iStranded in a Submarine
Author's Note-To readers of my first story iNever Got Over You, yes, it does look like I'm losing interest in it, but I promise I'm not! I'm still working extra hard on the next chapter, but while writing it I keep getting inspirations for other Creddie stories (like iAm Alone? and now this one). I wanted to try writing an adventure story with this one (I have to give credit to my brother for thinking up the concept for this). I'm also finishing the next chapter of iAm Alone? and some drabbles for my Creddie poem collection The Beat of Your heart, so keep checking the stories for updates! Please read and tell me what you think. This is also my first story that's in the third person point of view.
I don't own iCarly or its characters. If I did, iSaved Your Life would have ended differently... ;)
Chapter 1~Phone Call from Dad
June 10, Tuesday, 2:34 pm
It was a warm, pleasant summer day in Seattle, and the Bushwell Plaza complex was more peaceful than usual, with most of its school-age tenants out enjoying the good weather while it lasted. All was quiet in the lobby, and doorman Lewbert was almost content with the state of things for once. With all those irritating kids having gone off to bother somebody else for a change, he was left to do as he liked-which happened to be taking a nap at the front desk, newspaper over his face, with a fan pointed at him at full blast.*
And it was, for once, very quiet in apartments 8-D and, uncharacteristically, 8-C as well. With her son out for the day, Marissa Benson turned her attention to other tasks she usually didn't have time for with him around-such as disinfecting the bathrooms, cleaning all the tables and countertops with strong chlorine bleach, and spraying pesticides in the bedrooms. Summer was here, and the environment was ripe for disease-infected insects like moths, lice, ticks, and other pests that could harm her Fredward. She wasted no time and let no surface remain unsanitary.
Even in 8-C, the apartment famously known for being the most chaotic and frenetic in the building (and the headquarters of the popular webshow iCarly, whose creators were responsible for most of the usual disorder), was for once calm. Spencer Shay was busy with sculpting his latest "inspiration"-a 7-foot-tall candy bar with sculpted candy such as gummy worms and lollipops, as well as other various knick-knacks sticking out of it. Carly and her co-producers (Lewbert would say partners in crime) and best friends Sam and Freddie had also taken advantage of the weather, and had gone to the beach for the day. So Spencer was left with an empty apartment in which to create his "works of art" with no distractions.
Almost none. Just then his phone rang once. Spencer groaned noisily. His hands were covered in paper-mache, paint and glue, and were stuck in the middle of the chocolate bar gluing in another bedspring. He ignored it and continued sculpting.
It rang again. "Aww, not now!" he moaned. Then he remembered the auto voice command Freddie set up on it for this kind of moment. "State the caller!" he shouted at the phone.
It replied in a toneless voice-"Call from: Capt. Steven Shay.".
"Ok-WOAHH HOLD ON!" he shouted, suddenly excited. His and Carly's father, calling from his military station! Such calls were rarely allowed, and couldn't be missed. He hastily dislocated his hands from the paper-mache chocolate bar mess, ran to the sink and sprayed water on them, then shoved his hands into a pair of hot mitts without bothering to dry them and grabbed the phone just as it rang for the 4th time. "DAD!" he yelled excitedly, then quickly changed his tone. "Oh hey, Dad! Thanks for calling…No, no, of course you're not interrupting anything. No, I'm alone right now. Carly and her little friends are at the beach. Yeah, she's fine, we're both doing good-great, actually. Yes, law school's great. How much longer? Uhh-well I'm at the top of my class as we speak-" he chuckled-"so yeah, next year's my last one. I know, can you believe it? So how's it all going for you?" He listened for a moment. "Cool, you're still stationed on that submarine? Awesome! See any exotic fish or sharks? No? Ohh-I see, no windows.. I mean portholes. Yeah so anyway…gosh it's been awhile since we heard from you. It's too bad Carly's missing out on this…wait what? Idea? You had an idea?"
He listened for a few moments. And suddenly, for once Spencer was totally speechless. His jaw dropped as he kept listening in awed silence, until on the other end his father said "So that's all-Spencer? Are you still there?"
Spencer got back his powers of speech. "Yeah! I'm still here Dad! But-oh my gosh, WOW! Like, you mean it? Would that general boss-guy actually let you do that? Let us?" He paused for the response. "Are you KIDDING? Of COURSE, we would freakin'LOVE it! That's totally amazing! Carly will be so psyched when I tell her! WOOO!"(he leaped in the air)"So yeah, okay Dad, I'll talk to that guy, General something, your commanding officer back home, to get us the boat…what's his name, General Earl Entwich? Cool…okay Dad I understand you have limited airtime. I'll let Carly know-yeah she won't care, she's gonna see you soon anyway…Okay so-ok bye, bye Dad, love ya too, bye." He hung up, then whooped some more as he began dialing Carly's number. "She's gonna LOVE IT!" he yelled.
Meanwhile, things were winding down at the beach. Carly was stretched across her beach chair, drowsily letting the sun dry her wet skin and add to her already budding tan, after her latest swim. She watched out of her half-closed eyes, as Sam, laying face-down in the hot sand, began heaping sand on her back, having finished off a large lunch that consisted of the whole bag of potato chips, 2 cans of Dr. Peppermint* soda, and most of the potato salad and chicken drumsticks in the large basket of snacks both Spencer and Mrs. Benson had packed. She rolled over and began packing herself in sand.
Carly pulled her sunglasses off her head and back down over her eyes. The sun was bothering them. "You know Sam, you're going to get a lot of sand in your bikini that way."
Sam didn't stop. "My suit's already full of sand anyway." She glanced up at Carly. "Remind me how you got me to wear these revealing strips of fabric you call a swimsuit again?"
"Your old bathing suit was way too small for you, and since you had to borrow from me and all I have is bikinis…" Sam rolled her eyes. "Anyway Sam, you should be happy about it. You've gotten a lot more curves over last year, and you really do look good in that suit. Unlike me-I'm probably always going to be skinny and-well, flat-chested." She glared at her petite frame in the red bikini with gold sequins she'd picked.
"I only agreed 'cause you happened to have one that wasn't all frilly or feminine. Who would have known you had a camo bathing suit…anyway, you're not so flat, you're just built differently than me. I'm all muscle and…stuff, but you're all small and girly and weak, that suits you."
Carly didn't look convinced. "I would still rather have your boobs and hips. Mine aren't worth mentioning."
Sam grinned. "Not true! You don't exactly need helping bras anymore. Freddie noticed, you know. And he seemed to like what he saw."
Carly blushed. "Sam..." She looked out at the ocean, where Freddie had ceased his fast-paced body surfing and was peacefully floating with his eyes closed, letting the water bob him up and down.
"He's a guy, and they notice that stuff. Don't tell me you didn't see the way he looked at you when you took your shirt off." Carly rolled her eyes and looked out to sea, and Sam resumed heaping sand on her dark green camo bikini. "We notice that stuff too. See that guy other there?" She pointed at a tan twenty-something taking off his wetsuit. "Man, that dude's got abs. And check out his biceps."
Carly didn't notice. She was watching Freddie walking in from the water, body-board in hand.
She wouldn't admit it to anyone, not even Sam, but she had noticed Freddie's new development of broad shoulders and hard biceps lately, and she'd found it hard not to stare when he'd taken off his shirt today. And now the sight of him coming in from a swim, tan, wet and wearing his thousand-watt smile, made her knees quiver with a feeling that came out of nowhere, that she'd been feeling a lot lately in his presence. Since he'd turned 16, Freddie had earned slightly more freedom from his mom, had stopped wearing the geekier items of clothing in his closet, and had adopted a more devil-may-care, flirty attitude, which had earned him a reputation as quite a catch among even the popular girls at school. It was obvious Freddie was no longer a boy-he was becoming a man, a pretty gorgeous guy at that, and Carly had begun having thoughts and feelings about him she never had had before, and couldn't really admit to herself, that embarrassed and even scared her a little. Yes, he was her ex-boyfriend, and had had an insane crush on her since the 6th grade (although he didn't anymore), but she'd convinced herself after they broke up that any feeling she had for him never existed, that she loved him as a brother.
But now-well, she thought he was adorable, handsome. Even kind of hot, and…sexy. For a tech-crazy geek.
Shut up Carly! she thought. She'd promised herself she wouldn't let those thoughts sneak into her head. So she shut her eyes and pretended to be asleep while Freddie walked up to them, and sat down in the chair beside her. "Enjoying the sun, mis bellezas de bano (my bathing beauties)?"
Sam groaned. "Don't you have an off switch for whatever makes you say stupid Spanish stuff? It's really annoying 'cause nobody else can understand you."
Freddie rolled his eyes and turned to Carly. "Anything left in the snack basket that Sam didn't eat? I'm starving."
Carly didn't say anything, she just moaned slightly and pretended to snore.
"She's not asleep, she's just pretending," said Sam.
Freddie chuckled and shook her shoulder gently. "What game are ya playing, Carly?"
"Hmm?" Carly said, pretending to wake up. "Oh, sorry. I just dozed off for a minute. What time is it?"He checked his waterproof watch. "Uh, it's 2:35."
"Not ready to go home yet," Sam grunted from her sand heap.
"Who said we had to go home? We have lots of time left. Thanks, Carly," said Freddie. Carly had fished two hidden grilled cheese sandwiches from her bag and handed one to him, taking a bite from the other.
"Hey, no fair hoarding snacks from others!" Sam protested.
"You ate almost everything else," Carly retorted. She and Freddie snickered. "Do you want your best friends to starve?"
"I have a high metabolism," said Sam, just as Carly's phone rang. She picked it up. "Hey big bro, what's up? Okay I think I can believe it-no Spencer he didn't call me-wait what? He just called you? What did he SAY?" She sat bolt upright. "Your dad called?" Freddie mouthed. She nodded and put her finger to her mouth as she listened.
"Well Spencer sounds excited. And loud," Sam commented. "Shh!" Freddie shushed. "Don't shush me!" she whispered.
"Spencer he DIDN'T! No you're pulling my leg! No WAY! Oh my GOSH, are you SERIOUS?" Carly shouted. "Okay, okay, I'll tell them! Shoosh yeah, I want to go are you kidding! That's so amazing! Okay okay I understand-okay bye now Spencer, bye!" She turned off her phone and looked at her friends like she was going to burst.
"WHAT'S AMAZING? WHAT'S GOING ON?" they yelled.
Carly leaped off her chair and screamed "You're never going to believe this! My dad won't be able to leave his duties for a visit this year, so he had an even better idea! Guess what!"
"WHAT! WHAT IS IT?" they shouted in unison. Everyone on the beach was staring at the three teens.
"I'M GOING TO VISIT MY DAD ON HIS SUBMARINE OUT IN THE OCEAN!" Carly shouted.
Thanks for Reading! I appreciate your opinions!
*Homage to iDate a Bad Boy-the ending of part 1.
*2-The iCarly canon version of Dr. Pepper, obviously.