Who Stole the Cookies?

Now this kitchen wasn't any old ordinary kitchen in any ordinary old Neohome. This kitchen was on the first floor, right above the basement with the game room, and below the second and third floor. This kitchen was beautiful. When you first walked in, the first thing one noticed was that the floors were all hard wood, along with the many cabinets. The fridge was a direct import from Faerieland, as were the sinks, chairs, tables, and cupboards. The counters were always full of food and fruits and yummy things. In the fridge, there was a special section of Healthy Food. The Healthy Food Quiggle contributed to this. There was desert food, snow food, Tyrannian food, healthy food, spooky food, gross food (though no one ever went toward that!), tropical food, and even some very very rare Maraquan food.

But the most eye-catching thing in the entire kitchen was a beautiful cookie jar! It was a lovely red color in a curvy shape and always full of delicious, soft, gooey, sweet cookies! Obviously, everyone wanted a cookie all the time. To prevent this, the seven pets came up with a rule: Only two cookies a week for each pet! Everyone agreed and everyone was honest and friendly. Until one day...

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After waking up to a beautiful morning, Satilla got out of bed and bounced happily out of her room. She was careful not to run into the wall this time, like she had done so many other mornings. She walked slowly and deliberately passed her doorway and smiled, relieved she had made it out. The happy little blue Ixi bounced down the steps in a sort of skipping manner. "Lalalalalala..." she hummed softly to herself in time with her steps. In her bliss, she bumped rather nastily into Batilla who was on his way upstairs. Her brother glared at her.

"Watch it, Satty." he said grumpily. The Ixi dusted off his lovely red coat before returning his eyes to his sister.

"Oh, buck up!" Satilla said cheerily. "It's morning, Batty. No need to be grumpy!" Muttering angrily, Batilla continued up the stairs.

Determined not to let her brother get to her, Satilla jumped off the last step onto the ground of the first floor. She wandered merrily into the large living room. In front of the fire sat two of the other Neopets living in the house; Garner, an adorable baby Bruce, and Pertish, a handsome striped Blumaroo. Satilla wandered over next to her friends and plopped down next to Garner. "Hiya, Gary!" she said looking down at the Bruce.

Garner, without looking at Satilla, said "Don't call me Gary. It's Garner."

"Oh," said Satilla. "Well... Garner. What are you guys doing?"

"We're watching the fire..." said the Blumaroo. "Look! It did it again! Garner, did you see?!"

"Yeah! Yeah! It was great!" exclaimed Garner. "Boy, Pertish. That was the best one yet!" Satilla just sat there, staring at her friends. She hadn't seen anything. What had the others seen?

"Erm... huh?" she asked. Garner and Pertish just sat there, staring at the fire. Frustrated in her absolute obliviousness, Satilla stood up and started walking towards the steps leading downstairs. "Well... bye guys," she said behind her back. They didn't respond. Their eyes never left the fire. Puzzled, Satilla continued on her way and went over to the steps that led into the basement. Bouncing even more, she went down the steps. She saw Bon, a peppy Rainbow Quiggle, playing Meerca chase.

"Hi Bon!" Satilla said as she walked over to the Quiggle.

"Hi," he said shortly. His concentration was clearly on the game. His tongue was sticking out of his mouth slightly in concentration. "Whaddya doin' down here?"

"Oh me? I'm on my way to the kitchen to get a cookie and I thought I'd come here, just to check if anyone was down here." Satilla offered a happy smile. Bon pressed the pause button on the game and looked at Satilla.

"Wow... Those are good cookies aren't they?! I had one earlier. Yum yum!" He laughed squeakily like Quiggles often do. "Well, you should get along then. Don't keep them waiting." Bon kept eyeing his game. He wanted to continue playing it.

Satilla got what he was trying to say. "Alright." she said happily. She walked back up the steps and towards the kitchen door. She glanced back at Garner and Pertish who were still sitting in front of the fire. "Oy..." she muttered. She pushed the swinging door open and walked in. Like always, the door swung back and smacked her tail. "Oof!" She looked around and saw Leelah, the shyest Neopet in the house, perhaps in all of Neopia. She was a blue Chomby. "Hi Leelah!"

"Oh... erm... hi?" Leelah mustered a slight smile before looking down at the floor in her bashful way. "Whatcha doing?"

"Oh, me? I'm just getting a cookie! WOO!" Leelah started to giggle. Satilla happily joined in.

"Well, I better be on my way." said Leelah. "Enjoy your cookie!" Quickly, she ran out the door. Her stifled giggling could be heard with her giant Chomby feet going quickly up the steps. Satilla was on her way to the cookie jar when the door to the outside garden burst open. There stood Jap, a mean fire Wocky with mud on his fur. He always loved to play in the garden and would constantly track in small muddy footprints.

"What are YOU doing?" he asked meanly. His brow furrowed at the little Ixi.

"I'm just getting a cookie...." she muttered softly, looking at the ground. "I'm not hurting you..."

"Get outta my way!" The Wocky pushed past Satilla almost knocking the clumsy little thing down.

After the Wocky left the Kitchen, she started to cry. "I just wanted a cookie..." She rubbed her paw. It was scratched. "I'll have to get a band aid... But first I want my cookie!"

She walked happily over to the cookie jar. Slowly, Satilla put her paw on top of the lid and lifted slowly, awaiting the gooey smell.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHH!!!!!!!" The scream echoed throughout the house as the Ixi continued to shriek incoherently. Then, the fateful words finally came from her mouth in a way that you could understand.

"SOMEONE HAS STOLEN THE COOKIES!!!!!"

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All of the pets except for Bon came running through the kitchen door. "What is it?" asked Garner. "What happened? What happened? Why doesn't anyone tell me things?!"

Satilla sat down and started crying. "Cookies.... They're... they're... they're... GONE!!!" Batilla went over and sat down next to his sister, his paw patting her back trying to comfort her. "Don't worry. We'll get the cookies back."

Then Bon burst through the door cheering. "High score!!" Then he caught the glare that everyone was throwing him. "Wait. What's wrong?"

"Someone has stolen all the cookies." Batilla's voice was slightly frustrated. "The pot is empty."

Jap pushed past everyone and looked down into the cookie jar. "He's right. They're all gone." He looked sadly to the bottom of the jar. "No more cookies..."

Pertish took the cookie jar out of Jap's grasp. "Well, we can find this out easily. We just need to look for clues. First of all, does anyone want to confess?" None of the pets spoke or moved. "Okay then." Pertish got a determined look of his face. "Leelah and I will search the kitchen. Satilla and Batilla will go upstairs and search the rooms. Jap and Bon and Garner? Look outside. Break!"

All the pets set off for their designated area. After the rest of the pets had left the Kitchen, Pertish and Leelah started looking around. "Hmmm..." The baby Bruce looked around, touching the kitchen tops and randomly searching cabinets. Leelah also looked around, under the rug, in the bathroom, and by the door.

"I found something," Leelah gasped. "Look!" On the ground were large muddy footprints leading from outside. "Mud..." She looked at Pertish, who nodded.

"This clue points to Jap, obviously. He's the only one who ever goes out into the garden. His fur is constantly covered with mud..." The two pets wandered out the door and looked around at the garden. Not many things were growing besides weeds.

"What does he do out here if he isn't gardening?" Leelah asked shyly. Then she gasped again. "Cookie crumbs...."

Pertish ran frantically over and looked at the cookie crumbs that were scattered in the mud. "They're definitely chocolate chip! Look, there are even some chocolate chips in the crumbs! It must have been Jap."

"But we can't tell everyone until we have more clues." Leelah puffed out her chest. "It wouldn't be fair."

"You're right. Let's just go into the kitchen and pretend we haven't found anything, okay?"

"Deal." Leelah nodded and the two started to walk back inside.

"Wipe your feet," Pertish said as he scuffed around on the rug.

"Right." Leelah did the same and the two walked in.

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Jap led the way with Garner and Bon following slowly behind as they walked through the front door out into the yard. The Garden looked lovely outside the Neohome which made Bon a very happy Quiggle. "I feel like showing my colors to the world!!" He ran over, his body just a colorful flash, to the fence overlooking Neopia Central. "Hey Neopia!! LOOK AT MEEEE!!!" He jumped up and down happily, giggling in his squeaky way.

"Shhhh!!!" Jap ran over and grabbed Bon by the hand. "You'll wake people up from their afternoon naps!"

"Who takes afternoon naps? You'd have to be rather lazy..." Garner meandered his way over and looked at the clouds, a dreamy expression on his face.

"I do," said Jap with a growl escaping from his lips. "And do you know why? It's because I get so TIRED of dealing with you all!!"

Bon let out a triumphant giggle as he crouched down observing a flower growing from the grass. "It's blue stuff."

"What do you mean 'blue stuff,'" snarled the Wocky as he pushed Bon out of his way. "Hey. It is blue. There's also red stuff." He reached a cautious leg down and touched a few globs of red and blue paint and let it drip off of the end of his perfectly manicured paw. “So what?”

"Well," said Garner, momentarily pulling himself out of his dreamy phase, "it means that someone who is blue and red was out here.” Bon’s eyes got larger, but it went unnoticed. And by the looks of it, they had a cookie."

"How do you know they had a cookie," inquired the Quiggle.

"Just look at the chocolate smear on the grass. I'd recognize it anywhere. It's from the cookies."

"How would you recognize them?" Jap stood and glared at Garner. "You never eat your two cookies a week. Maybe you've been plotting this for a long time! Maybe you haven't been eating the cookies so the other pets wouldn't suspect you!"

"Maybe I was," said Garner. His expression was straight. "But as of yet, I'm innocent until proven guilty. Bon? Write down this evidence." The Quiggle immediately pulled out a Romantic Notebook and a Dark Faerie Pen and scribbled down the clues. "For now, shouldn't we just go back inside? We don't need to tell everyone until we're all together. This way we can flush him--"

"Or her," said Jap.

"Or her, out into the open! Let's go inside and look for more clues.”

The three pets started walking back to the house.

"Gee, Garner. You're so detectivey," giggled Bon as they opened the front door.

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"I beat you!" A flash of red swooped past Satilla as her brother passed her while they were racing up the steps. When she finally reached the top, she leaned against the banister, breathing heavily.

"Aw... I'm not in the mood to race. I just want a cookie." Her eyes became teary and Batilla walked over to his sister. "I was so excited! I always get a cookie every Tuesday, and yesterday I forgot. So I thought I'd just get it today and everything would be fine. It would have been great! I could have had my cookie yesterday but I forgot to get it because I had to buy the latest Usuki doll from the toy shop and... and... and..." Satilla sniffed loudly and started to cry again.

"Don't cry," Batilla said as he tried to comfort the crying Ixi. "I'll find the pet responsible. Come on. Let's look for clues." The two Ixis opened the door to the closest bedroom and stepped inside. After flicking on the light switch, they started to look around.

"Look at this!" Satilla cried after a few seconds of looking through the desk. She held up a Starry Notebook. "It's a diary. There's no name on the front though. We can find out whose it is by reading some of it! Look at this. 'It did it again today. It was one of the best so far. Garner thought so, too. Little does he know that he is about to lose the things he loves the most.' That's odd. What does that mean?"

"I don't know," Batilla said. "It obviously wasn't Garner because that note was talking about him. The person couldn't have wanted it hidden that badly if they just left it on the desk."

"I've got it!" Satilla cried. "Pertish must be the one who wrote it. 'It did it again'? He's obviously talking about the fire. He and Garner are always watching it and yelling about how great something is. 'He's going to lose it all'? No one loves the cookies more than Garner, even if he doesn't let on!"

"You're right," Batilla said. "We'd better go back and tell the others. Come on!" With that, the two Ixis ran down the steps.

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All seven of the pets stood in the shiny kitchen staring at the cookie jar. Everyone had collected their evidence, but no one had said anything yet. Satilla stood quietly. Batilla was positioned silently. Pertish was situated mutely. Garner was resting without a sound. Jap was sitting inaudibly. Leelah was located indistinctly. Bon was jumping up and down and humming loudly. "SHUT IT!!!" Jap screamed. The Quiggle's features sank, his feelings hurt.

"Sorry," he muttered.

"Well, we all know what to do now," said Batilla, taking charge. "I assume that we all found clues. Everyone nodded. "Good. Satilla and I will go first." The red Ixi pulled the Starry notebook out from behind his back. "If it pleases the jury, I would like have my sister read an entry from this log! Satty?"

Satilla stepped forward and took the notebook from her brother. She opened it and smiled. It was then that she noticed Pertish seemed to be paying more attention than he was before. She smirked. "It did it again today." She looked over the edge of the diary at Pertish. Satilla's eyebrow was raised. "It was one of the best so far. Garner thought so, too. Little does he know that he is about to lose the things he loves the most." With a triumphant "HA!" she slammed the notebook shut. "Clearly, this means that Pertish is the thief of the cookies!"

Everyone gasped. The Blumaroo's mouth fell open. "I am NOT the thief!" Pertish exclaimed. "Everything I wrote there has a perfectly good explanation!"

"Go on," said Jap with a disbelieving tone of voice. "We're waiting."

"Alright, alright! Well, Garner and I always like to sit in front of the fire and watch the flames make shapes. When the flames make the shape of a Bottled Faerie, the game ends. THAT'S what I meant by that!" He folded his arms and glared at Satilla.

"But what about this part?! 'He's going to lose what he loves most.' What does that mean?! Huh? Huh? Huh?" With each query, the blue Ixi took one step closer to the Blumaroo. Pertish, in time with Satilla, took one step back.

"I wanted to wait to tell you this," Pertish said reluctantly to Garner. "The plumbers say that in order to add that extra sink in your room, they have to make sure we don't have a fire lit. It'll take about a week, so we won't be able to play our game."

Garner's bottom lip began to tremble. The baby Bruce then burst into a paroxysm of tears and sobs and wails. "NOOOOO!!!" Pertish simply patted his shoulder.

"Oh," Satilla said as her cheeks began to blush. "Heh heh. That takes care of that, eh? Heehee..." Jap glared at the suddenly meek Ixi. “Well,” she snapped at him, “could YOU do any better?!”

“As a matter of fact, he can,” interjected Garner. “We found some clues of our own outside in the Garden. And, if it pleases the ‘jury’ I’d like to have Jap present them. Jap?”

“Fine, fine,” Jap said as he stepped into the middle of the group, hastily snatching the Romantic Notebook from Bon on his way past. He flipped it to the appropriate page. “Alright, here we go. We went out into the garden looking for some stuff. After I knocked some sense into Bon for screaming at all of Neopia and waking people up from their afternoon naps—“

“People do NOT take afternoon naps!” grumbled Bon.

“Don’t interrupt me!” snarled Jap. “Anyway, after Bon stopped waking everyone up, we continued looking for clues. Then, Bon so kindly pointed out a new development,” he said sarcastically. “As he put it, there was ‘blue stuff.’ After close examination, ‘red stuff’ was also discovered. In addition to that, there was a chocolate smear in the grass which Garner identified as chocolate from the cookies. So we all know to whom this clue points!!” There was an awkward silence as everyone stared at the ground before their feet. No one knew “to whom the clue pointed,” as Jap had so magniloquently stated. “Oh come on people! It points to Bon!”

Another dramatic gasp.

“What?! Me?!” Bon put a Rainbow coloured hand to his heart. “How does it point to me?!”

“Because,” Jap said with an eye-roll. “You’re the only one of us who has been painted within the last few days, so your paint is probably still a little bit drippy and wet. Then there was the chocolate in the grass. Come on people, it points to Bon!”

There was a collective “Oh!” before Bon jumped up, terribly offended. “Alright, shall I explain?”

“Please do,” said Jap with a sly smirk.

“Well,” said the Quiggle, his rainbow skin gleaming slightly in the sunlight that fell in splashes around the kitchen, “it’s very simple. Earlier today, I was taking a break from Meerca Chase. You can only eat Neggs for so long, you know. Anyway, I decided to take a break and walk out into the Garden. I went out and it was much hotter than I had thought it would be. Under the Leafy Bench, there was a Big Bar of Chocolate left over from the Advent Calendar. Since it was so hot, it was almost completely melted when I opened it, but I was hungry so I ate it nonetheless. While I was licking the remains off of the wrapper, I dropped it on my foot. I didn’t want to track it inside so I wiped it off in the grass. There. That explains everything.”

“Oh no it doesn’t!” exclaimed Jap. “Garner identified the smear of chocolate as the kind that is used in the cookies! Explain that!!”

“Well,” said Bon, “everyone knows that the people who make the cookies use chocolate chips from the Chocolate Factory. They’re the same people who make the Big Bars of Chocolate.” There was a blank stare from everyone in the room. It was quite for a few long seconds until Leelah finally broke the silence.

“Heh,” the Chomby said simply. “We still have our clues to go over,” she said. “Pertish?”

“Of course,” said the Blumaroo. “As you know, Leelah and I had the honor of searching the kitchen for clues, and we found some very interesting things.” He paused for a dramatic effect. Jap was just annoyed. “Anyway,” he continued, “we found footprints.”

A dramatic gasp.

“That’s right!” he continued. “Large muddy footprints leading inside from the garden. And guess what was around them? Cookie crumbs. Cookie crumbs that obviously came from more than one cookie. And do you know who this clue points to?” Everyone in the room looked at Jap in an accusatory manner. “That’s right!” Pertish nearly yelled. “It points to Jap!!”

“What?!”

“We caught you,” whispered Leelah. “Admit it. You’re the only one that ever goes out into the Garden. You always have mud on your fur. You love the cookies. Plus, you’re just plain mean.”

“Hmph!” Jap look rather hurt. “I would like to point out my feet.”

“What?” asked Satilla.

“My feet!! Just look at them.” Everyone did. “They’re small feet.” Everyone stared for a few moments.

“Well, congratulations,” said Batilla.

“No, that’s not what I meant! Look at them carefully,” Jap said. “I have very small feet. You said that the foot prints you found in the kitchen were LARGE footprints. Would you mind if I took a look?”

“No!” shouted Leelah. “We caught you!” she exclaimed with a stomp of her foot.

“Oh hush, Leelah,” said Garner. “You’ll knock the house down.” He gasped. Garner looked at Leelah’s feet, then back to her face. Her feet. Her face. Her feet. Her face.

“It was YOU!!” screamed Bon. “You’re the one with the big feet! You made the tracks to try and frame Jap! You probably planted the Big Bar of Chocolate, too!!”

“It… it was you, wasn’t it?” said Satilla, finding it rather hard to speak. “You stole the cookies from the cookie jar.”

“So what if I did?” asked Leelah in a haughty manner, suddenly abandoning her usual shy and soft-spoken personality. “I wanted a cookie. It’s a stupid rule anyway. Two cookies a week. Two cookies a week my big Chomby foot!”

“The rule was set and was to be followed by everyone,” said Jap. “And everyone did follow it, except for you. I’m so ashamed… What should we do with her?”

“No more cookies,” said Pertish. “Ever.”

“Nooooo!!!” screamed Leelah at the top of her lungs. “I won’t live without them! I can’t live without them!! No! Please! I’ve learned my lesson!”

“Absolutely not,” said Satilla. “If you really were sorry, then you wouldn’t have done it in the first place. No more cookies. Ever.”

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So Leelah was forbidden from having any more of those delicious, gooey, Chocolate Chip cookies ever again, which is a terrible fate. Everyone knows that they are the best kind. What’s that? The moral of the story? It’s quite simple. NEVER steal the cookies from the cookie jar!

{Author’s Note: A special thank you to NeoItems.net for providing me with names of some of the items I used in this story. I also wish to thank the Neopian Writers’ Board for going through particular pieces of this story. Also, thank you to my guild and best Neofriends (Buttercup, Blossom, Sparky, Chewy, Sparkles, Cloud, and all the rest) for supporting me throughout this long process. Thank you!}