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It was Tuesday.
Five strange creatures were sitting around in
the backyard of a small house on Rainbow Avenue, Neopia Central. Three of them
were busy playing with plushies and action figures of all sorts. The other two
were off more to the side, watching the intense game being put on by the others.
"Hah! Take that, Dr. Sloth!" yelled a red Eyrie,
brandishing a Count Von Roo plushie.
"Feel my hex ray, Dark Faerie!" cried a starry
Gelert. "Let the Faerie Queen go, Sloth!"
"Never!" laughed a Christmas Gelert, holding
the Dark Faerie plush toy. "Come, Von Roo! To the Hidden Tower where we will
assemble the mightiest of hex rays to... umm... hex that Dr. Sloth into next
week!"
"That was a really lame intimidation, AstronomyDog,"
mentioned the starry Gelert to the Christmas Gelert.
"Yeah, well, you just try to do better, Tchaol!"
yelled AstronomyDog.
"Oh, I am SO not intimidated," taunted Tchaol.
"Guys!" cried the red Eyrie. "You're brothers!
You're supposed to be best friends."
Tchaol and AstronomyDog exchanged glances. AstronomyDog
stepped forward. "If siblings are supposed to be friends, how come you're not
playing with your brother and sister then, Jon?" he said, motioning to a mutant
Kacheek and a white Aisha in the corner of the garden.
Jon scratched his head with a talon. "Well,
if they wanted to, they could play. Hey, Gioacchino! Yoko! Wanna come and play
with us?"
The white Aisha looked up from her tea set.
"Can I be Prom Usuki?" she asked.
The three shuddered simultaneously. Tchaol looked
at Jon. "Umm, no, but you can be the Light Faerie or something if you want,
Yoko," he offered.
The mutant Kacheek snorted. "Well, yippie! Can
I be the Water Faerie, guys?" he said, raising an eyebrow at the two Gelerts.
"If you want to, I guess, Gioacchino," said
Tchaol.
Gioacchino sniggered. "It was sarcasm, Tchaol.
I don't want to be a dumb Faerie. They're all stupid. Including the Water Faerie.
Especially the Water Faerie," he said, looking at the pile of Faerie plushies
on the grass.
The sky darkened, clouding over with thick,
gray clouds.
Tchaol and AstronomyDog looked up. "Looks like
rain," they said, in perfect unison.
"It always looks like rain," muttered Gioacchino.
Suddenly, the back door to the house flew open.
A girl skipped out. "Hiya, Jon, Yoko, Gioacchino! You three had better go home
now. There are thunderstorm warnings out and stuff," she said.
"Figures," said Gioacchino to himself.
"And besides," continued the girl. "AstronomyDog
hasn't even started his advanced Calculus homework, and Tchaol has at least
a hundred pages yet to go in that big book... oh, what's it called! Oh! I know
the author! Warren Piece!"
Tchaol shook his head. "Mom, I think you've
got it backwards," he said, heading inside with AstronomyDog.
"What? What do I have backwards?" she shouted,
as Jon, Gioacchino, and Yoko began to trudge home.
The sky was darkening by the minute. It was
raining lightly now, and every now and then, a bolt of lightning or a crash
of thunder would cause the three to jump a foot off of the cobbled road.
Yoko looked at the ditches, which were overflowing
with water. "Look, guys! They're flooded," she observed.
"Thank you, Captain Obvious," said Gioacchino.
"Something strange is going on here," said Jon,
looking at the sky. "Let's get home quick."
The three started off in a jog, which turned
into a run. Jon led the way, for he had the natural advantage of being able
to fly. Gioacchino and Yoko scurried along as fast as they could behind him.
They passed Wishing Well Drive, and were just crossing the steep hill into Neopia
Avenue when Yoko turned around.
"Umm, guys?" she said, stopping dead in her
tracks.
Gioacchino and Jon stopped. "What is it now,
Yoko?" Jon said, a little annoyed. "I'm missing the season finale of my favorite
soap opera."
"TIDAL WAVE!" Yoko shrieked.
Well, it wasn't exactly a tidal wave. It was
more of a tsunami. The huge wall of water came over the hill at a dynamic speed,
crashing down on the three creatures. The rain was pouring down in thick sheets
now. Trees and houses had fallen apart from the mere fury of the storm. Debris
was everywhere. The thunder was deafening. The lightning was blinding. And stuck
in the midst of this typhoon was Gioacchino, Yoko, and Jon.
"Aaaa-iee!" howled Yoko. "I can't swim!"
Jon dived down, and plucked his little sister
out of the raging water. "Where's Gioacchino?" he yelled, flying low from the
added weight of his sister.
"Look!" she cried, pointing at the mutant Kacheek,
suspended in the water below.
Jon dived down again, trying to pluck him out
of the water. He failed. "You two weigh too much! It's gotta be all the ice
cream, Yoko!" he yelled.
Yoko hissed and scratched her brother's ear.
"Ouch! What was that for?" he whined.
"Never tell a lady that they are fat, Jon. It's
common knowledge," she said.
"Stop with the fighting! We've got to find something
to hold onto or something, a raft of some sorts," screamed Gioacchino over the
roar of the storm.
The three paddled through the water until they
reached an tree trunk, sliced in two by a bolt of lightning. The tree had a
small tree house built onto it, and the top of the tree reached out of the tree
house, like a mast. The three climbed aboard.
"Now row!" cried Jon.
"With what? Our paws? We couldn't fight the
storm if we tried! Wait until it blows over, and then we'll try to get home!"
yelled Gioacchino.
"So what now?" whimpered Yoko.
Gioacchino looked at his younger brother and
sister. "I guess we could try and get some shut eye," he mentioned.
The three looked around, and found a small trunk
containing a pink quilt. They wrapped it around themselves and closed their
eyes. The wind howled in the night, and the storm raged on.
And on.
And on.
Gioacchino was the first to awake in the morning.
The storm had cleared, and the small tree house was still intact, bobbing along
in the water. He peeked out the window.
"Where are we..."
To be continued...
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