Spelling Bee Champ

On Monday night, Taylor Chris was sitting on her couch next to her mother. They were watching Taylor’s favorite reality show: Spelling Bee Champ. It was the last round and it was a boy, Marc, vs. a boy, Harry. Marc had to spell nefarious. If he got it right, he’d win the challenge.

Under her breath Taylor spelled, “N-e-f-a-r-i-o-u-s. Nefarious.”

Taylor’s mom chuckled. “Taylor, you should be on this show. Every word they’ve shown, you’ve spelled correctly.”

Taylor shook her head. “No way! Hundreds—no, thousands of people watch this show! Maybe even millions.” Taylor shuddered. 

But little did Taylor know her mom registered her anyway. Taylor loved talking and interacting with other people. The only kind of shy she is, is camera shy. She just doesn’t like being on camera. Marc answered nefarious incorrectly. Next was Harry. Harry had to spell claustrophobic – much harder than nefarious.

“C-l-a-u-s-t-r-o-p-h-o-b-i-c. Claustrophobic. Fear of being in small spaces,” Taylor muttered. Taylor high-fived her mom when she got it correct. Maria Spindle was just about to crown Harry the new Spelling Bee Champ when someone in a sweatshirt and headset came and whispered something in her ear.

Maria Spindle smiled. “Guess what? We’re starting a new promotion: The International Spelling Bee Championship! We’re not just in the US any more!”

Taylor’s mom looked nervous. “Taylor… I registered you for the next spelling bee.”

Taylor was laughing until she saw her mother’s face. “Mom, I know you meant well, but next time make sure that I won’t be going up against the best spellers from around the world before you register me for a contest.” Taylor thought for a minute. “Where are we going?”

“All over. But the first stop is Sydney, Australia, then London, England, then Paris, France, then more.”

Taylor was tired so she went to bed but before she did, she packed one carry-on suitcase. She packed two weeks worth of clothes, pajamas, and shoes for any and every condition. And in her book bag she packed her coloring book, colored pencils, encyclopedia, thesaurus, and dictionary. Finally she went to sleep. She supposed she was excited for the trip but she was too tired to tell.

The next morning, Taylor got up quickly. Their plane for Sydney left at 1:00 pm. They could not be late. Taylor choked down her toast and slurped her orange juice as quickly as she could before her mom stopped her.

“Taylor? Stop this nonsense.We have three hours to get to the airport! It’s only 9:00 am.” Taylor slowly calmed down, but she couldn’t stop thinking about the Spelling Bee. Were there going to be a lot of kids? Was everyone going to be much more sophisticated than her? What if she was the only one her age?! But her mom kept reminding her to calm down. It sort of worked. She supposed. S-u-p-p-o-s-e-d. Usually spelling calmed Taylor down. D-o-w-n. But now those questions just flooded through Taylors head like a storm. S-t-o-r-m. Ugh. Not even spelling could get these questions out of her head. H-e-a-d. Taylor didn’t understand. She’d been in spelling bees before. Why did this bother her? Maybe it was because this would be on international television. T-e-l-e-v-i-s-i-o-n. Taylor was starting to relax and let her guard down, until she thought of a new question. Q-u-e-s-t-i-o-n. Aye. She couldn’t stop thinking of words – but what if during the Spelling Bee she stopped completely? While Taylor’s mom drove them to the airport, Taylor flipped through her dictionary. She pointed her finger to the word wicked. W-i-c-k-e-d. Next cerebrum. C-e-r-e-b-r-u-m. Taylor played this game until they arrived at the airport.

“Mom, can you quiz me on some of the words in my thesaurus?” asked Taylor.

“Of course,” said her mom. The first word was crimson, c-r-i-m-s-o-n, the next catastrophe, c-a-t-a-s-t-r-o-p-h-e, the third private, p-r-i-v-a-t-e, and the last extreme, e-x-t-r-e-m-e. Soon they boarded their flight. Their tickets said first class! They were served hot fudge sundaes with peppermint syrup, and brownies for lunch. As it turned out, it was the captain’s birthday. There was a confetti cake with rainbow frosting and white sprinkles and the party favors were huge bags of toys and fancy chocolates.

At the bottom was a dictionary with a note that said, “Bring home the trophy for the good old US of A. Captain Lenora White.” This dictionary was huge, many more words than her beat up old one. Taylor loved it. Taylor flipped to the middle and pointed to the word crustaceans. C-r-u-s-t-a-c-e-a-n-s. Hyacinth. H-y-a-c-i-n-t-h. Taylor always thought everyone should know the beauty of words.

When they arrived in Sydney, Taylor and her mom took a cab to their hotel. Once there, Taylor’s mom quizzed her with words from the new dictionary.

“Disconcerting!”

Taylor thought for a moment before saying, “D-i-s-c-o-n-c-e-r-t-i-n-g.” Taylor clapped her hands.

“Triumphant!”

Taylor immediately answered, “T-r-i-u-m-p-h-a-n-t.”

Taylor’s mom thought for a moment before saying, “Nonchalant.”

Taylor quickly said, “N-o-n-c-h-a-l-a-n-t!”

Taylor’s mom paused for effect, “Last but not least… unforeseen!” Taylor memorized this word in the cab on the way to their hotel.

“U-n-f-o-r-e-s-e-e-n.”

The next day the Bee began. Taylor’s mom tugged her curly brown hair into pigtails with pink ribbons. Taylor pulled on the pink lace dress she brought, the white tights, and pink sneakers. Taylor took her dictionary and she practiced the word demonstrations. D-e-m-o-n-s-t-r-a-t-i-o-n-s. Then mystery. M-y-s-t-e-r-y. And so on. Right before they left for breakfast, Taylor did the word duplicate. D-u-p-l-i-c-a-t-e.

Taylor sat next to a girl with red hair and green eyes wearing a pink sweater and pink jeans.

“Hi I’m Joanna Kelley. Nice to meet you. This is my sister Amelia Kelley. We’re from England.” Amelia smiled.

“I’m Taylor Chris. Nice to meet you too.”

Amelia asked if the girls wanted to quiz each other. Joanna volunteered her dictionary. Taylor got quizzed on malicious, m-a-l-i-c-i-o-u-s, empty, e-m-p-t-y, and harmonious, h-a-r-m-o-n-i-o-u-s. Joanna got quizzed on trivial, t-r-i-v-i-a-l, classic, c-l-a-s-s-i-c, and charisma, c-h-a-r-i-s-m-a. Amelia got quizzed on marvelous, m-a-r-v-e-l-o-u-s, unruly, u-n-r-u-l-y, and admiration, a-d-m-i-r-a-t-i-o-n.

Soon the Bee started. Maria Spindle called a girl named Karen Lee up first.

“Karen Lee, your word is devotee. Please spell devotee.”

Karen said nervously. “D-e-v-o-t-e-y, devotee.” Taylor sucked in her breath and she knew that was the wrong spelling.

Maria Spindle grimaced. “I’m sorry Karen, but that is the incorrect answer. Devotee is spelled d-e-v-o-t-e-e. You may exit through the double doors.” Maria plastered a smile on her face and said, “Next up… Taylor Chris. Taylor, your word is triskaidekaphobia.”

Taylor sighed in relief. She knew this word. “T-r-i-s-k-a-i-d-e-k-a-p-h-o-b-i-a, triskaidekaphobia.”

Maria beamed. “That is correct Taylor! You’ll be moving onto the next round.” After she went, Taylor didn’t really pay a lot of attention to the other people. The last person to go was a girl named Justine Fleur from Paris. Justine got the word sapphire, s-a-p-p-h-i-r-e. She got it incorrect. She spelled it with only one p.

After the Bee, there was a banquet for lunch. There was roast chicken, steamed broccoli, vegetable quinoa, and boiled peppers. Taylor didn’t eat much. She was too nervous about the Bee tomorrow.

After the banquet, Taylor repacked her things. At 6:00 pm, Taylor and her mom left for London. When they arrived in London, Taylor and her mother were escorted to a fancy motel. The man at the front desk gave them the key to room 5 on floor 1. Taylor picked out a pair of faux leather leggings and a blue button down shirt for her outfit for the bee. As Taylor brushed her teeth, she mentally quizzed herself on: horrible, h-o-r-r-i-b-l-e; gangly, g-a-n-g-l-y; pneumatic, p-n-e-u-m-a-t-i-c; and conundrum, c-o-n-u-n-d-r-u-m. All done, she thought.

That night she had nightmares about words, shouting unpleasant things. She woke up quickly and tip-toed out of her bed. She went to the dresser and looked at the clock. It was only 2:00 am. Rats. She went back to her bed and eventually fell into a fitful sleep.

The next morning Taylor dressed into the outfit she picked out the night before, and just pulled back her hair with a headband. Taylor’s mom was still sleeping and Taylor didn’t want to wake her so she just went to breakfast quietly. At breakfast, Taylor got two chocolate glazed donuts and sat down next to a boy wearing jeans and a tee shirt.

“Hi,” Taylor simply said.

“Hi,” said the boy, taking another bite out of his scrambled eggs. The boy tried to comb his shaggy red hair, but it didn’t work. He just waited, and waited.

“So are you waiting for something?” asked Taylor.

“Yeah, my grandad.”

This is awkward, thought Taylor. “I’m Taylor,” she said, holding out her hand.

“Uh, hi, I’m Mason. Okay, so are you here for the spelling bee? I am.” Taylor just moved away from the boy whose name was Mason.

Mason shook his head. “I came on too strong again didn’t I? I do that a lot, sorry!”

Taylor grabbed her plate and moved to a different table.

At 4:00, the Bee started. First they called up the boy Mason.

“Mason Kall, your word is superstition,” announced Maria Spindle.

Mason said, “S-u-p-e-r-s-t-i-t-i-o-n, superstition.”

Maria Spindle did not look that impressed. “Alright, Mason, that is correct. You’ll be moving on.” Taylor had a feeling Maria Spindle found Mason as annoying as she did. 

“Next… Lisa Wu! Your word is desolate.” Lisa got desolate incorrect, then was Louie Martino who got sriracha incorrect, then Georgie Smith who got necessary correct, and Lila Jane Parks who got international correct. Then it was Taylor’s turn.

“Taylor Chris, come on down. Your word is astonished.”

Taylor thought for five seconds. “A-s-t-o-n-i-s-h-e-d, astonished.”

Maria Spindle put on a wide toothy grin and looked straight at the camera, “Correct Taylor! You may sit down at your seat.” Taylor walked back to her seat meekly, when she saw a beefy kid snarl at her.

“Karlo Yang, your word is finance.” The beefy kid walked up.

“F-y-n-a-n-s-e, finance,” the beefy kid said proudly.

Maria Spindle winced. “I’m sorry Karlo, that is incorrect.” 

Veins bulging, eyes bugging out, hands ready to smash some bones, Karlo screamed, “What!” He smashed the podium. Maria stood at his feet and pounded against the hardwood stage.

As even beefier security guards held him back, Karlo screeched, “Lemme at ‘er! Give me Maria Spindle!!! I know I got finance right! You just want me to lose my cool on international TV! Well it will not work!” 

Karlo took one look at the mess he made and fell to his knees sobbing about forgiveness. The beefy security guards hauled Karlo away.

“Well… that was interesting. Next is Mick Torrent. Mick, your word is silhouette.” About a dozen more kids went but Taylor just couldn’t stop thinking about Karlo, the way his eyes bugged and how he fell to his knees sobbing. It made Taylor think about reality, or whether they were all just pawns in somebody else’s imagination. The thought made Taylor shudder. S-h-u-d-d-e-r. When she was nervous she spelled. Ugh. U-g-h. It’s happening again. A-g-a-i-n. Taylor remembered her mom’s sweet voice, and how when it was time for bed, her mom would bring her a glass of milk and sing her a lullaby when she was younger. She thought about how they played double dutch, and checkers, and monopoly. She thought about snuggling together on the couch when Spelling Bee Champ was on and just spotting clouds that looked like bunnies, and lying together on the sun dried grass. These happy memories calmed Taylor down. When they exited the stage, Taylor’s knees wobbled, but this time not with nerves. Excitement.

At lunch, Taylor found out why Mason bugged Maria. Listen: “Maria Maria Maria Maria! Am I winning? AmIwinning? Am I? Am I? Am I? Am I?!”

Maria sighed. “Look! Mason I cannot tell you,” Maria said slowly.

Mason just frowned. “Not fair! Not fair! Not fair!” he screeched.

“Security!” Maria cried.

Taylor grabbed a red velvet cupcake, a confetti cupcake, and a chocolate fudge cupcake, with a side of Milky Ways, Kit Kats, and M&Ms for lunch. Taylor took the goodies to the room she shared with her mom. Tomorrow was the final challenge. Whoever got three words in a row won!

The next morning, Taylor went up last. Everyone else only got two words in a row correct. 

Taylor’s first word was skulduggery. S-k-u-l-d-u-g-g-e-r-y. She got it correct. Then burglar. B-u-r-g-l-a-r. Correct. Last, modicum. M-o-d-i-c-u-m. She got them all correct. 

“Jacklin, tell Taylor what she’s won!” Maria shouted to a woman in a red sequined leotard, with bright red lipstick, black tights, and red, six inch heels.

“Well Taylor, you’ve won ten free trips to Disney World, 250 million dollars, and a 40 million dollar gift card to every bookstore in the world!” Jacklin said. “Plus…” the crowd murmured about how much more Taylor’d win, “your own private plane, which includes a coupon for the next 10 repairs, 4 bedrooms that have their own bathrooms, 2 kitchens, 3 TVs, 2 dining rooms, and 2 TV rooms.”

Taylor’s jaw literally fell open.

A lady that looked like Mason climbed onto the stage and said, “My Mason should’ve won!”

Mason looked embarrassed. “Mother.” Security guards started pulling her back.

“He should’ve won!” she screamed.

“Well that was odd,” said Jacklin.

The Time When Unicorns Existed, or Shall I Say the Time When I Got Famous, or Maybe Not

Just remember, if you’re reading this story, don’t freak out. If you freak out, just stop reading this story right away.


Chapter One

Do you know the time when unicorns used to exist? Well, I know when. So this is the story: once I was dreaming about some unicorns — I saw unicorns flying in the air. That was amazing, really just to tell you. I loved it.

Guess what happened next: the unicorns were dancing for real! I know right.

Then the unicorns started to dance — it was so funny that I woke up and started laughing.

Crazy!

My mom said, “Hey, why are you laughing like that?” I was still laughing. That was surely crazy. My mom said, “Come on, stop laughing. Come on, get up.”

I still sat there. I was laughing like crazy.

My mom got so mad that she carried me up to the table and said, “Explain, explain, explain to me what this nonsense is all about!”

I said, “It was nothing to worry about, okay.”

Then my mom said, “The next time you do that again, you are going to get a toy.”

I was so surprised!

That was just one sentence that I loved!

Loved it!  

I think I just saw a unicorn right now in 2019 — dun, dun, dun.

That means unicorns really do exist. It looked so beautiful, and it had so many colors I couldn’t believe. I was sitting there on a chair in the morning just waiting for something. Then a unicorn just popped up running through the house! That was so amazing. It wasn’t my dream. It was in real life, actually! I really couldn’t believe that. I was the first person in 2019 to see a unicorn. Maybe I would be famous one day because of that. But I’m not actually sure if other people know about that. I know that my family knows, but… I am not really sure if other people know about this. Or people from the news, or anyone except for my family. That was really odd.

I said to my mom, “Did you see the unicorn just run in our house? It had so many colors! It was so cool! I was the first person in 2019 to see a unicorn! Isn’t that amazing?”

My mother said, “I know! I know! I saw that too!”


Chapter Two

I remembered when my mom said that when I have a crazy dream and laugh all the time, she’ll get me a new toy. I thought it was suspicious. So I did that again.

Then something weird happened. She actually didn’t give me a toy. She gave me something else.

It was a toy unicorn that you can ride on when you push the play button, and when you reverse it, you can go backwards. You can do that without even moving your legs. It does it by itself! That was actually kind of cooler than a toy.

I play with it all night and all day. I never stopped riding on it. I play with it all night, all day, every month, and every year. I got it when I turned eight years old. But I wonder if that was just for my birthday present or because… I was… laughing.

I was so confused. I was afraid to ask because if I asked my mom, she would take advantage of it and maybe take away the unicorn. So I didn’t want that to happen, so I just took it away from my mind and not care about it anymore. Then I just had fun with it as usual. I was thinking to myself why my mom would get something like that for $1,339.

I think I’m losing my mind! Is it actually true, or am I just dreaming? Are my eyes working right now?

Okay. Now let’s get to a new topic. Do unicorns actually exist? (That’s the title of the story.) I think they do. If I told the news that unicorns actually exist, I might be famous in some way. But I don’t know how.

I think I got an idea! I will go to the Mayor of New York.

I arrived there and said to her, “You dare call me a liar? But I was the first in 2019 to see a unicorn. This is true. I could even show you a photo, if you’d like. Put it on a newspaper, and send it to everybody in the whole world. Then I would be famous!”

“Neighhhh… ”

“What was that?” I said. “It’s a unicorn! Unicorns actually exist! I will look here, and you look there. And if I see a unicorn cross by, I will tell you to look there. And if you see a unicorn cross by, then you will tell me. Then we will see if unicorns really exist. This is my time to prove to you.”

The mayor said, “If it’s true that unicorns actually exist and you really saw it, I will make you famous.”
I said, “Hold on, hold on. Are you serious? You’re going to make me famous? No kidding? Are you?”

The mayor got frozen for a while. She was staring at something — it was huge and enormous. I looked there, and I saw a unicorn. The mayor was shocked, really shocked! I tried to unfreeze the mayor, but she kept staring at the unicorn. It was no joke. She was truly shocked.

Then the mayor unfroze.

I said to the mayor, “You see. Unicorns actually exist, and I was the first one in 2019 to see it. You see?”

The mayor said, “That unicorn that just crossed by… it was so beautiful. It had so many colors. My eyes were about to explode.”

I told the mayor, “Okay. Okay. Okay. Calm down now. If you want a photo of that unicorn, luckily, I took a photo. I have a printer at my house! I can print out a picture of the unicorn that crossed by and send thousands of pictures of it around the world. And give you one.”

I was willing to give the mayor one the next day, and printed off thousands of the photo, but then I forgot and fell asleep. I forgot and the mayor forgot to make me famous… dun dun dun. Man, the mayor was just totally off. All my work of being famous was off. And that was just bad. I couldn’t believe it.

The next day I woke up, and I stretched out. I took a deep breath, and my memory was wiggling. My memory caught up and at just that second, I remembered something big: do you know what it is? If you said I forgot to send the mayor a picture — you are correct. *Ding!* If you did not say that, you are wrong. *Err!*


Chapter Three

Okay, this story about when the unicorns existed is starting to get… totally out of hand. Anyway, let’s just get back to the story. If you’re still reading this story, great. If you like it, tell your friends about it. Okay, let’s just get back to the story.

Remember when I told you about when the mayor and I saw the unicorn? That was a way better unicorn than I saw at my house — it had more colors and was way more beautiful. And to be honest with you, that was actually good. Really good.

It was getting dark, and the sun was going down. The moon was rising, and the stars were out. Some feeling I have… in the night, I feel like I’m lonely for some reason. Maybe because it’s dark. Maybe unicorns liked to be in the dark, and people think unicorns don’t even exist. Oh yeah! Did I or did the mayor forget to make me famous? This is the worst day ever. I was supposed to be famous, and I am not. I must go back to that mayor and should have a plan to do something. I know! I’ll go to the mayor and tell her, “Weren’t you supposed to make me famous? Did you lose your mind?”

Then I went to the mayor and said to her, “Wasn’t I supposed to be famous?”

But the mayor said, “You forgot to give me the photo.”

And I said, “Oh yeah.” I had hidden the photo behind my back, and I said, “Do you want the photo? Surprise!!!” I pulled out the photo from behind my back. 

The mayor said, “Okay! Now let’s make you famous. Tomorrow, watch the news. I’ll make you famous on the news. I promise.”


Chapter Four

I woke up the next day, and I watched the news.

The news guy said, “Unicorns! Lovely unicorns!”

For some reason the news guy didn’t even mention my name or anything about me.

I was so mad about that, so I went back to the mayor and said to her, “I was watching the news just today, and the news man didn’t even make me famous at all or even mention my name or anything. He just said ‘unicorns lovely unicorns!’”

The mayor looked at me, with fake surprise.

Then I said, “You’re just faking, so if I go to the building where the news people go, and I ask them if you told them about me, or even mentioned my name, what do you think they will say? Every day I drive past the building, and I have written the name and address of where it is.”

The mayor said, “Okay okay. The only reason I didn’t make you famous was because… um… okay, I didn’t make you famous because usually when people make you famous the news people give out the address of where you life, and they might come to your door and ring your bell and do something. They might kidnap one of your daughters or your sons.”

I said, “I have daughters? I have sons? Well that’s cool, and plus that is new news for me!” 

The mayor, “No! No! No! You are getting off track. You have no kids. You are only a kid. Anyways, let’s just get back to what we were talking about before. So remember when I told you that when you get famous on the news, they tell your address and someone can knock on your doorbell and when they open the door they can do something bad to you.”

I said, “Okay, you’re right, but I’m thinking that usually no one does that.”

But the mayor said, “Do you want to live a nice and peaceful life or keeping on working to be famous because once you are famous people can forget about you once you stop doing your work of being famous.”

Then I said, “Actually, you are kind of correct.”

So the mayor said, “What do you think now?” 

“I have a plan actually. With your advice that you just told me, now I don’t want to be famous anymore. Now, for the news, I have a plan! A very special plan! Do you know what it is? Something special and crazy!!! I’m going to tell you something cool. Here we go! Are you ready for it? You’re going to go tell the news to someone named Mr. Piko Piko. Let me tell you a secret. That’s a fake person and a fake name. But don’t tell the news especially! Okay, let’s get back to what we were saying. Next, you are going to say about Mr. Piko Piko to the news and that he lived on 97th Street between Columbus Avenue and Amsterdam Avenue. So you got it? I’m going to write it down on a paper, and tomorrow I’m going to give it to you. And then after tomorrow, you’re going to go to the news and say everything that I told you about Mr. Piko Piko.”

The next day, I woke up and got a loose piece of paper and wrote everything about Mr. Piko Piko. Then, I went off and gave it to the mayor.

The mayor said to me, “Could I tell you something? Your plan is excellent! Give me a high five! And when someone tries to go to Mr. Piko Piko’s address and rings the bell, someone will open the door and the person who came will ask, ‘What is your name?’ They will say something else than Mr. Piko Piko. They are going to be so surprised!”

The next day, the mayor went to the news people and said there’s someone named Mr. Piko Piko and he lives on 97th Street between Columbus and Amsterdam Avenue.

The news people said, “Okay! Sure, no problem! But in the first place, why are you telling me this?”

“I’m telling you this because Mr. Piko Piko is willing to be famous.”

The news people said, “Okay.”

The next day, the mayor and I sat next to each other and watched the news.

Then the news people said, “Mr. Piko Piko is famous! He lives on 97th Street between Columbus and Amsterdam Avenue.”

He became famous at Rock and Roll music bro. The mayor closed the TV. Then the mayor and I started laughing so badly.

“Where did the news people get the Rock and Roll bro?”

“That was so crazy!”

We laughed for a while. It was a success!


Chapter Five

The mayor and I gave a high five to each other. But then, someone went to Mr. Piko Piko’s house and remembered that Mr. Piko Piko is not real. So, they rang the bell on the door and a guy opened the door.

He asked him, “What’s your name?”

The guy said, “My name is Pearator.” Pearator said to the man, “But who are you?!”

“Nevermind, I shall say.”

Then, the man just closed the door and left.

Pearator said, “That’s odd.”

The man went to his house.

The next day, the man went to the news people, and he said to them, “You guys tricked me! Guess what happened! You said the guy, Mr. Piko Piko lived on 97th street between Columbus and Amsterdam, but when I went there and knocked on the door and asked what his name was just to make sure and he said his name was Pearator.”

The news people said, “Wait, hold on. the mayor clearly told me in front of my eyes and ears this information and it’s not true. Something’s fishy around here. Time to animate the plan! We’re going to go to the mayor and go capture her.”

The guy said, “That’s a good plan. High five! If they are going to trick us, then we are going to trick them.” 

The next day, the news people and the guy went to the mayor and said to the mayor, “We went to ‘Mr. Piko Piko’s’ house.” When the news people said this to the mayor they used their hands to make air quotes. They continued and said, “We rang on the door and asked what his name is and he said his name was Pearato.”

The mayor looked at me and said to them, “Just one second. We need to go and do something.” 

The mayor and I went to this private room and said to each other, “Uh oh, they got us.”

“Time to operate another plan. So, we’re going to go back to them, and we’re going to shout ‘run!!!’”

So, we went back to them and said to each other, “Run!”

And the mayor and I ran away as fast as we could. But they still caught the mayor but not me because I’m too fast. Too bad for the mayor. She lost her job.

I said to the people, “You might have caught the mayor but not me because I’m so fast and you guys are so slow.”

They said, “Whatever, we don’t care.” And that was the end.

 THE END


Spell Casters

I Almost Pee In My Pants

“Reflectiao!” I yelled at the top of my lungs.

A small mirror the size of a piece of paper floated in front of me. It swung. I ducked. It plunged. I screamed. Luckily, the mirror protected me. I lifted my head from beneath my arms. The SpiderBright was gone. Somehow, the mirror looked bigger. Now, it looked around the size of a stove. I put on a triumphant face before anyone could see that I almost peed in my pants because I was so scared. I looked over my shoulder to see a girl holding a God SpellBook. 

“You know, I made the mirror,” she said, annoyed.

 “Oh,” I said, my jaw dropping.

“Name’s Adrena,” she said, “Professional Spell Caster and Detective.”

Bzzz Bzzz, my watch buzzed. ‘5:30,’ it read. I got three new texts, all that said, ‘Come to Clover City.’ I quickly told Adrena that I needed to leave. I got a train there. It took about one hour. I watched the city disappear as the train spread into the station. As I got off the train, a note taped to a sign was about to be blown away. “Oxxiel,” I whispered to myself. The note flew off from the sign and landed in my hand. It read:

Dear Adrena,

Meet me at Cristoffs Magic Shop.

8:30 P.M.

Sincerely,

Francisco.

One thousand questions crowded my brain. Well, there’s only one way to get answers, I thought.


I Get Attacked By A Killer Meatball

“Ouch ahh ooh,” I said warily.

There it is! There it is! As I emerged from the forest, I said a smoke spell, and it turned into a smoke cloud. I found a crack in the windows, then drifted in. I saw Adrena and another guy, who I guessed was Francisco, talking.

Pop! The smoke spell wore off. Whoops.

“Escalaza!” yelled Adrena. Their bowls of spaghetti grew till they were the size of a refrigerator. Boom! Okay, that meatball just grew eyes. (Typical.) With that it came lunging at me. I grabbed a piece of MagNet (or as you humans call it: yarn) and made Jacob’s Ladder with it.

“Mi,” I whispered to no one in particular. The MagieNet flew and trapped the Meatball Monster. Ftth. The monster disintegrated. “What’s going on?” I demanded. 

“Alright alright,” Adrena confessed, “I got a letter from my brother, and he told me he was seeing weird things around the city. So the Crystill told him to find a few people he could trust and try to find out who was doing this. That’s why we brought you here to — ”

“You didn’t bring me here!” I interrupted. “I found a letter.” 

“You think that O.X.X.I.E.L spell was yours?!” she snorted. “If you said that spell, you would probably blow it away even more!”

This whole time Francisco hadn’t said anything. Wait… he was levitating. Oh no, oh no, oh no! He was about to say a death spell. I ran out as fast as my legs would go. If I said a single spell, it would trigger his spell to charge up even faster. Bam! I jumped out of spell range before the green light engulfed. I wasn’t going down without a fight. I positioned my hands, so it would look like I was holding an invisible sword. I pulled my hands apart as far as I could. A green shimmer was forming between my hands. A long wooden bamboo staff was now in my hands. I ran toward the siblings.

 “Yah!” I said with gusto.

As I was about to blast off their heads, I tripped.

“Sorry,” said Adrena, “Imp.”

A portal opened beneath me. I fell in, screaming as I fell into my dark death.


My Funeral

I landed on something slimy. That’s when I realized what it was. A tongue. I tried to summon my magic bamboo staff to help me escape the Realm Of Monsters. I started moving. I knew it was only a matter of time before I died. I tried all the spells I knew. I could smell its bad breath by now. Chomp! I was swallowed into the monster. All the people I knew had a party to celebrate my life, even though they didn’t find my body. If you’re wondering how I knew this, I knew this because this was just a near-death experience. Just one of many more to come.


The Road Boys: The Halloween Mystery

Chapter One: Where is the Candy?

I just went to the office in the main hall at my school. Then I came back to the hall, and the Candy for Gratitude was gone. I’m sure I saw it was there before school started, but now it was gone! Candy for Gratitude is candy that people give to the soldiers. We share some of our candy from Halloween.

Whoosh! A person ran into the boy’s bathroom with a full big bag. I couldn’t see who it was, but I knew I shouldn’t tell anybody. But as I kept thinking, I said to myself, “That shouldn’t keep me from including Nikan and Ashton.”

I decided to tell my friends Nikan and Ashton because I knew I couldn’t finish this big Halloween mystery. The only time we could keep looking for clues was at Beyond The Bell, which was after school. We could do anything we wanted after school. We could play in the yard or the field. We could also do our homework. We ran right after school and hid before the coach saw us and told us to go to the lunch benches for him to count us. My friends, Nikan, Ashton, and Kourosh, and I ran into the boy’s bathroom and looked around for clues using four of our senses: sight, smell, hearing, and touch. We found letters on the walls that spelled Trista, and we also found a big white wall. We freaked out because we knew someone named Tristan and a person named Trista. All my friends, Ashton, Nikan, and Kourosh, started running and hiding from our coach to the other boy’s bathroom. We hid there for a couple of minutes. Then we went out. Just after we went out, we saw a girl go into the boy’s bathroom. Her name was Madeline.


Chapter Two: The Creepy Guy!!!

“He should really get a shower,” I said to Kourosh when we passed an old man around 120 years old.

I thought he was a criminal in disguise, but Kourosh thought it was just an old man. He was with a cane carved like a totem pole. The cane had faces of a raven, frog, wolf, and a bear. We went to the park, and Ashton said he could eat 2,000,000,000 elephants. We then played soccer. Ashton missed an open goal and then tried to make an excuse.

Later that day, Ashton missed the ball 987 times, and when he was in the goal, he missed all the other team’s shots. We lost 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 to 0. 

Ashton said, “But it was not my fault,” and made up an excuse. “The other team cheated by pulling my arm, so I couldn’t dive far enough to reach the ball, and the other team’s coach was distracting me.” 

By this time, Ashton was really mad because we did not believe in his excuses. We knew

he was making excuses because when someone else was in goal, the other team only scored once.

We went back to school, and we saw the same girl who went into the boy’s bathroom. She thought nobody was watching her, but we were spying on her because we knew she was up to something. Kourosh, Ashton, and Nikan thought she was a boy, but I knew she was a girl. She even had a girl name. After school, Kourosh’s parent named Mr. Jeffffffersoz came to pick us up. We made a plan to catch the thief. Ashton, Nikan, Kourosh, and I decided to ask her why she went into the boy’s bathroom. The next day, we went in the boy’s bathroom, but we didn’t see her. 

“That is weird,” I said.

The bell rang. Ring! Oh no, we are going to be late, we all thought. We ran to our class room. It was number 5,668. There were 7,000 classes in the school. It is the biggest school in the world. After school, we followed her to the library. We saw her hide behind the recycling bin while we were hiding behind a bush. She was talking to another person, but we didn’t know who that person was. Ashton was looking on the right side of the bush, Nikan was looking on the left side of the bush, and Kourosh and I were looking above the bush. We had to crawl to another bush to get a better view of who the girl (Madeline) was talking to. The first thing we saw was a carved cane. We all recognized the cane. It was the cane of the creepy guy.

“I am so close. Those boys think I stole the candy,” said the girl.

“I am ¼ finished with the candy,” said the old guy.

“Guys, the girl we saw was a distraction. It is the creepy guy,” said Ido.

We followed him to his house, and we called the police.


Chapter Three: Police

Weeyoo weeyoo ahh police,” said Kourosh.

“Relax,” I said.

 “I called them,” said Ashton. 

The police cranked open the door and saw the man eating candy. They brought the guy in handcuffs and took off his wig. O-M-G! The robber was the strongest man in the Donald Trump buildings. He was the best robber in all the world. We brought the candy to the soldiers.

One of the soldiers said, “I saw the news. Are you guys the ones who stole back the candy?”

We were known as the best robber catchers.


The Road Boys: The Labor Day Mystery

Chapter One: What’s Gone Wrong in the City?!

“Sadly, on Labor Day, Kourosh and Ashton moved all the way to Saudi Arabia and met Princess Wurayf,” Ido mentioned. 

“Ooohhhh,” Nikan said, “this grill smells good, and it’s fun to use it at my new house.”

Meanwhile, a bad robber named Harry Kane left his house and headed over to the jail. At the jail, he let 100,000,000 other robbers out. They broke all the handcuffs and the keys to the cells. Then, they all jumped into police cars and went over to the Diamond District, where all the stores were abandoned because the shopkeepers were at Labor Day barbeques. They broke in and put the jewelry in big gold and white bags that they dragged out the door.

In another part of the city, another robber, named Jojo Casias, snuck into a barbeque and stole the grill while the happy tan man was using the bathroom. He also stole medicine from the happy tan man’s house.

Then Jojo drove back to the Diamond District and then smashed open the cash register and started to do Fortnite dances after the robbers stole all the money. Then, they went to people’s houses and started shooting the front windows. The police left their barbeques and sprinted as fast as injured cheetahs to the police station. When they got there, they saw they had no cars. Also, the sobbing people from the bank noticed their cars were stolen, too. Then the robbers went to the bank and stole over 10,000,000,000,000 dollars, which was the first record high since Christmas of last year.

Back at the boy’s barbeque, Nikan and Ido heard a crazy scream. 

“Robbers are invading!!”

As they put down their hamburgers, they heard bombing sounds. They were ready to take serious action.


Chapter Two: Clues from The Road Boys

The Road Boys rushed into Nikan’s room and got the number three best disguise robber catching costume: a gun, a shield, disguise powers, a watch to communicate, plus a button that could let you choose the power you want.

“Let’s go,” said Ido.

The boys rushed out of the house and jumped onto the bank. They saw thousands of police cars. On top of the roof, they saw a list of where Harry Kane was planning to go. 

The list:

  1.  Get the robbers
  2.  Diamond District
  3. Bank
  4. Chocolate factory
  5. Steal all the barbeques
  6. Mall
  7. School
  8. Houses
  9. Offices
  10. Shoot people 
  11. Leave City
  12. Steal stuff from airport and fly away. 

“I’ll go to the chocolate factory,” Nikan said.

“If they left the chocolate factory, I’ll go stop them from stealing all the barbeques. And alert me if you’re in trouble. You know my number,” said Ido. 

Nikan was terrified as he ran through the streets faster than Jesse Owens. He arrived at the chocolate factory. Then, when Nikan snuck in, he saw the robbers stealing like crazy, stealing all the stuff.

Then Nikan called Ido and said, “I need your help. There are over 2,000 robbers.”

“Sure,” Ido responded.

When Ido arrived, they activated a power named invisible speed with their special watches and jumped on down.

“Let’s go,” Nikan whispered.

The boys snuck by the whole gang and screamed to call the police. The robbers got scared and ran out.

Then Nikan called the police and said, “The robbers just went out and are trying to steal all of the barbeques.”

“Sure, I’ll go chase them,” said the policeman named Mr. Writopia.

The boys headed out and started using their superspeed power and tripped the police cars that the bad guys were in and broke the wheels. Boom! The robbers were totally injured, and some couldn’t walk. They did not know what to do without their lost cars. They heard sirens. There were more police cars from another city! Then, Harry Kane swooped in on a helicopter and picked up all the injured robbers and the robbers who were suffering from really bad pain. Also, Harry Kane saved the robbers who were on the loose getting chased by policemen.

Then, the helicopter distracted the police, and people came out to help out. The robbers inside the helicopters helped the injured robbers feel better by giving them the stolen medicine. Next, they jumped out of the helicopter and stole all the barbeques because that’s what was next on their list.

Chapter Three: Catch ‘Em Boys

The boys ran 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 miles per hour and caught two robbers, and gave them to the police who brought the poor robbers to jail. They were poor because they were the only two out of 100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 robbers.

Then, the boys said, at the same time, “We need a trap.” 

The boys had the plan. They whispered it to the police and got started. First, the police chased the robbers toward Schanbel Boulevard. Schanbel Boulevald looked like a perfectly normal street with light posts all over because Mayor Melon lived on it. But the horrible robbers, all with concussions, ran over the trap that they didn’t know was a deadly trap and fell into it. It was 10 billion feet deep, and when all of them fell in, the friendly boys put up a firm gate so the deadly robbers didn’t get out, and if not all were caught, the boys made the same trap over and over again till the robbers were all caught. And, at the bottom, the boys put a machine that put handcuffs around the non-innocent robbers who destroyed the whole Labor Day!

After all the robbers were caught, they were put into dump trucks with a lot of trash, like stinky bananas and banana peels, which were totally awful.

Chapter Four: Jail

When they finally arrived at Kick Your Butt Jail, the robbers were in a moving tarp and were one by one loaded into a jail slot and were surrounded by chainsaws, and there was not even a single way to let the robbers escape.

After all the robbers were put into the jail slots, dinner was served: edible horse poo mush. There were no utensils or silverware given, only a plastic window if the robbers wanted to cover the open area which had iron poles around it so the robbers could not escape or shoot the city to death or kill people right out of the window.

The ground was all black and dusty. The walls of the mini cube had cracks and holes. It was just a plain room. Nothing was inside a plain room.

The robbers were whining to annoy the police and guards, so they would go away so that the robbers could make up a cruel plan. The guards finally called their wives to bring them earphones, so they couldn’t hear and at 10:00 sharp at night they all went to bed.


Chapter Five: Celebrate the Boys

The next day, the city met at town hall with misplaced artifacts.

The mayor, named Mayor Melons, said, “We must honor the people who saved our town… ”

As the mayor got ready to speak, he reached out his neck as tall as he could and got ready to speak loud and very proud, “Nikan Jafari and Ido Levertov. I must thank them so much for saving our town from such cruel robbers we were about to get killed by. Thank you so much. Thank you boys for saving our city.”

They planned to make a picnic to honor the boys.

“We will honor them at 12:00 sharp at Royal Mellow Yellow Park, and my servant Petit will serve appetizers, drinks, and food with his crew.”

When the church bell rang, everybody in the city arrived on time and was getting served from Petit and his crew.

It was an awesome celebration, and at the end, they had a yoga class, and finally at the very, very, very end, Mayor Melon, Governor Chicken, and President Taft, who was stuck in a bath, gave a speech and then at last awarded the boys with medals, Teslas, Lamborghinis, 1,000 billion dollars, trophies and so much more. And the boys thanked them so much and bowed to the crowd.


The Fennec Fox and the Clouded Leopard

Vapor the Fennec Fox was sitting on a rock when suddenly a No-fur with a stick came over to him. Vapor knew that sticks were dangerous, so he started running as fast as he could when he ran smack into a palm tree. At the same time, hundreds of miles away, Hang-down the Clouded Leopard was chasing a Vole for dinner when a Chihuahua blocked his way. Hang-down was very surprised. Suddenly, the Chihuahua howled in his face!

“Ruh-ruh-ruh-AWOOO!!!”

The Chihuahua started chasing Hang-down. Hang-down climbed up all the way to the forest canopy. Now the Chihuahua could not get him — he was stuck on a branch, and he couldn’t climb any higher.

Hang-down stared down at the Chihuahua and growled, “You little foo — ” when — crrrrk! — the branch cracked, and the Chihuahua fell, his tail getting caught on another branch. 

Hang-down burst out laughing because the Chihuahua fell, and he hated the Chihuahua. Then the branch that he’d been stuck on fell too, and it landed on the Chihuahua. The Chihuahua was stuck in a branch sandwich! And then the branch on top of him started to wobble. Then he started to wobble. And they fell!!!

Hang-down burst out laughing again. The Chihuahua landed on the hard, hard forest floor. Suddenly, a No-fur appeared. He was holding a stick, just like the other one. He also had a big spider web. He threw it at Hang-down, who tried to dodge it but got caught in the big web. There was an opening to the net, so he climbed out, but he didn’t know there was a trap. It looked like a rectangular big shaped spider web, so he went inside, but then it lifted off the ground, and he heard a sound — bririririririr!!! Hang-down zoomed past the canopy of the forest. Then he saw the forest end and a lot of little dots, black and tan colorish. Suddenly, he was over the water. Then he felt himself being lowered until the rectangular spider web was touching the water. It started tilting, and then water started rushing in. Then all of a sudden, the big rectangular spider web hit a rock. There was a big rectangular shaped cave with no entrance. Hang-down was very surprised and frightened.

Back in the desert, Vapor the Fennec Fox woke up to find himself sitting in a dark cave. He couldn’t see a thing and didn’t know where he was. He could hear a strange sound — bririririririr!!! He could hear something clinking below him (which was the big rectangular spider web Hang-down was in). At the same time… the dark place where Vapor was in and the big rectangular spider web got unleashed by something that looked like a scorpion tail. Both went sliding into a little opening of the huge rectangular cave. Once inside, it was very light and they saw a little, little cave which had a scorpion inside. When everything was opened, they saw how the scorpion looked. It was shiny and turquoise blue, and when the light darkened, it was sky blue and transparent.

Poison-Sting, Hang-down, and Vapor looked at each other. Vapor and Hang-down sniffed each other. They didn’t say anything for awhile.

Finally, Poison-Sting broke the silence by saying, “Hello, Fennec Fox and Clouded Leopard. My name is Poison-Sting, the blue scorpion.”

Then Vapor said, “My name is Vapor.”

“My name is Hang-Down,” said Hang-Down.

“Where did you guys come from?” asked Poison-Sting.

“I came from the Sahara — ” said Vapor until he was suddenly interrupted by a baby white devon rex. The baby was one foot and six inches shorter than Hang-Down.

“My name is — ” it said in a baby voice, because it was a baby obviously, “Oakheart.”

Poison-Sting inched his stinger but didn’t say anything. Hang-down opened her mouth but didn’t say anything. And Vapor just wagged his tail. 

He repeated, “My name is Oakheart,” still in a babyish voice. “Hello. I came from an animal shelter, and I escaped. Then some weird No-Fur came and brought me here… Do you want help to escape? I’ve been wanting to escape ever since a No-Fur with a stick that had fur on the end (a broom) tried whacking me with it,” said Oakheart.

“Yes, we would love to,” said Poison Sting.

So the four of them planned their escape that very night. Poison-Sting used his stinger to unlock the hidden cave entrance that the No-Furs would come in and out through, then they creaked open the cave entrance and crept out into the darkness of night… 

To be continued… in the next chapter of this book, Oakheart.


The Gingerbread Man

Once upon a time there was a gingerbread man. It started raining, but it wasn’t raining regular rain — it was raining frosting. The gingerbread man, whose name was Melanie, ate the frosting while he was walking to his house. He bought dinner on the way — he never knew it was going to rain frosting. He ate so much frosting that his stomach was too full to eat dinner, and that happened for ten whole weeks. He kept buying dinner on his way home from work because he didn’t think it would rain frosting, but then it did!

Melanie, the gingerbread man, carried a suitcase in his hand because he worked at a watch store: an Apple watch store. He ran the Apple watch store, and he only hired other gingerbread men. The reason he only hired gingerbread men was because they worked well together, but he could only find one other gingerbread man to hire, and he needed more — so one day he decided to make a gingerbread man. 

So he went home and made another gingerbread man, and since he also needed to find a wife, he made it a girl gingerbread man. And her name was Max. In the gingerbread world, girls had boys names, and boys had girls names.

Melanie and Max were walking together one day when he noticed he was late to work, so he said to his wife, “I have to go to work now! I’m late!”

As he was running to work, he saw another gingerbread man. And then four more gingerbread men with him!

So he asked them, “Are you looking for a job?”

And they said yes, so he hired them. 

They all went to the Apple watch shop together, and he introduced them to the other guy who worked with him in the store. But the five new gingerbread men didn’t actually work well in a team. They broke the glass, they made a mess, they threw the watches in the dump, and they stole a hammer and broke the whole store. The store was broken all over the place and was no longer a store. It was a new place for the dump. The owner fired them, but then the five gingerbread men got a hammer and destroyed the whole store, and it fell on them all, and they died. And that was the end of the owner and the five gingerbread men.

His wife was still alive, crying, “Where’s my husband, where’s my husband!”

She laid down in her house.

That was the end of her life.

The End.


The Game Show

So, I am a game show host, and I’m kind of the funny one. I announce the winner — not you! Okay? We have two contestants: Joe and Bob. Okay, I think I should tell you my name… My name is… the host!!! Don’t call me anything else. Especially not my real name, which I’m not going to tell you.

Fine, I’ll tell you. My name is beep.

  I won’t tell you my name. Hahahaha.

“Now it’s time for the Game Show. Bob, you can go first.”

“Hi, I’m Bob! I’m doing this so I can raise money for nothing! And I’m super dumb. Just so you know.”

“Thanks, Bob, for coming to this Game Show. Now Joe, introduce yourself.”

“Name’s Joe! I’m here because I have no reason… Okay. Done with my interview.” 

“Great. I ask the questions, just so you know. You press the button, and whoever gets it first gets to answer the question. And if you don’t get it right, you transfer $1 to the other team. If you have $0, you still lose $1, so you will have -$1. And if you end on a minus, you have to pay us!”

“So my first question is: who won the 2018 FIFA World Cup?”

Beep!

“Okay! Joe, you pressed the button.”

Joe says, “France!”

“He is right. Because he’s an expert in soccer. Also, if you win, you get $10. Actually $15. Actually no, $10. So Joe has $10, and Bob has $0. The next question is: Hmm… let me think. I didn’t prepare for the questions because I didn’t have time. Who won the 2022 FIFA World Cup?”

Beep!

“Spain!”

“Bob is wrong! It’s the future, so nobody knows. So Bob has to give $1 to Joe. Now Joe has $11 and Bob has -$1.”

“Aw. So much for my guess.”

“Now another question. What’s 100 plus 100?”

Beep!

“150!” says Joe.

“Wrong! Okay.”

Beep!

“150!” says Joe.

“You already said that! I said no!”

Beep!

“150!” says Joe.

“Oh my gosh, you’re annoying me so much! It’s not 150!!!”

Beep!

“150!” says Joe.

“Okay, I’ll tell you the right answer! It’s 200!”

Beep!

“200!” says Joe.

“It’s too late! You can’t copy me! You have to give the other team $4! Now Bob has $3, and Joe has $7. Okay, next question. Who is the dumbest person here?”

Beep!

“Me!” says Bob.

“You’re right! You get $10! Now Bob has $13, and Joe has $7! So because this question is super, super hard, it’s worth $50.”

Joe and Bob gasp.

“The question is: where do babies come from?”

Beep!

“Baby co.” 

“No!”

Beep!

“I have no idea.”

“No, you’re wrong!”

“Okay, that’s the end of the question. No one got it.”

No!

“That’s the end of the game show, guys! It’s time to tally up all the work… Dang it! I forgot all of the scores.”

Joe and Bob faint.

The End.

Cactus

Guy and Cactus are punching each other in zero gravity floating in space. They are right above the moon. They’re waiting for a shuttle than can take them to Uranus. They are punching each other because one wants the border wall between Uranus and its moon, Myanus.

Guy

The wall is good!


Cactus

The one between Uranus and Myanus? That one is shit!!!


Out pops a map from behind the stage. It shows “Uranus” and “Myanus,” with a wall between them. Then the map flips around, and it shows what Cactus wants. An empty space and a bridge between them.

The shuttle picks them up. (Cactus and Guy are walking around the stage.)

(They are on Myanus now.)

There is a tree that says, “Welcome to Myanus,” on a sign.

They start punching each other again.

Cactus 

We’re on Myanus?!


Guy 

No, we’re on Myanus!!!


Cactus 

No, we’re on Myanus!!!


Guy

No, we’re on Myanus!!!

Guy runs to the border and starts piling bricks for the wall.

Cactus runs over and starts taking bricks to the bridge.

(This keeps on going for 10 hours.)

(Both people faint.)

The next day… 

Guy eats a Big Mac burger.

Cactus eats a watermelon.

An hour later… 

Guy

We’re on Myanus!


Cactus

No, we are on Myanus!

Random guy wearing a shirt that says “no wall.” Guy whacks random guy on the head.

(Random guy does not like Guy because he does not like the wall.)

Guy is dead.


Cactus 

Hooray! 


He now gets everything he wants (that is reasonable). Some things that are reasonable are gold, gold, and gold. Cactus gets showered in gold.


Aliens Living on Mars

One day Alex was going to work as an astronaut. He was helping them build a spaceship they would soon go to space in. And today was the test for who was going to be on the mission. He hoped it would be him! And he also hoped that the test wasn’t going to be too hard. 

When he opened the door to the work space, Alex found that the only thing they needed to add to the spaceship was the top. The top was the most important part because the driver had to sit there, and it was where they saw from, so they didn’t run into a part of space where they couldn’t go back to earth.

Then Alex went into the part of the workspace where the test was being taken. He took a piece of paper and found the test was 40 pages long. This was probably going to take the whole day, so the ship wouldn’t take off till Monday, and today was Friday. They didn’t work on Saturday and Sunday. After the work day was over, he had 15 more pages to do, so now the ship wouldn’t take off until Tuesday — because there were more people still working on the test.

Alex went home and had his normal routine. He asked his mom if he could go out with his friends, and she said yes, so he went to the bar nearby. He and his friends watched baseball on the TV and drank some tequila. He was feeling good and hoped that he got to be on spaceship soon. 

***

On Monday, Alex got back to work, went into the room, and got his test back. He went back to work on the last 15 pages. Then, an hour before the work day was over, he finished the test. Then he went to see how the spaceship was doing. They’d added the top, and now they were painting it to look like one of the fiercest spaceships because they were painting it as a tiger! Then the work day was over.

When the Tuesday work day started, he saw the sheet of paper announcing the people who were going on the spaceship to space. There were 20 people in total going, and he was number 13!!! He was so happy he jumped up and down! It also said when it was leaving: it was leaving on Friday that week. Alex was so happy. He got out his phone and texted his mom. Right away, his mom texted back.

I’m so proud of u!

Alex needed to go prepare the spaceship for blastoff with all his stuff. He put all his gear in the trunk near his seat — all the seats had labels, and since he was #13, he put it in the one that said #13. Plus, best friend Miles was also in the spaceship. He was #12! He was right next to Alex. Then the work day was over and he was all packed up. As he was leaving, the boss said he could have Wednesday and Thursday off, because he was going on the spaceship. Then he had an idea: he was going to make a whole sculpture on Wednesday and Thursday of space. The only thing he didn’t know was what planet they were going to, so he just made a sculpture of the whole solar system. He hoped he was going to Venus because that was his favorite planet.

***

He got to work on Friday. He was so happy, and then he heard an announcement. It said: “All people on the list going to planet… Mars! Please proceed to the locker room to get your suit, and then please proceed to the spaceship. We will be taking off in 20 minutes.”

Alex went to the locker room to get on his suit. He got it on — it was also designed as a tiger! It had the number 13 on it and his last name, which was Zabbanegan. Then he made his way to the shuttle. He was feeling really excited, but he was also really happy because he’d get to eat those little dehydrated foods, like an ice cream sandwich. Plus he knew he would survive because he had previously been in the marines and survived World War 3!! Alex was sure taking off to space would be cool — getting to see the whole of earth from so far away. The ship would blast off higher and higher into the clouds, higher than an airplane can go — way up into space where you could see the whole galaxy. Alex had really, really wanted to go since he was only six years old, and now his dream was coming true!

Then another announcement came: “Please board the shuttle.” Alex got onto the shuttle using the little runway, and he got into his seat, and Miles was already there. And then he heard the countdown… 

“Ten… nine… eight… seven… six… five… four… three… two… one! Blast off!” 

Then it was true: he was heading to space! A few minutes later, he was deep into space, and they let off the boosters. Then Alex could see all the galaxy from just his window, and he could see a whole world right behind him. He was very excited. Back in the 2020’s space travel took a long time, but now with super speed travel, it took only a matter of hours. 

Deep into space Alex could see a tiny little brown planet which looked like Mars! It came closer and became bigger, and then he saw light…

“How could it be no shuttle blasted off since 2019? Why is there light?” he asked himself.

Then it got closer and then the light was bigger. And Alex wondered what could be that big with all that light. And then they started to look like tiny houses. Then it looked like there were green people walking all over. Then it looked like the people had antennas with eyes and no eyes on their foreheads. Alex felt an exclamation mark go off above his head! He thought aliens weren’t real, but now he knew it was true. It sounded like alarms were going off in his head because he was so shocked, amazed and surprised.

“Aaaahhhh!!!”

And miles said, “What? What happened?”

“I-I saw aliens!!!”

And then Miles said, “Aaaahhhh!!!”

Finally Alex and Miles got tired of screaming. By that time, everyone in the whole ship was staring at them. Alex told them what happened. Then the captain made an announcement that they were going to land on Mars in 10 seconds.

“Ten… nine… eight… seven… six… five… four… three… two… one… ” Boom!!!

They landed on Mars.

When they looked out the window, a bunch of green people were staring at the spaceship. But some wore blue caps, which were the exact same as a police officer’s on earth. And they had giant guns! 

But also they were aiming at the ship, getting ready to fire. Quietly, all the astronauts went to get their suits of armor — which were emergency suits with armor on top. And they got their human guns. Dun dun. They got out onto the ladder and down… Then… 

The war began!!! It was 20 human astronauts versus 100 aliens, but they were dumb. The aliens fired first, but he shot space because he was so dumb. He was the dumbest of them all. Then all the other ones started firing, but they were closer to the astronauts. And then things only got worse because all of them started to fire. But Alex — he was the best of all the astronauts because he had marine training. After all, he was in the marines when World War 3 happened!!! But luckily the war wasn’t that long, so he survived. Alex had really good aim and was really good with a gun, and so he killed most of them. But then out of the corner of his eye, Alex saw a giant giant building with more green people heading out of it with giant guns too.

Then he knew he was outnumbered, so then he took his little walkie-talkie and said to earth, “We need more astronauts that are trained for combat, because we have a little World War One in space going on here with the aliens.”

The commander said, “Yes sir, we will send 10 more ships up there.”

In just about ten more minutes, the spaceships arrived, and when the aliens saw that, the smartest guy of them all (but still pretty dumb) said in his walkie-talkie, to that big building probably, “We need more aliens! They sent 10 more ships with about 20 more people, so that’s just about 200. It’s war.

And then it really started to happen. Then there were just about 2 million aliens, and it started to get bloody. But the alien’s blood was yellow. So just about the red Mars turned yellow Mars.

And then one of the astronauts went to go spy in that building, and when he came back, he said into his walkie-talkie, “There’s literally a machine that makes aliens. This is going to go on forever, people!!!”

Soon, Alex’s 20 men were running out of air. They had to go back into the ship, refill, and then go back out. When they came back out there were only half the amount of astronauts because they were getting air too. But they were winning. They kept destroying and destroying the aliens and then finally Alex sent himself and randomly picked 20 other astronauts, not only from his group but also the other — and then went all the way behind that big giant building. Then they broke the window, climbed in, and hid behind the machine. They didn’t want to destroy it right away because then all the aliens would know, and they didn’t have enough people to destroy all the aliens coming out of the machine.

The machine looked like a giant door — which opens and closes — and when it opened, five aliens came out at a time, each holding a gun. The sound went — brum brum brum brum brum brum brum. A smell coming from the machine smelled like rotten eggs. The first thing Alex knew they had to do was destroy the aliens operating the machine: there were five of them. Because they could make as many aliens as they wanted to. But before they almost destroyed those aliens, they saw the commander come in and say they were losing the fight, so they could turn up how many aliens were coming out of the machine. The aliens operating the machine switched it from ‘5’ up to ‘100’! And then the door turned almost as big as how tall the building was, and the aliens were floating in the air and then fell down, balanced on the ground. Then Alex knew just what to do — he shot the five, and then all the aliens started to look behind them — and then Alex took a grenade out of his back pocket and threw it at the aliens, and it kind of hit the machine and exploded. Basically all the aliens got destroyed — and the machine!

They had basically won the fight, but there were still a lot of aliens out there. And so Alex and his crew destroyed all the aliens that had survived the grenade, then they exited from where they came from and went outside to destroy all the remaining aliens. But when they went out to Mars, all the aliens were already dead, and almost all the astronauts were gone, and even some of the ships. So it was over a long time ago. There was one ship remaining for them. The 20 soldiers got on board, and they went super-speed all the way back to earth! When they got back, basically all the astronauts were waiting, and they were celebrating, and they had a secret surprise party for Alex. They had a cake shaped like a rocket ship and cupcakes shaped like green aliens, with yellow lemon flavored filling. And then they had lemonade with tequila. Meanwhile, they were sending more people to Mars to clean up all the yellow alien blood and destroy the buildings, because humans were going to build a dome up there for scientists to study Mars. The 200 men who fought the aliens went to the news tower, and they told the president of the network to put it on the news and make them famous. That night, Alex’s mom saw him on the news, and she was so proud! She messaged him to say:

Wow saw u on news! what happened??

And then Alex texted back:

It’s a looooooong story!

THE END


Pink Fluffy Unicorns Dancing on Rainbows

Prologue

Hi. My name is Rebecca Rainbow. I am a rainbow, if you’re curious. I hate pink fluffy unicorns. Oh, you don’t know why? I’ll tell you.

I was out one day, settling another argument between Sally sun and Randy rain (the sun, Sally, and the rain, Randy, are my best friends) when my pink fluffy unicorn friend asked me to dance. We did, but then she started dancing on me! Then all the other unicorns started dancing on me! And that is why I hate pink fluffy unicorns.


The Story

I stomped home. I decided to talk to my dad about how the pink fluffy unicorns had danced on me.

“Dad?” I called when I got home.

My dad immediately popped up when he heard what I had to say. I soon discovered that this had been happening to other rainbows, and now they were ticked off. Since my dad was a senator in Rainbow Republic, he could recommend declaring war on pink fluffy unicorns.

I was so excited!!! My dad had said that the president of Rainbow Republic had agreed to declare war on pink fluffy unicorns. I had my heart set on joining the war against pink fluffy unicorns, but I would have to convince my dad first.

I was home after hanging out with my friends, Sally and Randy.

“I have something to tell you, Dad.”

He asked me what it was.

I told him that I wanted to join the war against pink fluffy unicorns.

“No way!” he screamed. “It’s much too dangerous,” he added in a quieter voice.

Fine, I thought. I’ll go to war myself.

In the morning I woke up early so I would have time to disguise as a man and run away to war. I got on all his armor and grabbed his color gun, then slinked out of the house and over to the battlefield. 

Battle was not dangerous for rainbows, unicorns, and other magical things. Us rainbows used classic color guns, which pink fluffy unicorns hated, because they did not have sparkly pink. Pink fluffy unicorns used sparkle guns, which irritated rainbows like me. 

Today was the first day of battle!

Sorry. My hands are so tired it takes a while to switch from one letter to the next. I never knew how tiring shooting Dad’s color gun would be!!! It was so not my size. I was also covered in sparkles!!! Those pink fluffy unicorns had their guns loaded!

I don’t think I liked this fighting so much. I was pretty sure that the only thing that was pushing me on was my hate against pink fluffy unicorns.

Wow!!! Something amazing happened. I met a human girl named Amber, and she was fighting on the rainbow’s side. Turned out that humans were great fighters. The battle went great. We won the war!!! The only thing that went wrong was that this horrible girl named Rebecca Hills joined the pink fluffy unicorn’s side. She was almost as good as Amber! Luckily, the classic color guns drove her away. But Amber would still have to deal with her. I thought I’d try to help her.

The End


Journey to the Rest of the Universe

My name is Universe. I like the possibility of infinity. Infinity means the highest number possible, which I like to say means anything is possible. I like that anything is possible. My favorite class is science. Anyway, my journey started one day after a long, boring day of school. I was talking to my friends.

Suddenly, the science teacher popped up and said, “Universe, the U.S. wants a kid to go to space, and I thought about you.”

This was the chance of a lifetime.

I said, “Of course!”

The very next day I went into the rocket.

I heard them say, “Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, blast off!”

Next, I went to look at my suit. It was a smaller, newer version of the other suits. The other astronauts helped me put it on. It was a little bulky, but otherwise comfortable. It was hard to get up once you fell down in it. When we finally got up to the moon, I went in space for the first time! When I first stepped on the moon, I fell because of the lack of gravity. After that, I grew accustomed to the gravity, and didn’t fall again.

I asked, “Can we go to the rest of the universe?”

They laughed and said, “Can we? I don’t think we are allowed to do it, Universe.”

They were being really weird, but I expected that. What else should I expect from grownups? If they expected me to put up with them, I would jump out the window. I wished that grownups wouldn’t be so weird. I did jump out of the window. It was fun. I climbed in and jumped out a couple more times. I had a jetpack with me. I liked the jetpacks best. You could steer them, and mine gave you candy, roasted marshmallows, and s’mores. I loved space because you feel like you could do anything if you could breathe in space. I started to go to the sun. Soon, I shifted it to heat protection, and a suit of fire appeared to shield me from the heat.

“Yahoo!” I yelled when I flew to the surface.

I wished that I could do that again and again and again. Instead I explored the sun. Through the suit, I could see the light and heat particles. They were so full of light that I couldn’t believe that on Earth you couldn’t see them. I could’ve stayed there for hours and hours, but I had to leave almost too soon. I wanted to see more particles. The particles were much better than the weird grownups. I wished that I could stay there forever, but too bad that I couldn’t.

Suddenly, I heard something say, “Hello.”

I nearly wet my pants. It was an alien. It looked surprisingly human, but no other human has gone to the sun. It was weird, but it wasn’t something from the weird grownups because they weren’t that smart. (For the grownups that are reading this, yeah, I really said that, but it’s true. Grownups are naturally stupid and weird.) It wasn’t that surprising, because I’d seen many crazy things. I went to Mercury to see if I could make another remark about grownups being stupid. There were a lot of craters, but I didn’t even need my fire protection. I found a lake of good drinking water. This was proof that grownups were not that smart after all. They were easy to fool. Their robots had a lens that made them see a desert. They were very gullible. I wished teachers were that gullible with homework. Actually, I take that back. They forget that they’d given it and they gave more. Now, grownups couldn’t deny that. They should go to jail. It certainly was a crime to abuse kids with homework. Abuse was a crime! They couldn’t deny that, could they. Recesses were abusively short, and school was abusively long. There were twelve months in a year, and there were ten months of school. Horrible! Why weren’t there six months of school and six months of vacation. That was also abuse. I went next to Venus next to clear my mind of grownups. Venus helped. It only helped because Venus was so boring. Or maybe because nothing ever happened. Wait! That’s just the same thing.

Next, I went to Mercury. At Mercury, I had a close call. Grownups were there, and for all I knew, they were still there. I decided to play a trick on them. I danced in front of them and put blindfolds on their faces. They were probably still swiping at the air. It reminded me of my friends doing my boring homework. At home, I spent my time reading or exploring. At least I brought my books. I still liked the Harry Potter books. The people at home thought that I was crazy to like books. I didn’t miss them at all. I definitely didn’t miss the homework. I hated homework, but who didn’t?

Next came Venus. It was very, very hot. You thought the sun was hot? Go to Venus! I was protected, so I wasn’t affected, and neither were the aliens. They were made of fire. (They also agreed that grownups were too much trouble.) They could talk and do everything that humans could do, as well as the things that they couldn’t. They were good friends, so we kept in touch.

I went to Neptune next. It looked cold, and it was just as cold as a snowstorm, but without the wind and snow. Those aliens were made of ice. Their sad, surprised faces reminded me of my teachers when they realized that I hated their classes. It just showed how crazy grownups were. I didn’t want to think any more about grownups. The aliens gave me drawing paper, since I left mine at home. I drew croctupuses and illigels for them. A croctupus was an octopus and a crocodile. An illigel was a lion, a snake, a butterfly, a cat, and an elephant.

I visited the rest of the universe next. It was really hard to go to another solar system. You had to run through the portal before it disappeared. It took me eight tries to make it. I visited a planet that I named Planet Chocolate because it was made of chocolate. As soon as I bit off a piece, it grew back. There were chocolate aliens. Everything except me was made of chocolate. The aliens gave me a bucket of everlasting chocolate. It was the best planet.

Next, I visited Planet Cheese. It was made of cheese, stinky cheese. I held my nose the whole time without even visiting the aliens. Then, I visited Vanilla Planet. It was made of vanilla. Of course the aliens were made of vanilla. They gave me a bucket of everlasting vanilla. I was pretty sure that Cheese Planet was the only disgusting planet. Next up, Vegetable Planet. I made a mistake. That was a disgusting planet. I spent about two seconds there. I hoped that the next planet would be better, and it was! It was Cotton Candy Planet. Yummy! They gave me a whole box of everlasting cotton candy. After that, I went to Lollipop Planet. The lollipops were delicious. I loved the chocolate lollipops. I got a lot of lollipops. Next, I went to Eclair Planet. It was one big eclair. It had a lot of cream. I got so many everlasting eclairs. I loved it! Next up, Macaron Planet. It was made of chocolate, vanilla, caramel, and so much more. The best part of each planet was getting the everlasting candy. After that, Ice Cream Planet! That was the best planet yet! There were so many flavors! I took most things from there. Then came Cookie Planet. That was a flat planet. It was a giant chocolate, chocolate chunk, sugar cookie. When I got my loot I started eating the everlasting cookies right away. They all smelled fresh, right out of the oven, and so did the planet. I couldn’t help it. To stop my mouth watering, I went to Planet S’more. (I didn’t want to offend them.) I thought that this solar system should be called the food solar system. Though Planet S’more was so mouthwatering, it was the best planet ever! The marshmallows weren’t too dark or too light. They were toasted to perfection. The chocolate wasn’t too syrupy or too hard.

Next, I went directly to Planet Fruit. It had all kinds of fruit. All of the fruit was in season all year long. The fruit that they gave me would never spoil, and it was everlasting fruit. After that came Planet Gummy. Everything was made of gummy. Yummy yummy! Hey! That rhymes. The people were even made out of gummy. It was the first planet I had gotten up the courage to talk to the aliens.

“Hi,” their leader said, “You are the first visitor. Sorry it looked deserted. We were afraid a grownup had come.”

“Nah, grownups aren’t that smart,” was my response. “Don’t forget that.”
“Won’t,” they promised.

Then, suddenly, a little boy asked the leader, “She help us?”

“With what?” I asked.

“With war.”

“A war with who?” I asked.

“With Bob,” they said.

I screamed. Bob was the name that struck fear in everybody, everytime, everywhere.

“Is he the B… B… B… Bob?” I stuttered.

“Bob. Real Bob.”

“I’ll help,” I said, trembling.

I soon learned that Bob put the poison in the gummies food that prevented them from growing back when bitten into. After that, he bit them. That was why they were scared. Bob was a grownup. Now do you see why I was so prejudiced against them? And it was not just Bob. It was all of them. Teachers especially. The homework. Anyway, enough about grownups. We would have a war across the galaxy. We would beat the legendary Bob. I just thought of something.

“Bob and his accomplice?” I asked.

They answered, “Bob accomplice.”

Bob’s accomplice was Pink Fluffy Unicorn. The last time they were heard from was when they danced on rainbows. They were brave. Very brave. I wouldn’t dare fight Bob. I was crazy. So were they. We were going to warn the other planets. They wouldn’t be surprised. Maybe they would help. I did it. The other planets would help. We had an army. We would beat Bob!  Bob fought with boxes of textbooks. Scary. We fought with everything we had. I nearly got hit! We were beating him back. We saw him wetting his pants.

Suddenly, he shouted, “I surrender!”

We won! The shout we gave was so loud that we fell.

We shouted, “We beat Bob! We beat Bob!”

After, I asked, “Can I move to S’mores Planet?”

The answer was, “Yes.”

The End


Afterword

I wrote a letter:

Dear Mom and Dad. I live on S’mores Planet. I will never do my homework or brush my teeth. Or brush my hair. If you care. I most certainly don’t. Just in case.

Love, 

Universe


Dragon Time (Part Two)

In New York City, Maria and the dragons were fooling around in Maria’s new room. They were making a mess and knocked a mug off a dresser, and it was a mug that Maria hated, so Maria was okay with it. And then they burned the dresser for fun. Nothing was in it, so Maria was okay with it. She knew that the dragons liked breaking stuff.

When the dragons were about to break her bed, she said, “No! That’s my bed!”

The dragons said, “Fine!

They went into the kitchen, and then Maria heard screaming. It was the cook! The dragons made her omelette burnt. Then, she had to make bacon, and when she left, the dragons cooked it for her and shoved it on a plate, took it to Maria’s room, and started eating. They snuck a bottle of beer into Maria’s room. Maria knew the dragons loved beer, so she was okay with it. The dragons drained the bottle very quickly. The dragons then trooped back down to the kitchen. They grabbed a jar of jam, took some pancakes, and trooped back up. And they gobbled them down. And then they drained up a whole jar of jam.

Maria was like, “Guys, what are you doing?”

And just then their tails were disappearing behind the door. Then the cook heard someone screaming. It was Maria. The tails had closed the door, and she heard the lock. And then she heard it again. When she tried to open the door, it opened smoothly. Then Maria heard someone screaming.

The cook was yelling at the dragons. “Bad dragons! Bad dragons! No beer for you!”

Then they heard something being scratched. It was the dragons scratching at the walls. Maria went to the wall and sighed. The dragons had completely ruined the wall. Then the earth dragon trooped in and fixed the wall. He used his mind to transport himself to Maria’s room. Then he flew out the window and circled over the city doing what everybody desired. But when somebody needed a shower, he used his mind to bring the water dragon into the house, and he gave a shower with nice and cool water. When somebody needed some quiet, he made earmuffs and put them around somebody’s ears. And when people were building a building, he always used his mind to make it spring out of nowhere.

Wowy made cars appear when somebody needed to go somewhere, and he delivered mail. He came home and had some beer.

Maria said, “Look, I found something!”

She pointed to an enormous black egg. Then she hit it with a hammer, and a dozen little brown dragons came out. And they looked exactly the same as Wowy! Then all 13 dragons made a pink egg. When it hatched, a pink dragon came out. And then it made a cupcake go on to a plate. It also made a delicious steak.

And then Maria said, “Pretty cool, huh?”

No!” screamed the dragons.

Then Maria said, “Why not?”

They said, “Because we can do that!”

Then the dragon made an exact copy of Wowy. Then, it made an exact copy of the sun and moon dragons. Then it made a copy of their pet unicorn. Then it said that it could make things duplicate and it could make things appear. Then it made an exact copy of some ground beef. Then it made a really tall beer bottle appear. He did this process several times, and there were ten beer bottles. They also made an exact copy of dreamer and the earth dragon. It also made a copy of itself. Then there was an ultimate dragon battle… 

In the end, the pink dragon won. Once they finished, they duplicated all the bushes with the pink dragon. The pink dragon also sneakily made some apple trees appear. Then she duplicated them, too. Then she duplicated herself, and she made her second self go around duplicating everything she saw, except for living things because otherwise things would get mixed up. Then, the real pink dragon made an illusion appear and an obstacle course. She made the dragons go through it. Most of the dragons failed. Once they failed, the pink dragons made them appear in front of her and were disqualified from the second challenge. The others who succeeded went through the rest of the course. Eventually, there was only one left, the earth dragon. 

The pink dragon went to oppose the earth dragon. The last stage was a battle. They shot fire and water, and they used everything they had, until suddenly the earth dragon used his power which no one else had found out. The power was… 

Instant Death.

The earth dragon used his power, and boom, the pink dragon lay dead. And then the pink dragon dissolved into powder, and the powder melted into the ground. The powder then exploded out of the ground in the shape of an egg. 

It was an egg! Then the egg collapsed, and there stood a snake. (Do snakes stand?) Then the snake laid eggs out of its mouth.

And to the snake, Maria said, “Be gone!”

The snake walked away. (Do snakes walk?) Then the eggs opened, and there were many tiny pink dragons. But they were vicious and sinister! They started swarming, the dragons, except for one… that one grew and grew until it became the healing dragon! 

Maria ran toward it and told it to heal the others. The dragon healed them, and then he became invulnerable, which meant his skin turned to iron except for one spot. His weak spot was his toenail. And then it just so happened that the dragons attacked him in the toenail. And it so happened that the healing dragon ran. And then he flew away, the pink dragons after him.

Then he screamed, “Incoming!” and he flew straight into a hospital.

The pink dragons went after him, but he used his power on hospitals, and they exploded as soon as they got in range. And on that happy note, he flew back. And while he was doing his hospital thing, Maria found out the pink dragon’s weakness. The weakness was beer! It was weird because all the other dragons loved beer — that was all they wanted to drink. That’s why they couldn’t defeat the pink dragons with their own weapons. And it was sad because they had beer. 

Only one dragon was left, and he charged. And then Jack had a brilliant idea.

“Burrito fight!!!” he yelled.

They got out frozen burritos, defrosted them, and hurled them at the pink dragon. The pink dragon dodged a guacamole one with no problem, but then the salsa one smacked him in the face. He went spiralling into the air, and with a quick swipe from a potato one, he crashed down. 

Then for the final thing: the earth dragon hurled a pork one and made the pork burrito grow fists, a head, feet, and wings, and then it started punching the pink dragon, and it was a sumo wrestling fight in the air. And so the burrito faked left, and the dragon faked right, and then the burrito whirled around kicked the dragon in the face.

Maria yelled, “Yeah!” and then the pork burrito opened up, and a flying pig charged out and finished off the dragon by blowing beer out of its mouth.

And they flew back to Dragon Land and lived happily ever after. The end.

Not!

The pink dragon fell onto the ground, and the ground absorbed him. And there, the grass started singing. The earth dragon groaned and fell. The green dragon danced a jig and also fell. Then Jack extinguished Mark. Mark dried up Jack in the process. And then, all of them got back up and forgot the earth dragon’s power was instant death. It was actually knockout. So, they all got back up, including the pink dragon. It was the good one, not the vicious and sinister one. Then the flying pig became a pet. The pig started playing with the unicorn. And then the dragons played tag. The earth dragon made walls in front of the others while Wowy made them disappear. So they were playing tag, and Maria was playing with them. Then the earth dragon made bigger walls, so Maria couldn’t jump over, but he made weak walls, so she crashed through them. Then the earth dragon made them harder, so she couldn’t break them, but she tried to dodge them. But the walls just kept moving themselves in front of them.

Then the dragons raided the kitchen for some beer. The cook was nice, so she let them have it. Then they fried an omelette and ate it. Then she got mad.

Then a new dragon dropped from the sky and said, “Wh-at’s n-ext?”

And another dragon of that type dropped from the sky onto his head and said, “What’s next?” Then the dragon made a shield and threw it into Dragon Land. Then he said, “What’s next?”

Then the shield hit him on the head, and he tried to stay conscious as he said, “What’s next?” Then he passed out. When he was conscious again, he threw a sword into Dragon Land. Then he said, “What’s next?”

Then the sword came back and struck the new dragon in the heart, but nothing happened. The dragon said, “What’s next?” Then the shield slammed him in the face and killed him.

Then the dragons drank some more beer because the dragons were being obnoxious. They were partying because he died. They didn’t exactly not like them. It’s just that they were being annoying. If anything, they wanted reinforcements for their army.

What the dragons didn’t know was that Maria was a cannibal monster who was going to overthrow the dragons once they took over the world.

Not!

Actually what the dragons didn’t know was that the dragons they killed were very annoying but had extraordinary powers. Their powers could even heal death. The powers absorbed into the ground, and then the ground could heal death. But it could only heal those dragons. It healed those dragons, and then they became actual earth dragons as the earth had their powers. And they had the earth’s powers. Those dragons again began to be annoying, but when they got mad, they rose evil enemies from the ground. And then they had to defeat them again. The worst time was when they rose the pink dragons. They walked around trying to kill the humans (the pink dragons, I mean. Not the annoying ones). But one of the annoying dragons powers was making death. 

The dragons flew around, and the annoying dragons also flew around. When the annoying dragons saw someone, they pestered them by throwing rocks, and then when they wanted someone to come back from the dead, they made that someone come back. Afterward as a sacrifice, they killed that flying pig. But after, it blew beer in their faces. But before it could reach their faces, the water dragon manipulated the water and the beer to make it rapid fire machine gun mode at the pig. The pig got soaked, and then it ran toward the wall and slammed its head into the wall. Then the dragons flew, and the fire dragon barbequed the pig. They killed the pig, but the annoying dragon made the pig come back to life. The dragons walked away, and they lived happily ever after. Not!

Then an army of vicious snakes, which could fly, attacked. They fought them, and they got bitten, but it didn’t affect them. After the siege of the snakes, they partied… not! Another army of snakes attacked. These had a different weakness. Not claw. Their weakness was unicorns. But they didn’t know that, and they did the same strategy that they did with the pink dragons. The healing dragon did his thing with the hospitals, and they did a burrito fight. But this time they were pizza burritos. A pizza burrito the size of a grenade hit the army of snakes and exploded. Pepperoni flew through the air, blinding the snakes. The snakes slithered around, bumping into each other, and then Maria figured out the weakness. She got out a regular burrito — it was a pork burrito. She made the dragons breathe on it and… she threw it! It landed in the army, and a unicorn charged out. The unicorn romped around until all the snakes were dead, and that was what the dragons called The Siege of the Snakes.

And then they lived happily ever after… 


The Murder Mishap

Clarice was running up the stairs of the old abandoned building. Suddenly a dark figure jumped out of the blackness.

“Hands up!” His voice shattered the darkness.

Boom! He had a cannon, too. Clarice fell swiftly to the ground. It was the end… 

William turned on the light. He looked at his witness, Arry. “Where were you last night?”

Arry looked startled. He was sitting in the chair across from William. “You know where I was. In the building.”

A smile crossed William’s face. He loved it when a case came together, and he was the detective.

Arry looked nervous. No surprise there. He had just seen a murder yesterday.

“Yes, but what were you doing there?”

Arry started sweating. “I was… sightseeing… because… it’s for school… ”

Sweat was trickling down his neck. He suddenly got up and ran out of the room.

“Poor kid,” William muttered. “He has no idea what’s going on.” 

William walked down the moonlit street. He sighed. Why can’t things be better for me? he thought. If I just had something nice in my life… It would be okay. My job is hard. I don’t have any family. I just need something good.

Arry was pretty scared. He sat down at the kitchen table and waited for his dad to come in. But his mom came first. She was dressed in a pink overcoat.

“Arry, I’m going out tonight. Your father is on a business trip, so be good. He’ll be gone for a week. I might not be able to see you. Be responsible, okay?”

Arry sighed and heated up some leftovers. His mom left and slammed the door.

Mr. Davies sat in the van. He was leaving his home on a business trip. He thought about his son, Arry. Then he thought about the success of his latest… recreation. He smiled. “So I murdered Clarice. Amazing. I have also left my home on a business trip. I don’t care. This isn’t even my real job! I’m crazy!”

William sat down again across from Arry. “So, Arry, can you tell me, what were you doing last night?”

Arry sighed. He didn’t want to give his game away. But his dad was away and didn’t really like him anyway. So it wouldn’t hurt… 

“William, my dad is the murderer. I can’t tell anyone. But I just… ” Arry burst into tears and dashed away.

That was unexpected for William. William had no idea who Arry was or who his dad was. So this wasn’t much of a clue. He sighed. “Nothing turns out right for me,” William said to himself. “I need a coffee.”

Mrs. Davies sat on the plush chair in the library and sighed. She pulled her favorite book out of her handbag. Even as she read, her mind drifted elsewhere. She was sad about her husband, who was leaving them without saying goodbye. She was worried for her son Arry, who was only ten and left alone. She slammed down her book and walked out.

“I need a break,” she told herself. 

Outside it was raining. William walked into a cafe and ordered a coffee. He sat down and started sipping. Then something caught his eye. His gaze traveled to the door, where a young woman in an attractive pink coat was walking in, complaining about the weather. Wiliam leaned in close to her and started to sweat. He walked up to her, got up close and personal — then coughed, unexpectedly.

“Oh, well ex-kee-yooz me,” she said.

Everyone there laughed. William felt his face turn red. He sat down feeling angry at himself.

“This was my big break!” he told himself. “I can’t ruin this. I still have my ace in the hole.”

So, William gathered up all of his courage and walked up to her again. He started feeling nervous and blushed.

Mrs. Davies looked at the man with disgust. He had coughed in her face, for goodness sake. But he was young and charming. Give him a chance, she thought. She smiled at him. “Hello, charmer. Did you remember your tissues this time?” She knew that telling a joke was a good way to be friendly. But this guy didn’t look so happy. He looked worried, embarrassed even. He smiled at her hopefully. She laughed and said, “So, you want a piece of me, hmmm? I think that can be arranged. 

Mr. Davies was sitting in the back of the van. He was a crazy person. So he almost didn’t notice when his cell phone buzzed. It said: You have a message from #AriannaDavies… click here to read. Mr. Davies clicked it. She had written: You need to come back ASAP srsly! No detours srsly!

“So my old wife is up to something?” he muttered. “I wonder what this could be.”

Arry picked up his head from the kitchen table. The sound of his mother’s high heels, click clack, had woken him up.

“Mom? What’s going on?” he asked.

“Shhhh, honey,” she soothed him. “Go to bed. Your father and I just need a little talk with each other.” She led him up to bed.

Arry was confused. His dad was here?

Mr. Davies looked across the bed to his wife. She said she needed to talk to him.

“It must be something big,” he reasoned to himself, “because I came from half across the country in Oregon.”

Mrs. Davies looked at him seriously. “I need to talk to you about us,” she began. “I… met a guy. I like him. He likes me too. A lot. You… I don’t think you are the most devoted husband. So I want to marry him and you… you and me can end. For his sake and mine… I’m sorry. But this is my choice.” 

Mrs. Davies was very hopeful. She looked at her husband. Tears were almost forming in her eyes. She looked like a begging child.

Finally Mr. Davies nodded. “Sure, I don’t care,” he said, willingly.

William sat down in the hard chair. “Once again, Arry.” His voice struck the silence. “What were you doing that night? You have told me your dad was a murderer. I take it you were at the crime scene. But is there anything else you have to tell me? Anything at all?”

Arry shivered. He looked worried once again. He took a deep breath. “He’s not my dad. They’re divorced, and no one wants the kid. I’m a nobody to them… Wahhh.” Arry was crying very hard.

William frowned. There must be something I can do, he thought.

Mrs. Davies and William Davies walked out of the real estate company. By chance, they passed the orphanage. A sad Arry was sitting by the window.

“I feel bad for him,” William told her.

“Make your move, then, William,” she told him.

They walked in.

“Excuse me,” said Mrs. Davies to the manager. “We are the Davies couple, and we would like to adopt Arry?”

The manager looked surprised but willing. “Of course, ma’am.”

They walked out a happy family.


Laura on 318th Street

Prologue

Laura Wilder Ingalis stared out of the car window. New York City was so busy and packed, while London was much quieter. Laura decided that she liked her old home much better than this one. She adjusted the strap of her seatbelt and squeezed her suitcase with her legs. Laura’s suitcase was turquoise with lightning bolts embroidered with her initials. She took it wherever destiny took her (or, erm, wherever her foster parents lived), and it was caked with memories. She glanced at the driver, but he kept his eyes on the road.

“How much longer?” she pondered out loud. The driver didn’t answer right away.

“About ten minutes,” he slowly responded.

Her shoulders sagged. The driver was about 50 years old, judging by his beard, which was covered in gray. He wore an old brown romper with a red and black checkered shirt underneath the dirt colored overalls. The Jeep he owned was the same age as him and was groaning with every right turn.


Chapter One

When the driver announced that Laura had arrived, she was ecstatic. Then the driver took out her folder of records, and her grin turned into a sour frown. That record held all the things she wanted to keep secret. All the things that had happened to her and by her. All of that important information slipping through her fingers, and into theirs. Yes, she did not like that manilla folder. Not a bit. The chauffeur of some kind opened the door, and Laura stepped out. Outside was a little restaurant called Delilah’s Diner. It was a small brick house with a door that jingled when it opened. On top was a red brick house with two little windows perched in the wall. Her gaze shifted to the narrow hallway in between the restaurant and the cheery bright green house next to Delilah’s Diner. 

“Well?” the driver asked. “Come on!”

Laura grabbed her suitcase and ran after him into the restaurant. Her brown hair flowed behind her as she ran across the street. A strong gust of wind sent chills down her back. Then she jumped onto the curb and rolled her suitcase into the restaurant with her. The door opened with a creak. Laura jumped. The inside of the restaurant was not that different from the outside. There was a long drapery of white fabric above the doorway. She pushed through the drapery and entered the restaurant. It was a small shabby one, with wood planks as the floor. The walls were covered in peeling crimson wallpaper. There were tables crammed into every corner. They each had napkins and utensils and water glasses, but they were all empty. Laura turned around to face the door and saw that it was closed. She peered around, then suddenly noticed that the driver was missing. 

“Hello?” she said, her heart beating. She heard stairs creaking.

“Laura? Is that you? I thought you wouldn’t be arriving until noon!” said a female voice.

Laura moved forward, avoiding tables and dodging boxes until she came across a staircase with a woman standing on top. She smiled warmly. Her hair was pulled up into a messy bun, and she had on a neat black dress with a white apron tied at her waist. Her eyes were a deep blue and were weirdly familiar. The driver followed her down the stairs as she stepped down the stairs. She pulled her into a tight hug, and Laura dropped her suitcase to her side. She smelled faintly of cinnamon. 

She pulled away and said, “I’m Murial. You can call me Miri. I heard your parents were umm… ” Miri hesitated. “Anyway, I have your room all ready for you, and you must be starving, so I will make pasta or something for lunch. Is that okay? Here I’ll take your bags… ”

Laura found it easier to nod to all Miri’s questions and say as little as possible as she followed her up the squeaky stairs. When she entered the next floor, she was surprised. It was much neater than the down stairs. Miri recognized the look of shock on Laura’s face and explained.

“We own the second floor. Mr. MaCaya owns the restaurant. I work here, and every morning I come downstairs and wait on all the people, which isn’t a lot. If you can’t tell, we aren’t getting that much mon — ” She stopped speaking for a moment, and Laura’s head shot up like a rocket and looked Miri right in her sad eyes.

She shook her head and walked down the hallway, Laura at her heels. She gazed around. The walls were a robin’s egg blue and basically, you entered the stairs and there was a room a few feet before you had a room, which Miri told Laura was her room, and then on the other side of the room was another room which was the bathroom. She took her to the last room in the hallway, and here Miri informed Laura that this was her room. She opened the wooden door and pulled along her suitcase. Caplunk, kerplunk, went the suitcase as she slid it over the cracks in the entrance. She looked around. The walls were a beautiful yellow, and a large window was opposite to where she was standing. She gasped. There was an old fashioned bed with blue sheets and a blinding white pillow. There was a fancy patterned rug on the floor and a large desk with a blue spinning chair. There was a lime green beanbag chair right next to the bed. This room was much fancier than Mr. Joseph T. Pennyworth’s “room” as he called it. Laura thought it was a retired broom closet. The curtains were covered in little hedgehogs, and Miri parted them and switched on the light.

“Why don’t you put that suitcase on your bed? We will unpack your things later,” Miri said cheerfully.

“Okay,” she said and obliged to heaving her almost bursting suitcase on her bed.

When she plopped it down, a cloud of dust flew into her face. Laura coughed. She heard the stairs creaking and knew that Miri was going downstairs. She turned around and walked down the stairs toward the dining room. On the way there she crashed into a large man squished into a tiny tuxedo. He turned around. His face looked so much like a pig that Laura snorted and then tried to cover it up with a cough but failed miserably. 

“Hello,” the man said with a forced smile. Laura immediately recognized this person. It was Mr. MaCaya.

Chapter Two

That night, after a helping of bread and potatoes, Laura couldn’t sleep. She tossed and turned and tried the trick someone at her old school taught her, but it was totally useless. So she went downstairs to ask Miri for a cup of warm milk or tea, but came across someone speaking. Laura could barely make out the noise, and so the young girl crept quietly down the stairs, bent over the railing and strained her ears to hear the conversation. It was definitely Miri’s voice. 

“I know, I’m living off my savings now. It’s a shame really. He won’t let us tell anyone. Barely pays us a dime a day.” 

Laura suddenly felt a pang of guiltiness for eavesdropping. She ran up the stairs as quickly as she could and jumped under the covers. The next morning, she woke up tired. She suddenly remembered everything that happened that night. It all rushed back to her. She sat up in bed for about ten minutes, thinking and going over everything she heard in her mind. One thought came across her and stayed in her mind for the entire day. The young girl couldn’t stop thinking about Miri and that she was not getting paid. She knew that it was illegal of course. But because he was technically paying them, there was nothing Laura or Miri could do. Unless Laura made up a new law that he couldn’t pay his employees less than ten cents a day. It was just wrong. It wasn’t the way this was supposed to go. Miri should have been paid fairly. All the other people probably quit. Why didn’t Miri? It was a puzzling question.

I’ll start with what I know, she thought. Laura checked for her suitcase and saw that it had been unpacked. The curious girl zipped it open and found her secret pocket on the back. Unzipping it, she dug around for her notebook, and finally felt the familiar grip of her journal. She sighed in relief. Quietly, Laura tiptoed over to the window and opened the curtains, but it was still dark out, so Laura turned on the light switch which was conveniently located right next to the window. She slunk noiselessly back to her bed and jumped into the bed. She fished for a pen under the bed. Then she opened up to a blank space (which were scarce) and started writing:

 What I Know About House 365 on 318th Street

  1. It is home to Murial and me
  2. The boss is Boston MaCaya
  3. They barely have any customer

Laura stopped writing. Then, the answer hit her like a sack of potatoes. That was it. They had no customers, no money. They couldn’t afford to pay the workers, let alone the rent. Laura suddenly remembered a book she read about this. It was really funny, but this wasn’t because it was actually happening.

It was real.


Chapter Three

Laura had terrible sleep last night. It wasn’t just because of last night. It was the feeling in her gut that she was missing something. Mr. MaCaya was a liar and a thief. Why was she feeling differently about that? And, to push those thoughts out of her mind, she got dressed and thumped down the stairs, only to remember that the kitchen was on the one floor Miri could afford. She ran back upstairs, got momentarily lost in the hallways, and finally found the kitchen quiet. The table was covered in a tattered tablecloth, and the chairs were pointed in all directions. There was a bread basket that was left over from last night with a few pieces of half eaten slices of them lying alone on the table. Suddenly, a shadow rose from the darkness of the kitchen. It was large. It was tall. And it picked her up and put her in a sack. Everything went black.


Chapter Four

When Laura woke up, she found herself lying on the floor of a strange house. Her head was beaded with sweat. Her eyesight was fogged and cloudy. She rubbed the sleep out of her eyes. The puzzled girl looked around her. She was in a small cottage with wet walls that were caving in like a sand castle, but made of straw. There was a small chair and table in the middle of the only room in the house. The one window opened the dark sky into the cottage. Laura stood up from the floor. On the table, there was a small white scrap of paper. As she walked over to the table, she looked around, but there was nothing else to see. It was scary. The paper lay flat on the table. She snatched it up in her hands. It said:

This is the place that you will be staying in for the rest of your life. You have witnessed a crime, and you are willing to tell others. Your precious Miri will be nothing against me when I get ALL the money of the world. I will be in control. I WILL RULE THE WORLD whether you like it or not. The door is locked. You will never stop me, for I am the amazing BOSTON MACAYA.

Laura was shocked. She thought Mr. MaCaya was doing it for a reasonable reason. But he wanted to rule the world. Laura was the only one who knew the truth. But she would never get to anyone in time before Mr. MaCaya finished his plan. She would have to save everyone. The world was depending on her.


Chapter Five

Laura knew how to get out. The window, of course. But the thing she was worried about was actually getting back to her home in Wisconsin. This was Colorado. Toot toot.

“I got it!” Laura said. She would ride a train to Wisconsin. The problem now was how to catch a train. But, that was easily solved because there was one right outside the “House.” Laura ran outside, the note clenched firmly in her hand, and ran outside. She barely made it. Now, she was in a crowded train with no idea where she was going. Hopefully it was Wisconsin. Tweet tweet!

“Police coming through. Make way! Make way!” a gruff voice said. She looked up and saw a police officer glaring at her.

“Where is your parent, young lady?” he said. And Laura began. By the time she finished, the police officer said, “You are on the wrong train, princess!” Laura cursed under her breath. “I’ll take you home, and we’ll sort this MaCaya thing out.” Laura grinned. 

“Thank you, sir!” she beamed. And she was almost home.

WISCONSIN NEWS! 

YOUNG GIRL GAVE PROOF! BOSTON MACAYA ARRESTED! GIRL ADOPTED.

A young girl named Laura Wilder Ingalis saved the city! She was adopted by Murial Smith! See more on page 16!

The End. For now.


Princess Lou’s Adventure

Once upon a time, there was a princess named Lou, and she had one sister and one brother, and she lived in a castle in a place called London. One day, she went on an adventure with her brother, mom, and sister to an island called Wasabi Island. So they took their family’s royal boat. Once they got to the island it was already dusk, and so they all went into their rooms on the boat and slept until a bright light woke the mom up.

She opened her room’s door on the boat, and she said, “What are you?”

The thing said, “I am a good witch. Really, I promise, but my old best friend’s mom put a spell on me. I am really a good witch, so please don’t hurt me please.”

The mom said, “Oh fine, I won’t hurt you. But why are you here?”

The witch said, “I am here because the spell made me get trapped here too.”

The mom said, “What spell did she put on you?”

The witch said, “I have no idea.”

The mom said, “One minute.”

The witch said, “Okay,” and then there was a big cloud of smoke, and she disappeared.

The mom went and got her daughters and her son, and then somebody else came onto the boat.

He said to the queen, “I am really your husband. I just got trapped here somehow.”

All the children said, “Daddy!”

The mom said, “Now now, kids, we don’t know if it is really Daddy. So I am going to ask you some questions alright. Kids, go into Lou’s room and watch TV on my computer. Here is my computer.”

The kids said, “Yes, Mommy.”

“Okay now here is your first question, where was our wedding?”

“Here is my answer, at Sunken Gardens.”

The queen said, “Yes. Here is your second question, what is your mom’s friend’s dogwalker’s full name?”

“Here is my answer, Jessie Rose Robinson.”

“Correct,” the mom said. “Here is your third question. What is your sister’s boyfriend’s favorite color?”

“My answer is gold.”

“Yes, correct. Here is your fourth question. Where was our first date?”

“My answer is Daisy’s Diner.”

“Correct. You got all of them correct, so you must be my husband.”

She hugged her husband, and the mom said, “Kids, let’s go home now. But first say hi to Dad.”

They all said “Daddy” at once.

The dad said, “But who will drive the boat?”

The mom said, “I will.”

The dad said, “Alright.” 

So once they got home they all took a nap, and something woke Lou up. Surprisingly it was her brother and her sister, whose names are Dorothy and Charlie.

They said in childish voices, “Lou, there is somebody at the door!”

“Don’t worry, guys. I’ll get the door.” So she checked her phone because they had a Ring doorbell, and she checked the app, and it was somebody with a hoodie on that said anonymous on it, and she was freaked out.

So she said to her little brother and sister who were two, “Please go into your room or go into Mommy and Daddy’s room.”

They said, “Okay, Lou.”

So they went into their room and locked the door and watched their favorite movie on their tablet. So Lou locked all the doors and windows, including the courtyard. Lou wanted her mom and dad and sister and brother to be safe. The human tried throwing a brick at the window from outside, but it didn’t work, so he tried climbing over the fence. It didn’t work. It seemed there was no way of getting in.

She said to herself, “I only do this because somebody is forcing me to, and I don’t want to do it.” She sighed.

The next morning she checked her Ring app, and she was gone. So she called her best friend, Emma, and told her what had happened. But first Lou had to tell her parents what had happened. So she did. After that, she called her best friend Emma.

The end.

Jonas and Matthew

This book is dedicated to Jonas, my good friend and also a creator of Jonas and Matthew.

Hi! My name is Matthew, and I live with my friend Jonas in a mansion. We’ve got an arcade, a zoo, a water park, and an amusement park. One morning at our mansion we were in our arcade playing the Transformers game.

“Yeah! This is awesome!” said Jonas as we were finishing the hardest level.

“How about let’s play the Angry Birds game,” I suggested.

Soon we were at the Angry Birds game. In the middle of when I was playing, suddenly a crazy pig took up the whole screen! Jonas and I burst out laughing. Jonas laughed so hard that he fell to the ground, rolling with laughter.

That night it was Halloween, so we dressed up in our trick-or-treating costumes, so we could scare other people trick-or-treating. I was dressed up as a vampire, and Jonas was dressed up as a werewolf. We both hid next to our door and waited for some trick-or-treaters to come. First, a kid with a bunny costume rang our doorbell. Ding dong! The doorbell rang. Jonas jumped out of the bushes.

The trick-or-treater screamed, “Get me out of here!!!” and dropped his candy and ran away.

Then, a kid wearing a sheet with holes cut into it for eyes (which I realized later was a ghost costume) came up to our door and rang the doorbell. Ding dong! I jumped out of the bushes.

The ghost kid then dropped his candy and screamed, “Mommy!” and ran away.

After a whole night of scaring, we picked up all the candy and went inside our mansion to our room to check out the candy. We started eating the candy, but the pile in front of us just would not grow smaller. Then we started stuffing candy in our mouths frantically. Soon, all we could hear were the sounds of ourselves munching on candy. Suddenly Jonas had accidently ate some slingshot gum. Slingshot candy is a candy that makes you go crazy trying to get it out of your mouth. He chewed some and made a bubble. The bubble expanded until it was almost touching me from across the room and then shot back. Splat! All of the gum landed back onto Jonas’s face. After an hour of pulling gum out from Jonas’s face and hair, we got the mess cleaned up. Then I saw something in my bag. It was a soda bottle. Before I could take it, Jonas took it and drunk it all up.

“Hey! I was going to drink that… ”

Jonas spat out the soda. It was slingshot soda! Before I knew it, Jonas was chasing me down the stairs.

“Aghhh!” I screamed as Jonas spit all the slingshot soda on me.

“Sowwy bubby,” said Jonas. I got angry really fast. I started chasing Jonas around the room as fast as I could.

“Get back here!” I said.

Finally, after I stopped chasing Jonas, it was already midnight. I decided to have one last candy before I went to bed. I grabbed a random candy and opened the cap and drank it. Uh oh, I thought. I had drank slingshot soda. Jonas had realized that too, because he was already getting out of his blanket tent, ready to dash out of the room. Ptoooooooo! I spit out the slingshot soda all over Jonas.

“Why you little… ” said Jonas as he chased me all over the house.

An hour later, we finally came back to our bedroom and collapsed on our beds from exhaustion. It seemed like we had only slept for one second when our alarm clock started beeping. Beep! Beep! Beep!

“Hey!” I said as the alarm clock fell off of the nightstand and onto the floor with a crash.

“We need a new alarm clock,” groaned Jonas as he woke up.

We decided to turn into our animal forms. We had gotten the powers when we were born because our whole family had the same powers. My mom and dad and his mom and dad were very rich and could turn into animals, so they got enough money for us to have our own mansion and explore our powers.

First, we both turned into dogs. We snuck around town, looking at things from a dog’s eye view. Suddenly, a hand scooped us up and put us in a car.

“Hey, let us go!” I said, but I am pretty sure it came out as, “Ror, ror, ror!”

Jonas and I clawed at the door, trying to get out as the car drove away. (We could not turn back into our human forms because we could only turn back into humans in our mansion.)

Being in an adoption center is a lot worse than you think it is. As soon as we pulled up in front of the adoption center, I knew it was bad news. Outside the center, there was a rusty sign that said Doggy Doo-Doo Adoption Center. The inside was not any better. All of the dogs, cats, turtles, birds, lizards, fish, frogs, and other animals were buried under piles of dog poop and looked like they had not eaten in two days. When Jonas and I got in, I immediately started trying to think of a plan to get out. Then I had a idea! I told Jonas to get us out of the adoption center.

“First, let’s bark very loudly to attract the staff’s attention. Then, while they are distracted, we run away.”

After we made it a far distance away, we turned into snakes and slipped down into the sewers. We slithered in silence for one sewer snake day until we passed another manhole that was lined with muck and dirt. We slithered up into the sunlight.

The first thing I saw was that we were in a grassy field that looked like a savannah.

“What! Are we in Africa?!” we both said at the same time. We slithered back into the sewers.

Another sewer snake day later, we passed by another manhole. This time, it was spray painted with a lot of graffiti and smog was drifting into the sewer tunnel.

“Should we check out what is out there?” I asked Jonas.

“Yeah, I think we should see what is up there,” said Jonas. I knew what he was also thinking. It could be right under our mansion. We slithered up above the ground again… only to find ourselves wrong.

We saw that we were in a bustling city. Everywhere, smoke billowed. A truck zoomed down the road, almost smooshing us. A big wall loomed far in the distance. There was only one place this can be…

“What? We are in China!?” said Jonas.

“This is worse than before!” I said. We were about still halfway across the world from our mansion.

We retreated back into the shadows of the sewers and started slithering the way we thought our mansion.

Finally, we came upon a manhole that said Jonas and Matthew were here!We gazed up at the manhole.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” I asked Jonas.

“Let’s go!” we both said at the same time.

We emerged onto the street near our mansion, startling a demented chicken. “Bok-bok-bokao?!” it said angrily.

“I think we should be… running!!!” shouted Jonas as he turned back into a dog. I turned into a gecko and held onto Jonas’s tail for my life.

The demented chicken flapped its black wings and hobbled after us.

“Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!” I screamed from Jonas’s tail.

We jumped through the doors of our mansion at the last second as the demented chicken flapped and hobbled and rolled towards me.

After we got through the doors of our mansion, I sighed in relief. We were back in our mansion. Jonas jumped into the elevator and pressed the button which said Jonas and Matthew’s room in big letters. Ding! The elevator doors opened, and Jonas jumped out. With me still on his tail, he collapsed right in front of his bed, tired. We both slept, knowing that tomorrow would be a good day.