curtly.

     Capara the red Kyrii pushed past both of the boys and said, “Because these Slorg-brained imbeciles blew up my house, that’s why!”

     Marik-sama just stared at the three of them. ‘What a bunch of freaks,’ the Aisha thought.

     “Now since that’s out the way, move it!” Capara pushed past Marik-sama and placed a deck of cards on the gothic glass table.

     “Hey!” Marik-sama said loudly. “I gave nobody permission to come in my house!”

     Capara shrugged and shuffled the cards. While she did this, both Branston and Little Timmy edged their way into the vampire-like room. And as soon as they came in, both Brucey B. and Kalora the Kau entered as well.

     “Fine,” Marik-sama growled. “You can have your game here. But it better be over in one hour. And anyone else is definitely not allowed!”

     His words meant nothing to Princess Fernypoo, Chuffer Bob and Agent 00 Hog as they casually walked into the house. Marik-sama wanted to say something, but decided not to. No one was going to listen to him, so why waste his breath?

     “You better not start this game without me,” said Spectre the Jetsam as he too walked in uninvited. “That would be disrespectful to the king of Cheat.”

     “Stop talking and start playing,” Capara demanded as she split the cards into separate sets of thirteen of all.

     “You made sets for ten Neopets,” complained Chuffer Bob. “There are only nine of us.”

     “The Aisha makes ten,” Capara answered simply. “Get over here and play, Aisha.”

     Marik-sama did not feel like playing a game of Cheat with these strange Neopets, but if he refused, they would keep bugging him to do so. “Fine, I’ll play,” Marik-sama said. “But only for one game.”

     “One game is all it will take,” Branston said, conceitedly. “Because the Branston is going to win tonight!”

     “Of course you will,” Kalora said sarcastically, “the Branston.”

     Agent 00 Hog straightened up his tux. “Shall we get this started?” he asked. “I have an important mission at the Chocolate Factory and I cannot miss that.”

     “You just want the free night chocolate,” Princess Fernypoo said, haughtily.

     Agent 00 Hog rolled his eyes and blushed a bit. “Just start the games,” he said, embarrassed.

     Capara took out three cards. “I have three threes,” she announced as she put the cards in the center of the table.

     “No way!” shouted Little Timmy. “You cheated!”

     “No, I didn’t!” Capara said, her voice rising.

     “Nice try,” Branston said, chuckling, “but everyone knows that you are lying when your voice sounds like a nine-year old.”

     Capara frowned and pulled back her cards. “Okay, Tim, it’s your turn.”

     Little Timmy stared in concentration at his hand of cards and drew out two. “I have two kings,” he announced.

     “Cheater!” screamed Agent 00 Hog. He leaped onto the table and leered at the cards which turned out to actually be two kings. “Oh...”

     “You have to take the pile,” Spectre said. “It’s part of the rules.”

     The Moehog sighed and took the two cards and placed them along with the rest of his cards.

     “My turn,” Branston stated. He took out a few cards and said, “I have three sevens.” As he put the cards on the table, Marik-sama noticed that a fourth card slipped ever so slightly from the rest of them.

     “I can obviously see you’re cheating,” the Darigan Aisha said to the golden yellow Eyrie.

     Branston growled and took the cards back. “I so could have gotten away with that.”

     Chuffer Bob decided that it was his turn next. “Hmm, I have two twos,” he said. He put the cards in the pile. “And no, I am not cheating. So do not think I am. Because I am not cheating.”

     “Aha!” Agent 00 Hog said, “I caught you cheating!” He reached over and looked at the cards. They were, in fact, two twos. “But... how? You clearly said you...”

     “Were not cheating,” Kalora finished for him. “He definitely played you!”

     “Just take your turn already!” muttered Princess Fernypoo under her breath. But it was not low enough for Kalora to ignore it.

     “Wait like everyone else!” shouted Kalora. Everyone gasped except for Marik-sama, who could not care less.

     Kalora’s face turned purple as she took out one card. “One ace,” she called. Agent 00 Hog held his tongue as for he did not want to gain any more unwanted cards.

     Princess Fernypoo smirked and laid down three cards. “Three queens,” she said.

     “What Neopets are featured on the card?” Capara asked.

     “Umm... A Lupe, a Quiggle, and... a Kyrii,” Princess Fernypoo said clearly.

     Little Timmy made a buzzer noise. “Wrong! You are a cheater!”

     As soon as the words came out of his mouth, the doorbell rang yet once again.

     “Oh boy, my pizza’s here!” Chuffer Bob squealed. He leaped out of his chair and ran up to the door. In that time, Little Timmy stole a quick peek at the purple Meerca’s cards.

     “Who wants Mushroom-olive-pepperoni?” the chubby Meerca asked with a smile.

     “I’ll take one,” said Agent 00 Hog as he took a slice.

     “Me too,” said Brucey B. as he reached over and took a slice for himself. Capara craned her neck to see what cards Brucey B. had and memorized them exactly so she could point out if he was cheating.

     Brucey B. decided to put down four “Jacks” and end his turn.

     “Cheater, cheater, cheater!” Capara chanted loudly. “There are no Jacks in your hand!”

     “How would you know?” asked the confused Bruce.

     Capara shrugged and said she did not know. “I just have that tuition,” she said.

     “You mean intuition,” said Princess Fernypoo.

     Capara rolled her eyes. “Hurry up and take your turn, Hog.”

     Agent 00 Hog spent about fifteen whole minutes trying to calculate what method he should use to try and win and finally came up pulling out two fives.

     “Hey!” cried Chuffer Bob. “You cheated!”

     Agent 00 Hog laughed. “Only you would think that I would actually cheat in a game of Cheat, you Slorg-minded glutton!”

     “So you cheated, huh?” said Capara.

     Agent 00 Hog gulped. “No,” he said slowly. He reluctantly pulled the whole pile of cards to himself and placed them in his hand.

     “It is your turn, Aisha,” said Spectre as he glared at him.

     Marik-sama sighed hastily. “Fine.” He drew out two fours and placed them on the table.

     Little Timmy accused Marik-sama of cheating, but that only ended up making him have to add the pile of cards to his hand. “Your turn, Spectre,” said the saddened Tuskaninny.

     “Address me as your royal Highness,” said Spectre, putting a fin on his chest.

     “Then I want to be called the Lord of the Dance floor,” said Branston, conceitedly.

     “Then I want to be called The Feisty Rising Star with Great Hair!” yelled Capara.

     “When did this become a name contest?” Marik-sama grumbled to himself.

     Spectre grumbled and threw down four cards. “Four sixes,” he announced. He then shot a red glare over to Agent 00 Hog who was about to loudly accuse him of cheating.

     “We should probably end this soon,” Princess Fernypoo spoke up suddenly. “It’s, like, ten o’clock and I have to have at least fourteen hours of beauty sleep.”

     “Have you been getting it lately?” Branston asked. “’Cause it’s seems to not be working.”

     The princess Acara’s eyes turned a deep red and she leaped on top of the Eyrie while knocking over the table in the process.

     “Man, the game is ruined,” muttered Little Timmy. “And I was about to win.”

     “Yeah right!” boasted Capara. “I was about to win! The pretty Neopets always win!”

     “So why didn’t I win?” Kalora asked.

     Capara thought it was best not to answer the fashion-challenged Kau and instead left through the front door.

     “Well,” said Spectre, “this was not weird.” He got up from his highly uncomfortable Spooky Sofa and left the house. Agent 00 Hog and Chuffer Bob scrambled after him.

     “If you didn’t know already,” Kalora started to say to Marik-sama, “this always seems to happen every Friday night.” She left the dark house, leaving the poor Darigan Aisha twitching and stranded with both an angered Fernypoo and a badly injured Branston.

     “See you next Friday!” called Little Timmy to Marik-sama as he left the house as well.

     As soon as the words escaped the fifteen year old Tuskaninny’s mouth, the tortured Aisha fainted, leaving no witness to see Princess Fernypoo drag the self-proclaimed Lord of the Dance Floor to the woods behind the house.

The End