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"I'm bored. Are you bored?" asked Shaylily, a disco Shoyru,
as she sat upside-down on the Zen Couch. Shaylily had a gift for magic, coupled
with a drive to solve mysteries for the good of all Neopia. In addition to that,
she was the heir to the throne of Larishi, as a member of the Starlight royal
family. Her petpet also had a penchant for magic, but the Bluna's element was
ice.
"Brrflp," replied Crystalia, who was sitting
next to her on the black-and-white patterned upholstery.
"Thought so." She opened the book she'd borrowed
from the Deep Catacombs' library -- the only books in Neopia that didn't disappear
after being read -- and started reading it out to her Bluna, who listened for
lack of a better thing to do.
The disco Shoyru's reading was interrupted by
the sound of a Trumpet of Deafening, accompanied by drumming on trash cans and
guitar that sounded like a tortured Kadoatie, from the garden. Shaylily scribbled
"I CAN'T HEAR MYSELF THINK! TONE IT DOWN!" on her sketchpad and ran outside.
There, standing between the rows of glass roses,
was Aerolani, a white Shoyru and Shaylily's sister. She was a bit of a free
spirit, and always wore several beaded necklaces. As well, she'd bought a guitar
and played it so it sounded like a Kadoatie being tortured, joining it with
a Trumpet of Deafening that she played with a similar lack of skill.
Beside her was Starilya, a little prankster of
a speckled Shoyru, and Aerolani, a white Shoyru who was both shy and reasonably
quiet and hippie-like at the same time. They stood with their instruments arranged
in front of them, blasting out noise that couldn't possibly be called music,
as the disco Shoyru stuffed the hastily scribbled sign in front of Aerolani's
Trumpet of Deafening. The white Shoyru seemed to get the message, as she signalled
to Starilya amidst the din to stop.
"Could you take your so-called music into the
garage or something? You're deafening the neighbourhood with your instruments
of torture!" she yelled almost as loud as Aerolani and Starilya's mediocre music.
"Well, it sounded a lot better before you started
yelling!" Starilya blasted back, speckled face turning red with anger.
"Whoa! Can you cool it? White Speckles will get
better, but I doubt the Shayster wants to hear us practicing," suggested Aerolani,
always the peacemaker, as she played with the golden peace symbol on one of
her many beaded necklaces.
They were joined by StarSkyFire, the shadow Shoyru
who spent all his time up in his lab on the second floor inventing gadgets and
brewing potions, while trying to keep Starilya out of his lab with the help
of his Baby Fireball Azamanti ("burning" in Ancient Neopian) and their owner
Furbyfun, who'd recently grown wings during a visit of sorts to Starilya's family,
the FallingBlues.
"I can hear you from the second floor! How am
I supposed to concentrate on my homework, or your brother on his inventions,
when we keep hearing this loud music and yelling from the garden? You should
be preparing for Neoschool!"
"They're actually working on Neoschools?" asked
Aerolani in disbelief.
"Yes, and I need you to pick the subjects you'd
like to take instead of playing your music! And I'd like to add that your Trumpet
of Deafening is well named!"
Later, once they'd picked their preferred subjects,
Furbyfun surprised her pets with an outing. "Since you're going to be in Neoschool
soon, I thought I'd take you on an end-of-summer outing! Does Mystery Island
sound good?" The four nodded quickly in agreement, knowing that the tropical
island was the only place agreeable to all of them. Shaylily would have been
fine with Mystery Island, but Aerolani would have picked Terror Mountain.
After loading up with "everything but the kitchen
sink," as StarSkyFire put it, they headed for the ferry to Mystery Island. Once
on board, they were all able to relax except for Shaylily. "I just have a feeling
that this trip won't work out as expected," she explained.
"How can you say that? We've got everything we
could possibly need, the weather's perfect, and we haven't seen the FallingBlues-
the only Neopets we know who could possibly ruin our trip -- in ages!" exclaimed
Furbyfun.
"I don't know. I just have a feeling."
They reached the island then, and took several
minutes to get all their gear off the ship. "Couldn't we have left something
behind? Like the inflatable boat?" grunted Aerolani as she struggled under the
weight of several bags.
"No way! We need all this stuff!" answered Furbyfun,
loaded down with bags herself.
By the time they got to the beach, almost all
the spots were taken. "Don't worry. There's a secret beach on the other side
of these trees," said Starilya, "the FallingBlues used to take me there. It's
not private anymore, but hardly anyone knows about it."
As she finished her sentence, a young blue Mynci,
here with two older Myncis that had to be his parents, snickered behind a small
hand and said, "Look, Mommy! Pack Unis!" as he pointed at Furbyfun and her pets.
"It's rude to point at people, Sammy," replied
his mother, although staring at them herself with large brown eyes.
The five ignored them as they pushed through
the palm trees. "Wow!" exclaimed Shaylily, looking out over an empty stretch
of unoccupied sand and water. They began to unpack their beach gear, which thankfully
didn't include Aerolani and Starilya's instruments, and let their owner blow
herself silly inflating the boat and inter tubes as the four Shoyrus roamed
the beach.
"Hey, what's that thing over there?" asked Starilya,
speckled hand extended in the direction of a dark shape on the edge of the water.
"I don't know. Maybe someone threw it out," said
Aerolani, trying to figure out what it was with iridescent blue eyes squinted.
"Well, we'll never find out if we don't go see!"
answered Shaylily, adventurous as ever.
"Shouldn't we go get Furbyfun?" asked the ever-cautious
white Shoyru.
"If we do that, it might be washed away," replied
StarSkyFire, "then we'd never find out what it is."
Agreeing with their brother, the Shoyrus walked
cautiously over and gasped in surprise. Lying on the sand, wings torn and broken,
was an Air Faerie. "Please, find my Shoyru..." she wheezed as she pointed at
the tiny island not far off the shore.
"But we have to help you!" exclaimed Aerolani,
white wings beating furiously as she tried to pull the Faerie twice her size
out of the gently lapping water, bigger waves looming further out to sea.
"No... find Jade..." she croaked weakly.
"Go get Furbyfun," advised Shaylily. The four
ran for the shady spot where their owner was reading a copy of The Neopian Times
on her beach towel, the row of palm trees making the sunglasses perched on her
nose unnecessary.
"What is it?" asked the owner as she put down
the New Series section.
"There's this Faerie on the beach and she needs
help! She told us to find her Shoyru!" answered Starilya as she tugged on her
owner's arm.
Furbyfun broke into a run as her pets led her
to the spot where the Faerie lay. "You... the owner?" asked the Air Faerie as
the Shoyrus' owner bent down in front of her.
"That's me. What's wrong?" asked Furbyfun, blond
hair reflecting the tropical sunlight.
"No... time. You must find my Shoyru," answered
the Faerie as she pointed again at the island. She opened her mouth to say more,
but then a wave crashed down on them. Shaylily sputtered as she suddenly found
herself underwater, struggling to the surface. The disco Shoyru reached the
air first, expelling a plume of water as her siblings and owner surfaced.
"Where's the Faerie?"
"She doesn't seem to be here," answered Furbyfun
as she tried in vain to wring the water out of her drenched hair.
They swam back to shore with no other waves in
sight, noticing that most of the beach had been drenched. "There goes my only
copy of the newest Times," complained Furbyfun as she held out a dripping, ripped
wad of paper whose ink had ran all over it. The rainbow-like effect of all the
colours mixing formed interesting patterns, but the stories, series, comics
and articles were gone forever from Furbyfun's copy.
"Cheer up, you can always get a new copy," said
StarSkyFire, "but at least we got the swim we came here for."
"Well, I for one had no intention of swimming,
especially without my bathing suit," replied the human girl.
"If we're going to that island, we'll need a
boat," Starilya pointed out condescendingly.
"We have one," replied Furbyfun with a knowing
wink, "the one I blew myself silly inflating. It isn't as silly as you say to
be prepared for anything!" as she pointed at the empty orange rowboat whose
fluorescent yellow oars stood out against the gently blowing sand.
"You think of everything," groaned Starilya.
She had been hoping to stay behind, and was a bit disappointed at the thought
of rowing out to the island. It was unavoidable, though, which was obvious from
the way her owner and second oldest sister were loading up the raft. She caught
a glimpse of a Tent in a Box, several Bottles of Water, a pot, a pan, five cups,
and a Mad Clock, among other things, as they were tossed into the boat.
"Starilya! Come on! We're launching the boat,
and no one and nothing can be left behind!" shouted Aerolani from the shallows.
To be continued...
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