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Antaliaza was fast asleep, snoring loudly and chewing
very hard on the tablecloth. The rule of thumb with Liaz is "don't ask." I didn't
until he rolled over in the booth and pulled the tablecloth right off the table,
knocking salt, pepper, and the candle in the middle asunder. He caught the salt
and pepper with his Acara tentacle thingies and the lit candle with his tail.
Then, Liaz set them gently back on the table. He was snoozing soundly the whole
time.
After he finished, I realized I didn't know where
Ace was. Then, I felt something furry brush against my leg. I looked under the
table and there he was, chewing something.
"There's free gum under here!" he announced proudly,
and then blew a small bubble that was a sickening shade of green. "Want some?"
I reached over and took the gum out of his mouth
by the bubble (which was a lot more solid than bubbles should be). "Don't do
that!" I told him sternly. "That gum is not for chewing."
Ace looked down at his paws, ashamed. "You can
have this, too," he said sheepishly, pulling a large wad the exact color of
dung off of his tail and handing it to me. "I was saving it for later."
He climbed back into his seat and I distinctly
heard him say, "Free gum under there! Take what you want, just don't let Iceblue
see you!"
Lilabelle was the only one who decided to try
to sneak some gum. As soon as she closed her hoof around the wad, I tickled
her ankles with my tail to let her know I was there, and the hoof shot back
above the table.
I now had the pawful of used gum Ace had given
me and nothing to do with it. Since I couldn't think of anything else, I decided
to return it to its home beneath the table. Then, I tried to get up, but something
sticky and stinky pulled at my mane and head.
No. No. Oh, please, no.
I reached my other paw up to feel the whatever-it-was.
Sure enough, it was what Ruby would call ABCDEFG- Ancient Badly
Chewed Disgusting non-Edible Flamingo Gum.
I'm not really sure where the "Flamingo" came from. But the point is, some of
that ABCDEFG had decided to stick firmly to my fur, gluing me to the table.
Eventually, I worked my way out of the ABCDEFG
by pulling it out hair by hair. While I was under there, the waiter came again.
From what I could see from under the table, he was a Mutant Jetsam who used
his tentacles to carry everyone's plates. The conversation went something like
this:
Waiter: Who had the Picklepalooza?
Ruby: Me! Mm... pickles...
[loud smacking sounds as Ruby presumably begins to devour the Picklepalooza,
whatever that is]
Waiter: Buried Treasure?
Lilabelle: Mine!
Waiter: Fried Green Chokatos?
Flex: That would be mine.
Thanks!
Waiter: Little Sailor's
Spaghetti?
Destacter: That's Iceblue's!
She is under the table! She sits here, though. Put it there and thank
you very much! The spaghetti is saved, thanks to (dun dunna DUUUUUUN!) THE DESTACTER!
Waiter: Mud Pie?
Liaz: Snorkypoo!
Flex: He means that it's
his.
Waiter: Bugs a la Mode?
SupremeEvilness: That is
mine! With its energy I shall RULE THE WORLD! MWAHAHAHAHA!
Waiter: Chia a la Mode?
Destacter: That is
mine! With its energy I will prevent SupremeEvilness from ruling the
world! MWAHA -- I mean, dun dunna DUUUUUUUUUUN!
Waiter: And here's the Captain's
Supper! It must be for you!
Ace: Um, thanks, I guess...
Waiter: Enjoy!
Then, the waiter slithered or walked
or tentacled or whatever is is Mutant Jetsams do away. By then, I was free of
the ABCDEFG and could crawl back into my seat.
"What took you so long?" Ruby asked,
taking a breath between bites of her Picklepalooza.
"Don't ask," I replied. I quickly
switched my small plate of spaghetti for Ace's... well, I'm not sure exactly
what The Captain's Supper was, but it smelled good. I took a bite of
the... thing, and it tasted good, too.
Lilabelle's Buried Treasure didn't smell
so good, though. When they say "buried," they mean buried. In actual
dirt. It's a huge bowl full of dirt that comes with a little shovel. I think
you're supposed to dig for your dinner. At least, that's what she was doing.
She didn't mind, though. Despite her usual squeamishness, Lilabelle loves
dirt.
Liaz had dirt, too, or mud to be more
specific. (Health codes are merely suggestions to The Silver Dubloon.) He grabbed
the plateful of mud and dumped it on his lap. Then, he hid the bowl under the
table.
"Always hide the evidence, or they'll
be after you!" he advised me. I nodded sagely.
As for Ruby, she devoured her Picklepalooza
before I could get a good look at it. It was green and probably contained pickles,
but that was all I could tell.
We all ate in silence -- except Ace.
"Ooh, spaghetti!" he said loudly. "I love
spaghetti!" He ate a forkful of it to demonstrate his love for spaghetti. Then,
he leaned over the edge of the booth and began to talk to the green Kyrii on
the other side.
"Do you like spaghetti?" he asked the
Kyrii, who nodded, amused by this. "I do! It tastes so good! Spaghetti! Spaghetti!
Spaghetti!" After that, he sat back down.
"Let's all sing the Spaghetti song!" he
shouted to everybody in the Southern Hemisphere. "Spaghetti, oh, spaghetti!
You're always a little wet-ee! But I like you that waaaaaay, yes I do, oh it's
true! Spaghetti, Spaghetti, SpaaaAAAAaaaaghetiiiIIIIIiii..."
Only then did I notice the several dozen
empty sugar packets on the table in front of him.
I swallowed and hissed, "Ace! This is
not Branston's House of Karaoke! Stop singing and be quiet!"
Ace slid down in his seat so his nose
was level with his belly button. "Sorry," he whispered. Then, he took his fork,
reached up to the table, and began to eat his spaghetti strand by strand without
getting up.
"Spaghetti, spaghetti..." he sang very
softly.
Then, there was a loud crunch as
SupremeEvilness smushed a bug on Destacter's head and laughed evilly. (SupremeEvilness,
not the bug.)
"Stop that!" I cried and reached over
to get the bug out of Destacter's thick blue fur. SupremeEvilness pouted.
"Curse you, Eyrie!" the Quiggle fumed.
"You may have outwitted me this time, but I will have my revenge!"
"And I will have revenge on you,
you fiendish... uh... fiend, for I am... The Destacter!" Destacter announced.
"Really?" Ruby gasped. "We had no idea!"
I finished The Captain's Supper in two
more bites. Eyries are so big, we can eat almost anything in less than three
bites.
Since The Author Above is way too lazy
to describe any of the food we ate, I didn't get to see the actual edible part
of Buried Treasure (if there was any). But now, Lilabelle was eating the dirt.
I kid you not. She was eating the dirt.
"Uh, Lilabelle?" Flex said. "I hope you
know you're eating dirt."
"But it's totally organic!" she replied
and dropped a freshly dug worm (still wriggling) into her mouth with a touch
of relish.
"Wow, I didn't know we had relish!" said
Ace, grabbing the bottle of relish and squirting some onto his pasta.
Lilabelle unearthed another worm and ate
that, too (but without the relish this time). Ixi, as you may have noticed,
are not generally picky eaters. Ruby, on the other hand, was sickened by this
and almost saw her dinner again. (Or maybe she'd be seeing it for the first
time. I don't think she stopped to look when she ate it.)
After trying and liking the relish, Ace
was experimenting with all the different condiments on the table except for
Asparagus Juice. (For some weird reason, Ace is terrified of asparagus.
So are Ruby, Flex, Destacter, me... well, actually, pretty much all of us are
afraid of that little green stick of pure... undiluted... eeeeviiiil.)
He would squirt a little bit of mustard from one of those omnipresent little
packets from the middle of the table in his spaghetti and eat it. After that,
he decided to try some of the ketchup from the little glass bottle next to the
omnipresent packets of stuff. He turned the bottle upside down, whapped it hard,
shook it harder, threw it on the ground and stomped on it, and had Ruby attack
it with all of her Battledome abilities, but to no avail-- there was just no
way to get the ketchup out of that bottle. I reached over and handed him a little
plastic packet of ketchup.
"Oh. Thanks," he said embarrassed.
Lilabelle picked up the bowl of dirt and
poured what was left of it into her open mouth. After that, all of us except
Ace were done eating.
Ruby looked around for a minute, then
got bored, grabbed a gray paper napkin and a few of those little plastic packets
of stuff, and began to paint a portrait of Flex ripping a green Chia plushie.
She's an artist at heart. Flex saw what she was doing and posed with a fork
in his mouth. Ruby nodded gratefully and squirted some more tartar sauce onto
her "canvas."
Liaz, who had fallen asleep again, suddenly
awoke and sprang to his feet to give a loud speech about the dangers of Cornupepper
Jelly. I reached over and pulled him down gently by his forepaws. He sat down
but continued to warn us against its "vile, spicy ways."
"Aah, ah..." breathed Destacter.
"RUN FOR COVER!" screamed Ruby (but not
loud enough so anyone outside the booth could hear her), ducking under the table
with Flex and Ace.
Then, Destacter sneezed.
Now, one little sneeze wouldn't usually
be a problem. But this one was a BIG problem. Lupes, you see, have really big
noses (the better to smell you with, my dear). Really big nose = really big
sneeze. Really big sneeze = REALLY BIG problem.
The force of the amazing phenomenal wonder
sneeze sent Destacter crashing into Lilabelle next to him, who hit the part
of the huge seat cushion next to SupremeEvilness, who was sent flying into the
air and falling hard onto the table, which immediately fell over and sent the
food, plates, and little packets of stuff (which have now become an annoying
running bit that I'm sure you're glad to see disappear) splattering into the
wall. As soon as they heard the crash, Ruby, Flex, and Ace popped back up.
"Hm... only one plate broke, but on the
plus side, the ketchup'll leave a stain that's not gonna come out for a long
time," said Ruby with the air of a Neopian Times columnist reviewing the latest
culinary creations of the gourmet club.
"Ooh, mayonnaise!" said Ace excitedly,
licking the wall.
"Very impressive. I'd give that sneeze
an 8.7 out of 10," Flex told Destacter.
I grabbed my napkin and started wiping
the big glob of leftovers off the wall. Then, the same Wocky from The Bathroom
Incident came walking up with what I really hope wasn't the same towel. She
reached over to start cleaning, but then she noticed me.
"You know, it looks like you've pretty
much got this one covered," she said hurriedly, and then ran off. Then, she
froze for a second and came running back.
"Oh, yeah, the bill," she said, handing
me a receipt for the amazingly expensive amount of... three Dubloons.
"Wow, three Dubloons? Is that all?" I
said, surprised.
"Oh, that's the tax," said the Wocky apologetically.
"Here's the real bill."
I'll save you the pain of the painfully
huge amount of Dubloons on that bill and skip straight to the part where I scream
"AAAAAAH!"
"AAAAAAH!" I screamed.
"Oh, sorry again..." blushed the Wocky.
She took back the receipt, crossed out a zero or two, and handed it back. I
paid her and she skipped away happily.
Suddenly, Liaz jumped up and screamed,
"FOR THE GOOD OF THE SOLAR-POWERED CHEESE!" Then, he crawled out under the table
and began to run away. I scrambled out of my seat and tried to catch him. Everyone
else followed us.
Liaz crawled low to the ground but surprisingly
fast. He wove through an endless sea of tables and finally reached the bathrooms.
An Island Grundo walked out of "Manly Buccaneers" and Liaz, spotting the open
door, ran in, knocking the over the poor Grundo. I apologized to the Grundo,
waited for a second outside of the door, then sighed and ran in. Only Lilabelle
stayed outside.
A very tough-looking Pirate Tonu was washing
his hands when I came in. He turned around, stared at me and Ruby, then said
in a surprisingly high-pitched voice, "Hey! Girls aren't allowed in here!"
"It's an emergency," I said breathlessly,
scanning the bottoms of the stalls for the feet of a bright yellow Acara. There
weren't any.
"Oh, I'm gonna tell on you," threatened
the Tonu.
I ignored him and looked again. Then,
I heard a familiar voice in the vent behind me.
"The jelly! The jelly! It's captured me!"
shouted Liaz, rattling the cagey thingy in front of the vent. "FREE ME! FREEEEEEEE
MEEEEEEEE!"
I lifted up the cagey thingy and Liaz
jumped on me. Then, I walked out of the bathroom, attempting to hold up my dignity
with an insane Acara dangling from my neck. When we got out, I crouched down
and let him crawl off.
"Come on, guys," I sighed, tired but happy,
"let's go home."
Liaz jumped right back on my neck.
The End
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