The Path to Freedom: Part One

     Yeah, right.

     Okay, Sampson really was a green kogura, and he did live with his owner and three other pets in Neopia Central. And their family was pretty big. But they certainly weren’t happy.

     Sampson’s owner was a neopoint tycoon. She was one of the richest owners in the world. His owner’s name was Clara Neeo, and she was REALLY, REALLY, REALLY good at games. Clara also was just in neopets for the money; she would never have gotten a pet unless her agent had told her to.

     Clara was also the author of about forty books in Neopia. She was a reporter who worked at the Neopian Times every second day, and had been named employee of the month twenty-nine times. Clara had eighty-two fan clubs, twenty-four of them official.

     Clara was truly a superstar. She had been named plushie tycoon twelve months in a row, earning her more than a million neopoints. Clara sang in twenty concerts in the concert hall, all which were sold out the day after the advertising started.

     Clara was very, very, very, very, very, popular, and everyone in Neopia knew her name, if they liked her or not. Then one day, her agent came over and said that she had just gotten some results that Clara had been waiting for for months. Her agent told her that out of one hundred neopians polled, eighty-nine of them had said that they thought that superstars with pets were better. Clara had rushed off to create a pet, and that is where Sampson came in.

     Clara lived with Sampson for three more months until Clara made another pet. Clara created Sampson’s sister, Julie, a blue gelert, because she thought that if she had more pets, she would be more popular.

     Five months later, Clara got a visit from her agent. The agent had taken another poll, and this time, seventy-six out of one hundred neopians polled had liked superstars with big families better. So Clara created another pet. She created a red lupe and named him Jefferson.

     Clara thought that Jefferson would be her last pet. So did Sampson, Julie and Jefferson, for that matter. But when Clara started thinking that showing that she was nice would gain more popularity, she decided to adopt a pet. So she went to the pound and adopted a royal aisha named Mindy. Mindy was only one day old because her owner had been very poor. Her owner created her, painted her with a royal paintbrush that he had gotten through a ‘Something has happened!’, and sold her to the pound in hopes of getting more money to feed his other neopets that he had. Clara had come and adopted Mindy the day after her owner had abandoned her.

     As the pets got older, Clara decided to carry on with her ‘nice = popularity’ racket and bought all her neopets expensive and rare petpets. She had bought a meowclops for Mindy, because even though she was royal, Mindy liked scary things; a devilpuss for Jefferson, because Jefferson LOVED fighting in the battledome; a feepit for Julie, because Julie loved cute things; and an uggatrip for Sampson, just because it was rare.

     Later on, Julie finished the last book in the series she was writing. She had written thirty books in the series, and was getting an offer to write a bunch of series for the Neopian Times. Clara had been so proud that she went off and bought a faerie paintbrush for Julie, the one thing Julie had always wanted since she first saw it in a shop in the market place at three days old.

     Then Jefferson fought his millionth battle in the battledome, and won it. Jefferson had won every battle he had been in, and so Clara was proud. She asked Jefferson what he wanted the most, and he answered a Halloween paintbrush. So Clara had bought that for him.

     Now it was a year later, and Sampson was still unpainted. He was also the oldest, most responsible pet of Clara’s, and was the one who always babysat the other pets while Clara spent hours and hours in the game room, racking up neopoints by the thousand.

     One day, Sampson woke up and walked down two sets of stairs. Clara owned a huge mansion; only one plot of land was empty, and that was so that they would not get trapped inside the house.

     The day started out normal; Mindy left early for singing classes, and Sampson was left eating breakfast with a faerie and a monster. It’s like beauty and the beast, he thought, and let out a snort of laughter.

     Julie and Jefferson looked at him quizzically. Sampson just grinned and shrugged his shoulders.

     Once they were done breakfast, the trio put their dishes in the sink

     Julie walked over to the pen where the petpets resided. She picked up her feepit, which she had named Adorable, and tickled him under the chin. “Goodbye, my baby,” she cooed. “Mommy has to go to an author’s meeting, where the best authors meet every month.”

     Adorable pushed his head affectionately into Julie’s arms.

     “Awww!” Julie said, her eyes brimming with love. “Aren’t you the cutest thing?”

     Jefferson snorted. “Leave the mushy stuff to your stupid love stories,” he said irritably.

     Julie frowned at him. “I’d like to see you try to write a best-selling novel,” she said. “Then maybe you’d know that there is more to life than beating up pets smaller than you.”

     At that, Julie put Adorable back in the petpet pen, grabbed her book bag, and flew out of the room.

     Jefferson poured himself a glass of fruit juice and drank it down in one gulp. “Tell Clara I’ll be at the battledome, okay?” he told Sampson, and then he left the room.

     Sampson was alone now. Clara was still upstairs sleeping, for all he knew. But then again, Clara sometimes got up earlier than even Mindy to go do some ‘important’ errands.

     Sampson went over to the petpet cage and saw Adorable and his uggatrip, Spike, wrestling together playfully. Fluffy, Jefferson’s devilpuss, was napping, and usually when Fluffy was napping, it was not wise to wake him.

     Mindy’s meowclops, See-all, was sitting alone in the corner, washing himself. See-all was kind of an outsider to the other petpets; he never was allowed to join in the fun, and no one seemed to pay attention to him, except for Mindy.

     Sampson always felt like See-all; he was the only unpainted pet in the household, even though he was the oldest. All of the other pets were all so great. Julie, the best-selling author; Jefferson, the battledome king; and Mindy, sweet, smart, beautiful Mindy, who had a voice like an angel’s.

     Sampson wasn’t good at anything. All the other pets, like their owner, were superstars. Sampson was not. He was just the normal, unpainted, lousy-at-everything pet, at least according to all the others. And what hurt Sampson the most was that they were right.

     Sampson heard the door open and Clara entered. She was out on an errand after all.

     Clara was carrying a box. She set it down on the table. “Where are the others?” she asked.

     “Mindy’s at singing, Jefferson’s at the battledome, and Julie’s at her meeting,” Sampson recited.

     Clara didn’t look like she cared in the least.

     “What’s that?” asked Sampson, looking at the box curiously.

     “A paintbrush,” Clara replied absently.

     Sampson’s eyes lit up. “For me?” he asked excitedly.

     Clara looked at him. “Of course not. Why would I buy one for you?” She didn’t seem to notice Sampson’s face fall, because she continued, “I’ll put it in our shop for about a million more than it's worth, and sell it. We’ll have lots more neopoints.”

     At that point, Sampson exploded, “Is that all you care about? Making money? Don’t we have enough?”

     Clara looked at Sampson accusingly. “Don’t be selfish, Sampson,” she said, as if he was the one doing something wrong.

     “I AM NOT BEING SELFISH!” Sampson roared, making Clara jump back with fear. “I AM THE ONLY UNPAINTED PET HERE! OR DID YOU NOT NOTICE THAT?”

     Clara looked at him angrily. “I only reward pets by painting them,” she said, “I just don’t say, ‘How about we get you painted?’ out of the blue!”

     “I’ve done enough around here to have that reward,” Sampson growled.

     Clara looked at him as if he was being sarcastic. “By the rate you’re going, you might as well never be painted,” she snapped, and then she stormed out of the room.

     But Sampson was going to be painted. He knew what he was going to do.

***

      Sampson grabbed the box with the paintbrush in it and snuck out of their mansion. It was eleven o’clock, and everyone was asleep. Sampson walked down his street to where the main shops were. He quietly padded towards the rainbow pool.

     Just before he jumped in the pool, he hesitated. He had no idea what colour this brush was. What if it was something horrible, like mutant?

     But Sampson knew he had to take that chance.

     He quickly jumped in and opened the box. He took the paintbrush and covered his body with the cool liquid. Then, when he was sure he had covered his whole body, he dived under the water and waited for the transformation to take place.

     Once he was sure he was painted, he walked over to a puddle to see what colour he was. He sat there, the moon behind him. The reflection looked dark, and ominous.

     Sampson shivered as he realized he had painted himself Darigan.

To be continued...

Author's Note: If you are reading this, I'm in the NT!!! My dream has come true! I am an author!!!!!!!!!!!!!!