Notes: Hey! We're The Holes Posse, and this is the fic that the six of us
wrote. The six of us being Aly, Heather, Kate, Elanna, Relina, Shira, and
Meta. You might know us Better as WheelerChick, Heatherchan, Eh, Man,
Slvrfng, Shyz, and CherryKoolAid. But anyway, here we are. We each wrote
different sections that I edited and made into chapters.
If you want to join the Holes Posse, talk to Aly. There are some
requirements and such, like you can't join just for the IF. But if you are
really interested in joining and posting at our Hangout Board, email
WheelerChick.
Have fun reading, and when you're done please review! Thanks, we all
appreciate it!
Keep spreading the Holes love!
((Notes and Editing done by Kate)) Disclaimer: We do not own Holes, as much as we would like to.
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Elanna was sitting at her computer one night, or, morning rather as it was a little past one. But as school was out for the summer, finally, she didn't really care. At the moment, she was having a very spirited MSN conversation with her friend about different hair - fluffy hair, actually. The hair in question belonged to none other then Holes' very own Zero and Zigzag. In between typing messages, she was also online on three different windows. In one window, she was browsing Fanfiction.Net for Holes fics - new ones, or old ones she may have missed. In the second, she was insulting a poser who was pretending to be Khleo Thomas. And on the third window, she was exuberantly adding messages to her favorite message board, the Holes Posse's Hangout, which was made up of fellow Holes fans from the aforementioned Fanfiction.Net.
As well, being the multi-talented person Elanna made herself out to be, she was also drawing in one of her many sketchbooks. The sketchbook itself had many drawings in it - almost half the book, drawing on two sides - but it wasn't as full as she liked it to be. Which was why she was constantly adding to it. Many of the drawings were anime, with some semi-realistic drawings as well. Although a lot of the characters depicted were from various fandoms, there were many original characters there as well, complete with mini-biographies. It was a joke Elanna often laughed to herself about, "Heheh, I've got a total mix of character personalities here! Someone might end up thinking I'm a skitzo!"
The picture she was working on was of Zero. She finished the last detail of his hair happily and put her signature down with a flourish. She then stuck the sketchpad into the back pocket of her jeans along with her pencil and eraser so that she would remember to bring them upstairs with her, if and when she finally went to bed.
Elanna stayed on for another twenty minutes or so before deciding to say goodnight to her friend, sign out, and finally go to bed. She signed out, told the Khleo poser to either f*** off or get some real proof, and prepared to leave one final message at the Hangout. However, as she was tired, her head knocked against the screen of her computer when she leaned over to type. She cursed but didn't get up because the keyboard made a somewhat comfortable pillow, and she was tired, so tired . . .
Elanna fell asleep right there at her keyboard, her unfinished message still waiting to be typed, and thoughts of logging out all but gone; because there was no one awake to think them. All the other members of the Hangout were still online, and Elanna was too, technically.
And something happened there, something no one ever expected. The dedication that the members of the Hangout put into loving the book Holes, the movie Holes, the characters of Holes, and fanfiction and fanart of holes triggered something. It was like the pure dedication became a being unto itself, a being that wanted to reward the girls for their dedication ... . . wanted to bring them together into a place where there were certain people they wanted to meet at a certain place.. . . .
No one knew quite what happened, or how, but when Elanna awoke, she found herself looking up at a bright sky.. . . . a bright sky that was in the middle of a desert, where there was nothing to be seen in all directions.. . . .
***************
Kate typed at her computer, head cocked to the side, and biting her lip angrily. She had tried to download the movie Holes onto her computer, but it hadn't work. Now she was mad because she was deprived of seeing the movie. For some strange reason, movie theatres didn't sell tickets at eleven o'clock at night so she had had to resort to her computer. As well as trying desperately to find some hint of Holes in the empty black screen that was her computer, she was typing messages to other devoted fans on the Holes Posse's Hangout board.
Sighing, she pushed her light brown hair out of her eyes and typed some more into the message she was sending to the Posse board. Some music was coming unceremoniously through her speakers, and singed aloud under her breath. For some strange reason remembering school assignments study notes was the hardest thing ever for Kate, but remembering song lyrics were like a second nature. She could hear a song once and know half the words. Kate had quite the song encyclopedia stored up in her brain, ranging from the hellishly-scary Barney song to Eminem. An ongoing groan from her classmates and friends was "Oh god don't get her singing".
Kate also delved into books, which had led to writing. While in one of her 'read every book in the house' moods, Kate had stumbled across 'Holes'. She had read it again and again, never tiring of it. She wrote a few stories on the book, after seeing the movie and having her creativity sparked even more. She posted her stories on Fanfiction.net, and had come in contact with other obsessed fans, which led to the Posse board.
Suddenly, Kate's vision started to waver. The room spun and became hazy, straight lines becoming fuzzy and transparent. Colors blended in with one another and rushed around her at a dizzying pace. The girl clutched her head, and squeezed her eyes shut. When she opened them again, she was kneeling on a hard, dry surface, her hands on her face. Slowly standing up, she stared around in awe at the desert all around her with the deep blue sky overhead.
Nothing was in any direction, except for a small black figure lying on the ground about 100 feet away. As Kate started to jog toward the figure, she stopped dead staring at the ground beside her.
It was a hole, five feet deep and five feet wide.
************
Elanna's blue eyes flashed open, trying to look around at her surroundings. She quickly closed her eyes again, moaning.
"Who the hell opened my window blinds?!"
She slowly opened her eyes, blinking against the sunlight and propping her head up on her shoulder. When her eyes were opened fully and she had taken a good look at her surroundings, she made a kind of squeaky noise and her head fell off her elbow.
Where she had expected to see the familiar pink and blue flowered wall- paper of her bedroom, she only saw brown sand. A lot of brown sand. It was also very, very hot. She let out a breath she hadn't known she had been holding.
"Ah, I get it now. I'm dreaming again. Why must my dreams always be so odd? Since when have I ever dreamed about a desert before? Whurph, crap, better stop talking to myself."
The girl shifted, still lying full-length in the dirt. "Okay.. . . . Why haven't I woken up yet ... . .?" She then had a thought. "Crud, this is probably one of those nightmares where I need to force myself to wake up! Must . ... . concentrate ... . . "
Elanna lay very still in the dirt, her face screwed up in concentration.
"Aw, screw it."
She picked up a little pebble on the sandy desert floor and scratched it against her arm. It hurt, and had left plenty of red lines too. Deciding the rock wasn't working, she tried pinching herself. That hurt, too. Slowly, the thought dawned on Elanna that maybe she wasn't dreaming. She stood, glaring wearily at the sand all around her - there wasn't anything else she could glare at.
"I'm dreaming . . ... I gotta be dreaming . . . ..If I'm not dreaming, why else am I in a desert?"
Elanna liked to imagine all sorts of things when she was bored, so suddenly, the idea of her being transported somewhere didn't seem so unlikely. But that didn't make being stranded in a desert any less scary. Collapsing to the ground, she started to babble about all the things she would need to actually survive in a desert.
"IneedwaterandfoodandaplacetogotothebathroomandthisreallysucksandIwannagohom eImissmycomputerwhyisthishappeningtomeImustbedreamingI'mdreamingI'mdreamingI 'mdreamingGAH! Get a hold of yourself, girl!" She cried, slapping herself in the forward.
Grimacing, she looked down and smoothed out her olive-green t-shirt with the caption 'Bugle Boy, Combo Girl' and an army girl's silhouette. Her expression changed immediately when she caught sight of what was crawling on her front.
Crawling on her stomach was a tarantula. Elanna leaped up immediately and ran around in circles, screaming her blonde head off before remembering that tarantulas hardly bit and when they did, it wasn't dangerous. Gingerly, she plucked the leg of the large spider, and with it's hairy body dangling, she tossed it a good distance from her and scooted backwards babbling incoherently again about 'a damn big hairy spider.'
Resigned to the fact that she actually may be stranded in a desert, she started to walk. She knew that when someone is lost, they should stay in the same area so that someone could find them, but she saw just how huge the desert was and figured if someone did come looking for her, they'd be able to see her anyways. She also knew that she should find a civilization, or at least water, so that she wouldn't dehydrate. At the very least, she hoped she would run into a single person, anyone, just so she wouldn't be alone, plus, perhaps they would have water ... . .
"What I wouldn't do to meet up with someone ... . . "
******
Kate stared at the hole in shock, then looked up dazedly. The sun beat down on her face and shoulders, making her wish she were wearing cooler clothing then her jeans and t-shirt. Like, a bathing suit. Or at least a pair of shorts. She saw the little black figure that had previously been lying down was now higher, as if in the position of someone sitting. Wanting the company of something - anyone, she started running towards the figure. Not easy in searing heat and jeans. Apparently the figure hadn't noticed her yet. As she got closer, she realized with surprise and a tiny bit of amusement that the person (for she had figured out that it must be a person by now) was dancing around in circles.
She was shocked by the hole she had seen. With those dimensions, and considering her surroundings, it almost reminded her of............. No. Couldn't be. She wouldn't let her thoughts turn to what she wished it was, because she knew how disappointed she would be if it wasn't. Somehow, on a subconscious level, Kate was convinced this was a dream. But she didn't stop to think about it, because in dreams you don't stop and think that it's a dream. You just wait it out. She was going to probably wake up soon anyway. She might as well make the most of it.
Coming nearer, she slowed to a walk. The person had blonde hair and was wearing an olive green t-shirt. By the hair, Kate figured it was a girl. As Kate came up behind her, she heard the girl mumbling to herself something about spiders and meeting someone. Kate laughed to herself at the pure ironic-ness of that statement, and unconsciously tied her hair up into a ponytail with an elastic around her wrist. She stopped about five feet behind the girl and put a hand on her hip, she was exhausted from running across a desert in unimaginable heat.
"Do I count?" Kate asked, her mouth quirking into a smile
*************
Meta was sitting at her computer in the dark. It was late, and she knew she should be getting to bed soon, considering she had an exam the next day. But she was too wrapped up in her 'multi-tasking' -- reading Holes fanfics and posting on the Holes Posse message boards. At one point, she was tempted to go upstairs and get her global binder and actually study, but then a particularly interesting story caught her eyes.
All her friends called her 'obsessed.' Meta didn't really care, but was annoyed when they didn't listen to her ramble on and on about Zigzag's fun hair.
Besides, Meta had met some cool people through Fanfiction.net and the Holes Posse boards that shared her love (coughobsessioncough) for Holes.
On that particular night, there was a horrible thunderstorm. Meta knew that she should turn the computer off, but that story was SO GOOD. All of a sudden, there was a loud crash of thunder. Meta jumped and looked out the window, but turned back around to face the computer as it started to smoke. The screen began to flash, and Meta got dizzy.
She woke up seemingly hours later. She rolled over to sit up, but then realized that she was not in her bed.
"What the......" She said aloud, as she brushed sand from her hair. "Sand?"
She stood up, and then realized that the sun was beating hard on her. She looked around for any sign of life. All she saw were...holes? It kind of reminded her of a book, but there was no way that it could be real. Once again, she scanned the horizon. This time she noticed something...two somethings. It looked like two people, one laying on the hot sand, and the other standing above her. They, like her, looked completely out of place and confused in this...desert. She watched as the one standing puller her hair into a ponytail, and then jogged over to join them.
"Hey." She said to the two. "How did you guys get here?"
*************
"I wish the real world would just stop hasseling me, I wish the real world would just stop hasseling me"
Rob Thomas, and his band Matchbox Twenty were being played through two two- inch speakers on Aly's computer desk. Her parents and brother had long since gone to sleep, leaving her the only one awake, in the house, hammering away at the computer. She was still dressed in the black Dickies, and a black t-shirt that read 'SUGAR RAY' on the front, displayed a picture of the whole band, with her favorite bassist Murphy Karges in a sombrero, and had tour dates on the back, of which she wore all during the day. Hundreds of bracelets and leather spikes were displayed on her wrists, and three ball-chains hung from her neck.
She pulled a piece of purple hair out of her eyes, pushed her small black glasses onto her face, and yawned.
"I miss ya Heather" she typed into an open instant message, and sent a picture of Magnet, her Hispanic buddy, from Holes.
She couldn't never quite figure out what it was about teenage guys from broken pasts trying to make something of their lives. But whatever it was, it made her passionate, enough to write her own stories from it, and create message boards from it, and just plain obsess herself with it.
"Too bad I'd never get a chance in hell with Magnet. Or Miguel Castro. Haa......that's fun to say. Miguel......Miguel.....MIGUEL FOR PRESIDENT! Heheh. He wouldn't date a punk like me." She put her hand on her face, and reminded herself of how crazy she was, and to chill out now and then. "I wish the real world WOULD stop hasseling me."
Aly glanced at the clock on the computer. 1:37 AM. Great.
She bent over to untie the black canvas Converse shoes on her feet that she neglected to untie earlier. As she did, she groaned at the piercing sensation from the pyramid belt that dug into stomach, and pulled one of the laces from the shoes.
Suddenly though, the sensation intensified, and the piercing sensation seemed to take over her whole body. Aly fell off the chair, Matchbox Twenty CD still being played, though Real World had ended and Long Day took its place. She moaned, laying on the ground, and closed her eyes, trying to think about Magnet to calm her nerves.
She felt much hotter suddenly, and she felt she might pass out or throw up, as it began to feel like she was falling. Then it all stopped, as Aly crashed onto dusty ground, and she lay in a black and purple heap in the desert.
*******
Elanna looked up very quickly as she heard a female voice saying, "Do I count?" with a hint of a smile in her voice. The voice seemed to be responding to Elanna's mutterings from before about wanting to meet up with something in this middle of nothing.
"Aha, it is a dream, see, here's my guide and they're gonna tell me what do and I'll wake up and never eat chocolate chip cookies and coke before going to bed and-"
"Hey, are you okay?" Kate interrupted the girl, eyeing her oddly as she struggled with her ponytail. "Would you open your eyes or something, you're freaking me out!"
" . ... . oh . . ... " Elanna mumbled humorously before opening her eyes. "Hi, are you part of my dream?"
" . . ... No, I'm real . ... . "
"Are you sure?"
"Very sure."
"Positive?"
"Do I have to prove it to you?"
"Yes, that would be nice." Elanna grinned, positive it was a dream after all, and that the dream-person trying to prove it was a dream would only accidentally make the dream go away.
Kate grinned, and, leaning over, pinched Elanna on the arm, hard, but not too hard.
"OW!" The blonde shrieked, batting Kate's arm away. After her slight moment of hysteria passed, she stared at Kate, her blue eyes very wide and her blonde hair somewhat tangled as it fell down her back. "You ARE real . . . I'm not dreaming?"
"No, you're not." Kate grinned, amused by the girl's actions.
"No wonder, DAMN did that hurt."
"Sorry, hehe .... . . " Kate mumbled, smiling widely with her arm around her neck, a typical anime pose.
"So if I'm not dreaming, that means . . .... AAAAAAAAGGGHHHH! I touched a tarantula! I TOUCHED ONE!!!"
"So that's what you were muttering about . . .... "
Elanna paused in her hysterical screaming, "Huh?"
"When I was over there," Kate motioned to where she had found herself, "I saw you and came over, and when I was walking, I heard you muttering about a 'damn big hairy spider' or something and wanting to meet someone . . .... "
"Oh. . ... " Elanna was silent. "You heard that?" She asked, grinning sideways at Kate.
"Yep. Pretty funny."
"I'd like to see how you would react if you just noticed a great big bloody spider just crawling all over you . . ..."
"Not happening sweetie, don't try it." Kate answered, laughing and flipping her now tied-back hair over her shoulder.
Engrossed as they were in their conversation, they stopped talking immediately when another girl jogged up, seemingly out of nowhere.
"Hey," the girl stated. "How did you guys get here?"
"Well, I was sitting at my computer--" Elanna started.
"Hey, me too!" Kate interrupted.
"Wait...You mean you didn't come here together?" Meta asked.
"Yeah." Kate said. "I kind of, landed here, and found her. She was already laying here when I got here."
"Oh. But do you know how you got here?" Meta asked again.
"Nope, no idea." The two girls said together.
"Hmmm.....That's strange."
"Yeah it is." Agreed Kate and Elanna.
"So ummm......" Meta began. "Okay, this is weird. If I'm stuck in a desert with people I don't know, I wanna at least know their names. I'm Meta.
"I'm Kate." Said the girl with brown hair.
"Elanna." Said the third with blonde hair.
"Okay then. Let's see. We're stuck in a desert with complete strangers, holes EVERYWHERE, and no other human beings in sight."
"Yeah, basically." Kate said. "Wait, look at all these holes. Doesn't it remind you of a book?"
The three girls looked at each other, amazed.
"Uhm........." Kate mumbled.
"A certain book," Elanna trailed off.
"Lets see, five by five holes everywhere, non-ending desert, tarantulas, and not a cloud in sight." Kate said, counting it off her fingers.
"Is it just me or are these coincidences kind of creeping you out?" Meta said, staring around at the desert.
"Well, all the evidence points to one thing," Elanna said. All the girls looked at each other and said one thing.
"Holes."
"So.........." Kate murmured. "Do you think we should start randomly searching for a Camp full of boys in orange jumpsuits?
Elanna started to giggle. Meta and Kate stared at her.
"What?" She asked. Then realized she was still giggling. "Oh. You forgot to mention really hot boys in orange jumpsuits."
"Oh." Kate said, arm on the back of her neck. "Good point."
Meta grinned. "And we're standing here why?
Kate grinned. "Point taken."
"One problem." Elanna said, and Meta and Kate turned and looked at
"Ah. Which way then?" Meta asked. her. "Which way? In case you can't tell we're IN THE MIDDLE OF A FREAKING DESERT!"
Kate stood on her tiptoes in her navy sneakers and peered out in every direction. She was about an inch taller then the other two girls, not freakishly tall but a bit taller then most other girls.
"I think there's a darker spot off that way." She pointed to the shadow in the distance. "That could probably be the camp."
"What you say we head in that direction, then?" Meta asked.
They started walking but then Kate suddenly stopped. "HOLY SHIT!"
"What?" Elanna asked, staring at the ground incase there was a tarantula or yellow spotted lizard.
"We're IN HOLES! Do you know what that means?" She asked excidedly.
"We're going to have to dig five foot holes?" Meta asked.
"Zero?" Elanna asked hopefully.
"The BOYS will be there!" Kate said.
"Oh yay, we're going to a camp full of thirty-somthing girl-deprived teenage boys." Meta said sarcastically, then laughed. "What are we waiting for?"
Kate and Elanna laughed, and kept walking. But then Kate started to talk again.
"Don't you guys get it? Holes! This is like, my dream! I love Holes so much, I'm even in a Holes Posse, I even-"
"Me too." Elanna cut in.
"And me!" Said Meta.
The three girls stared at each other.
"Wait, Elanna, arn't you........." Kate started.
"Celestra." Elanna finished. "And you Meta........."
"CherryKoolAid." Meta added. Elanna and Meta turned to Kate.
"And Kate, that would make you,"
"Man." Kate confirmed. They stared at each other for a while again, then Kate stepped forward and gave Elanna a slight hug, then Meta. "So we aren't complete strangers, then."
"Nope." Elanna agreed.
As they walked towards the camp, the Holes became closer together and
more orderly. Not so randomly dug in the dirt anywhere. As they got
closer, all three girl wondered how they got here, what it would be
like when they made it to the Camp, and whether anymore Posse members
would suddenly appear out of no where.
*****************
Heather sighed and ran a hand through her long, dark blonde hair as she studied the instant message windows that were amassing themselves on her desktop. All in all, there were about seven. She grumbled something and clicked a few closed without responding. She wasn't in a very talkative mood. Alyssa was going on about how Heather should come back to Ohio, and also sending pics from one of their favorite books-turned-movie, Holes. She grinned and turned up the volume on her headphones; Holes soundtrack blaring. The Holes Posse message board was minimized on her taskbar.
Rain pounded against the windows of her home, but she barely heard it. Her alarm clock read almost one thirty A.M., and she still hadn't bothered to change out of her baggy jeans and blue MegaTokyo shirt. Paper was strewn across her desk, along with several drawing utensils, a CD case, and other miscellany. An unfinished sketch sat in front of her, having been abandoned for the time being.
She was just about to key in a response to Alyssa's IM, when a particularly loud clap of thunder sounded overhead and her computer screen blipped off, along with anything else electrical in her room that was plugged in, leaving her in complete darkness. Her headphones, which were running on batteries, continued blaring as she jumped up suddenly and succeeded in bashing her knee on the underside of her desk.
"OW! Dammit, what the....."
She tried to maneuver out of her room to get to a flashlight, managed to trip over her chair, and land face first on the carpet. She squeezed her eyes shut and put a hand to her head.
"Oww....."
When Heather opened her eyes, it was no longer dark, and it was no longer cool and comfortable, like her room. She was, in fact, lying on her stomach, in the middle of what looked like a desert. She scrambled to her feet, eyes wide. Dirt, dust, sand, and more dirt lay in every direction. She began to panic, but paused as she saw a figure staggering to their feet not six feet from her. This only alleviated her panic for a moment as recognition of the figure came to her.
Red and blonde hair, spiked. Black t-shirt, baggy jeans, red sneakers. The tall, lanky boy straightened, muttering obscenities and turned his green gaze on her. She did the only thing any logical person would do.
She screamed.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE!?" she demanded, starting to back away slowly. "You don't EXIST in the real world you live in my head you can't get out you're just my split personality and what the hell am I doing in a desert with yooouuu!? Where am I?!? I want to know what the hell is going on here!"
The boy grinned. "Oh, d'you always have to be so dramatic?"
"Landis..... you're standing in front of me. I THINK I HAVE A RIGHT TO PANIC!"
Landis shrugged and looked around. "Man, I'm having the weirdest sense of-- "
"--déjà vu..... I know......" Heather wrinkled her nose and squinted, starting out on the horizon as if she stared long enough, she could cause some sort of sign of civilaztion to appear.
"Uhh, who's that?"
Heather followed Landis's gaze to see someone trudging over to them. Purple hair, Sugar Ray t-shirt, dickies, black glasses... no way. It wasn't possible.
"ALYSSA?!?"
Lyss squinted for a moment, then her eyes widened and she ran to Heather and practically tackled her. "OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD!!! WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE!? WHERE ARE WE!? I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU'RE HERE!! AAAHH! OH MY GOD!!!"
"Lyss, Heather can't breathe."
The punk girl swiveled her head to shoot a retort at Landis, but her jaw dropped in shock. "W... ..wha..... Landex!"
************
Kate, Elanna and Meta couldn't actually see the Camp yet, but they did notice how the holes appeared more and more, as well as more orderly. Suddenly, Elanna stopped dead.
"What is it, hun?" Kate asked concernedly.
"Well, we're pretty sure that we're in Holes, right?"
"Yeah . . ... " The two other girls trailed off, wondering what the odd blonde girl meant.
"So we'll find Camp Green Lake, right?"
"Right!" Meta said exasperatedly. "We just talked about this, remember?"
"Yeah.. . . . " Elanna said slowly. "But, what if we're not in the right time?"
Kate stopped walking and turned around too, facing Elanna. "What do you mean?"
"Okay, let's say we find the camp, but when we get there, if we get there, the guys we want aren't there? What if we came here before or after our regular D-Tent guys were here?"
"WHAT?!" The other girls shrieked.
"You mean we might get here before any of the guys were here? Or after all the guys leave? But that would SUCK!" Kate complained.
"Yeah! I wanna see Ziggy at the very least!" Meta complained. "How are we supposed to know whether this is the right time?"
Elanna was quiet for quite a time, thinking. "You guys were both at the Hangout the time we got here right?"
"Yep," they both responded.
"Well, I've got a theory... "
" ... " "Oh, I was supposed to elaborate?"
Kate and Meta almost fell to the floor at the simple yet stupid add-on.
"Well, it's kinda early for me to explain it now, and I only thought of it because it sounds like something I would write, but basically, I think it might have to do with us being Holes fans. I can't really explain it right now. Besides, I'm probably wrong."
Kate cracked a grin. "You mean like how you were . . . ahem . . . confused easily?"
"Shut up, you. Anyways, I think we will be in the right setting."
"But," Meta cut in, "There are still four possibilities, even if it's the right time. It could be before, with Barf Bag instead of Stanley, in the middle with both Zero and Stanley, third with Twitch but no Zero, and fourth where both Zero and Stanley are gone."
"NOOOOO!" Elanna wailed. "Stanley and Zero are my favorites, and there's only a one out of four probability they'll both be there!"
"Hey, remember what you said about us being Holes fans? Well, we're fans of Holes in the middle of the book, with Stanley and Zero. So, if you go by what you kind of said before, they'll probably be there." Kate said logically.
"Good," Elanna pouted, twisting some blonde strands of hair behind her shoulder.
"Besides, at the very least, the other guys will be there!" Meta said enthusiastically, her eyes dancing.
"I only want Zero." Elanna said.
"I want Zero too, though! Well, kind of," Kate said, putting her arm behind her neck again in her characteristic pose.
"Aly said we have to share at the Hangout, so I guess we'll share here too," Meta replied.
"That's fine with me, besides, it's not likely either of us can actually get him as a boyfriend!" Kate said, close to laughing her head off.
"Wouldn't that be weird dating a fictional character?" Meta said, grinning.
"Yeah, but a CUTE one! He looks good in orange!" Elanna screamed, drooling slightly and collapsing into a giggle fit at the spot. Meta and Kate both stared at her. Again.
"I'll try to stop doing that," she said; almost instantly sober. Kate and Meta sighed.
There was silence as the trio started walking again, until Kate interrupted it.
"Okay, so us two," she motioned to Elanna and herself, "are sharing Zero, so who do you want, Meta?"
"I dunno, maybe Ziggy, though I'll probably have to share him too."
"Share him with who? There's only three of us," Elanna protested.
"Well, weren't the rest of the posse online at the same time as us? Maybe they got taken here too . . . " Meta trailed off.
"If they're here, where do you think they are? Semi-lost like us? Completely lost? Maybe already chilling at the camp?" Kate asked.
"Well technically, I doubt they'd be able to 'chill' within a thousand mile radius of here," Elanna quipped.
"Wait," Meta cried. "Look over there!" She pointed. A great distance away, there were three upright figures that appeared to have their backs facing the trio.
"Ooh, let's go see! Maybe it's Aly and Heather and someone!" Elanna yelled, jumping up and down hyperactively.
"Maybe it's serial killers," Kate commented. There was dead silence. "I was joking."
"Well, let's go see!" The three girls ran in the direction of the figures, yelling loudly and hoping to catch their attention.
**********
"It's too hot, Lyss, get your arm offa me." Landis moaned and pushed the girl's arm off of his shoulder.
The purple haired girl just smiled at him though. "This is crazy!" she sighed, "Crazy go nuts!"
"Guys, his is bad. We're wandering around in the desert with no food or water or cell phones or-" Heather stopped speaking suddenly, ignoring Aly's and Landis's confused stares.
"Come back to Earf, Heaver," Aly waved her hand across her face
"Sh!"
She turned around, and looked into the horizon. Then her eyes rolled down. "Look! There's like....people are over there.....screeching....eep" Aly smiled. "Screeching civilization, AHOY!"
Landis rolled his eyes. "C'mon, lets just keep going forward. I don't want to have to deal with any more psychos. I already got you and Heath."
"No! Crazy insanely people are better than no people! Least maybe they'll tell us where the hell we are!" Aly grabbed his arm, and led him back in the opposite direction, toward the strangers. Heather fallowed.
"Or, Landex," Aly continued, using her pet name for him, "Psychos are better than a band of Abercrombie models." she laughed as Landis shuddered.
'What's with these Holes,' she thought, walking at a fast pace. 'There's like a zillion of em...everywhere.' The 'Dig It' theme song from the movie Holes began to run on a familiar loop in her head.
They continued to walk forward, dodging the holes left and right as the figured became much clearer.
"ALY?!" - "HEATHER?!" - "PIZZA MAN?!"
Aly stopped dead. Landis and Heather both crashed into her back. She fell forward, and Landis and Heather fell on top of her, and rolled off to the side.
"OW! BASTARD! LYSS!" Landis cried. Heather moaned, "wassat all about?" she rubbed her head.
"Heaver...." Aly whispered, "They know our names." Heather's eyes widened, and the three of them froze as another set of figures approached them.
"It's Aly, I know it," a blond girl whispered to another with light brown hair.
Aly leaned back on Landis. "Who are you?"
The three girls smiled, and the blond put her hand on her face, and then said, "I'm Elanna. This is Kate, and that's Meta," she pointed to the other two girls. "You are Aly, right?"
"No, I'm the Easter Bunny," Aly said with thick sarcasm. Landis and Heather smirked behind her. "Tell me how you know my name."
Kate smiled, "We're psychic."
"REALLY?!" asked Landis, standing up suddenly, "COOL!"
"No, numbnuts," Heather said, also standing, and Aly followed them both.
Elanna, Kate, and Meta were giggling as Aly narrowed her eyes.
"We have a theory," Kate said. They looked at her impatiently. "If you're Aly, and I'm assuming you're Heather, right?" Kate smiled at Heather, who in turn nodded. "And whoever you are," she glanced at Landis, "Then you're obviously fans of Holes."
"Umhmm, movie and book," Aly nodded, and pushed her glasses up on her nose.
"As insane as it sounds...look around you. 5 by 5 holes in a desert. Tarantulas. No clouds." Kate said.
Landis yawned. "But to the chase." Heather elbowed him.
"Dude," Kate said, "We're at Camp Green Lake."
Aly blinked. Heather's eyebrows rose. Landis snorted.
"NO SERIOUSLY!" Meta cut in, "If you were at the Posse board at the time you somehow appeared here! IT'S NOT IMPOSSIBLE!"
"You were at my board?" Aly asked, confused.
"Yeah!" said Meta, "CherryKoolAid!"
Aly looked to the other girls.
"Celestra," said Elanna.
"Eh, Man," said Kate.
Aly looked back at Heather. "Were you at the board?"
Heather nodded. "So maybe it's not impossible...." Aly grinned.
"So have any of you seen my Hispanic buddy?"
Kate grinned, and slapped her hand to her forehead exasperatedly. "Do any of you SEE the camp?"
Aly, Heather, and Landis looked around. They all shook their heads.
"Nope." Heather said.
"Nuh-uh." Aly added.
"No." Said Landis. "Can you?"
"Uhm." Kate looked embarrassed. "Actually, no."
"I see." Landis said, raising his eyebrows.
"There's a shadow over there. Does that count? And the holes are getting more......." Elanna said, searching for a better word.
"Frequent?" Kate suggested.
"No, holey." Elanna finished.
"What the hell?" Aly asked, confused.
"But we think we're heading in the right direction. " Meta pointed out. " We also have screwed up logic that says that all our favorite characters should be there. It's........tell them your screwed up logic, Kate."
"Okay." Kate said, starting to walk in the direction of the shadow with the rest of the group following. "Because we're all really big fans of the book in the time when Stanley, Zero, X-Ray, Squid, Armpit, Magnet and Zigzag are all in D-Tent, chances are that we 'appeared' in the desert when they were all there."
"M'kay, say what about how we got here?" Heather asked, staring at the girl.
"Dunno, ask Elanna." Kate said. The girls wearing baggy pants made her feel slightly out of place with her tight jeans.
"Whatever. How'd we get here?" Aly said to Elanna. Elanna just kept walking, staring at holes.
"Uh, Elanna?" Meta asked. Elanna kept walking.
"YO! ELANNA!" Kate yelled. Elanna looked up, startled.
"Sorry, what?" Elanna asked. Kate shook her head and pointed to Aly.
"How. Did. We. Get. In. The. Friggin. Desert." Aly said slowly. Heather laughed, and Landis rolled his eyes.
"Well," Elanna said, starting again on her theory, "Since we're all holes fans, somehow that must have made us appear in where we wanted to be so much."
"Okaaaay," Heather said slowly. "Sure, why not."
"You have no idea how hard that was to get out of her the first time," Meta groaned. Kate laughed.
"That's the lamest explanation I've ever heard." Landis groaned.
"Shut up, you." Heather said.
"By any chance do any of you just randomly carry a jug of water with you?" Kate asked the tree newcomers.
"Uh. No?" Aly asked.
"Darn, I left mine at home." Elanna said. Everyone stared at her. "Just kidding. Jeez!"
Kate rolled her eyes. "Hey, is it just me, or do you see that shadow becoming darker?"
"We must be getting closer." Meta said.
"Well, this should be interesting." Kate said, staring at the shadow that was Camp Greenlake.
Meta nodded.
The group of six continued walking steadily towards the shadow on the desert floor, the shadow everyone was feverently hoping would be Camp Green Lake.
Five people in the group were walking fairly normally, but Elanna, who
seemed to run on solar energy, was skipping. Skipping in the middle of a desert with four people she knew only through the Internet and one she didn't know at all.
"Goddamn it, it's hot," Elanna griped, suddenly stopping in mid-skip and rolling up her pant legs. Landis raised an eyebrow. "I always wear my pants like this," the girl explained. Landis shrugged; rolling his eyes and went back to his place beside Heather.
"Who is this Landis guy anyways?" Meta asked, as if he weren't even there.
"Lyss knows. You could say he's kinda my split personality. I guess he's here 'cause Holes isn't technically real . . . "
"Explain later?"
"Maybe."
Elanna was bounding in circles around him. " I like your hair," she giggled. Landis stared at her uncertainly, then decided to glare, hoping to scare her off. It worked, and Elanna dashed behind Kate.
"Zero better be there to protect me," she whispered laughingly to her.
"Yep. He can ward him off with his shovel à la Pendanski!" They both laughed.
Over the few minutes that followed, the gang of teenagers participated in the things teens did. Heather and Aly were chatting non-committaly, Kate and Meta were giggling and chatting about random things and Zigzag, and Elanna was making faces at Landis, hoping to freak him out and see if he'd glare again.
It was Heather who stopped first. She bent down to tie her shoe, and the rest of the group crowded around her, wondering if something was wrong. When they realized she was only tying her shoe, and not dying as Elanna had asked, they decided it was a good time to take a break. They rested for fifteen minutes according to the watches on Elanna, Kate and Meta's wrists and stood up again.
They all looked around for the shadow so they could get back on track and find the camp (and the lovely cool water stored there that would save them from withering in the hot desert air). They looked again, and again, and quadruple-checked after that. But they couldn't see the shadow.
As one, six loud voices wailed into the air, "DON'T TELL ME WE'RE LOST IN A FREAKING DESERT!!!!"
"How could this happen?"
"What are we gonna do?"
"We're all gonna DIE!"
"I WANT MY MOMMY!!!!!"
All of the girls began to panic. They all looked to Aly, as she had been the one who started the posse, and therefore had technically gotten them into this mess. Unfortunately, Aly was doing an Elanna, and trying to annoy Landis.
"ALY!!!!!!" They all shouted at once. The girls seemed to have a psychic ability to all yell at the same time. As they were all loud, Aly immediately snapped to attention.
"What? I SWEAR TO GOD I DID NOT STEAL THE COOKIES!!" She yelled.
"What????" Elanna inquired, and by the looks on everyone's faces, they were just as confused.
"Oh. Sorry. I guess i went off into my own world there for a second."
"Um...yeah. So. What are we gonna do?"
"What are we gonna do about what?" Aly asked. This caused several of the girls to groan, and Meta smacked the palm of her hand against her forehead.
"What are we gonna do about the fact that we are LOST IN A DESERT, and have no idea how the hell we GOT HERE!!??" Kate yelled. The group of girls (plus Landis) seemed to be yelling a lot.
"Oh that. Why don't we just follow that shadow?"
"The girls looked to where the shadow had been a few minutes prior, and miraculously, it was there again.
"'kay, that's just creepy." Meta commented.
"Where'd the hell it go in the first place?" Landis inquired.
"Wait." Kate said suddenly. "When Heather tied her shoe, we stopped and turned around to ask if she was dead, right?"
"Uh, yeah. You WERE there, right?" Aly asked.
"Shut up, I'm trying to make a hypothetical conclusion here." Kate snapped.
"Sorry," Aly said, crossing her arms. "Somehow though I ain't seenin' any
conclusioning." "She's doing mental conclusioning. You can do that, right?" Elanna asked.
"Dude, I don't think conclusioning is a word, but can I get back to what I was saying?" Kate asked exasperatedly. Everyone nodded. "Okay. Jeez. ANYWAY, we turned around to watch the amazing Heather tie her shoe."
"I kick ass at tying shoes." Heather commented randomly.
"Sure, why not. Anyway, SHE WAS TYING HER SHOE." Kate tried to explain.
"We know she's tied her shoe. It was awesome, but can you get to the point?" Meta asked.
Kate was on the verge of having a mental breakdown. "ANYWAY.......we turned around, and faced the direction we came. We then decided to take a break. And sat down where we were standing. Facing the way we came. Now tell me, when we got up did ANYONE look in 360 degrees?" Kate aked.
"No?"
"Nuh-uh."
"Nope."
"I didn't."
"Three hundred and sixty degrees is a circle, right?" Elanna asked.
"Yeah." Meta nodded.
"Are we supposed to count all the degrees separately? I mean..." Elanna got up and rotated about a millimeter in each direction. She finished. "I only got thirty." She commented.
"CAN I GET TO THE POINT??" Kate yelled.
"We've been waiting." Landis said.
"Yeah I know." Aly said.
"OKAY! My hypothetical conclusion," Kate said, with a glare at Aly, "Is that nobody actually looked in that direction." She pointed in the direction of the shadow. "Because everybody thought it would be in the other direction since they thought that was the way we were going."
They all started once more walking towards the shadow.
"Too.......hot............going..............to...................die....... ...." Elanna groaned.
Kate grinned. "Don't worry, think: Zero will be there with a nice big bottle of water."
"Or Zigzag." Meta said.
"Magnet, too!" Aly added.
And with wordless grins to each other, the holes fans kept walking towards the shadow.
Are we there yet?" Heather whined as she plodded alongside Lyss and Landis.
"No," the only male present answered gruffly.
"Are we there yet?"
"No."
"Are we there yet?"
"No."
"Are we there yet?"
"NO!!! SHUT UP AND WALK!"
Heather grinned and made her way around a hole.
"The holes are getting a lot more frequent," Elanna observed. "We're probably getting close."
"It still looks pretty far away," Kate mumbled.
"I'm finally in the Holes book and I'll be dead before we ever freakin get to camp," Lyss said with a heavy sigh.
"Eurgh . . . Kate, do I look dead to you?" Elanna asked, drooping over over- dramatically.
"You don't look dead, um, whatever your name is," Landis replied, glaring again.
Elanna stared at him in a groggy sort of angry way. "I'm Elanna, and that's Kate and Meta," she growled. "And I didn't ask you."
"Lovely," Heather remarked. "By the time we get there, we're all going to bite each other's head's off."
Aly grinned madly, walking in a circle slowly around Landis as though examining him. "I dunno, this guy looks like he could definitely use some ketchup," she said.
Landis glared. Again. "Cut that out," he said, shoving Aly, who just laughed and shoved him back.
"It sure is fun tormenting the only guy in a group full of girls!" Meta quipped, amidst plenty of laughs.
"Indeed," said Elanna.
"Ha. Ha. Ha. Now shut up before you all find yourselves dead in your sleep."
There was dead silence.
"I told you they were serial killers, at least, one of them was," came Kate's voice.
There was silence once more as the group of six walked more. Those who had been more energetic in the beginning gradually slowed more and more until they were walking normally, the heat finally starting to sink in. Elanna could be heard griping about wanting her green Gilligan hat and some sunscreen, and perhaps her funky blue sunglasses, to which several of the group told her to shut up.
After passing several more holes and one scorpion (the whole group quickly shuffled to the left of it and gave it a wide berth), Elanna stopped again.
"What the hell is it now?!" Meta asked.
"I've just had a thought," Elanna responded.
"Ooh, did it hurt?" Aly joked.
"Hahah, you realize I say that to my brother everyday, right? Anyways, presuming we get to Camp Green Lake, we can't act like we know the characters."
"WHY NOT? We're NOT walking in a goddamn desert just to pretend we don't know the guys we wanted to meet in the first place!" Heather started screaming.
"Yeah, I wanna see my hispanic buddy!"
"Don't forget the Zig-man!"
"Oh please, it's not like I don't wanna just walk in there and give Hector a hug, I do, really, but here, these guys are real people, and real people would think we were freaks if we just waltzed in there and acted like we knew 'em!"
"Yeah, I think I know where you're getting at. If we act like we know them, which we do, they still won't know us, and they'll think we're uber-weird, and knowing Zigzag, he'll think we're aliens who read his mind or something." Kate said, placing her hand on her hip.
"Ooh, the blonde's a genius, she thought of something to save our asses." Landis commented dryly.
Elanna almost made a rude gesture but caught herself in time. "I'm actually smart, you know, but I think it's better for peeps to see me as a fun, hyper crazy chick rather then a know-it all brainiac turd." Screams of laughter made their way around the group, but once everyone had calmed down, all heads turned to Aly.
"What, am I the leader or something?" Aly asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Well, you did create the board that started this and all . . ."
"You people!" Aly cried, throwing up her hands in exasperation. "Yeah, okay, when we get there, act like you don't know 'em. Get to know 'em if you want, and remember to share. Y'all happy now?"
"Yep."
Pacified, the group kept walking, Elanna dancing along backwards, facing the group. All of a sudden, there was a shriek, as Elanna fell over sideways into one of the five feet wide, five feet deep holes.
"I'm okaaaaaaaaaay!" Elanna's voice warbled from inside the hole, tinged with both laughter and embarrassment.
"OH MY GOD!" Kate was shrieking, doubled over with laughter. "I just KNEW she was going to fall into a hole at least once!"
After Kate spent about fifteen minutes hauling Elanna out of the hole, which she had somehow managed to get herself stuck in, the group of six continued walking.
"You know, you're lucky as hell that there wern't any yellow spotted lizards in that hole." Aly commented after awhile.
"Mmm. Nothing like finally making it to Camp Greenlake only to become lizard food." Meta agreed.
"Well that was an awfully warm and fuzzy thought, I feel so much better about falling in a five foot hole now." Elanna snapped, brushing her blonde hair out of her eyes.
"Jeez, guys, chill." Kate said calmly, pulling her ponytail tighter. "We'll be there soon. That shadow's getting darker." The attention of the group was spiked, and six pairs of eyes gazed out across the desert to the steadily darkening shadow.
"You know, it probably would have taken shorter time to just go to big thumb from where we, er, landed." Heather said.
"But if we had we wouldn't have known which direction the camp was in." Landis said, glancing at Heather.
Kate groaned. She didn't know how much farther she could go. She hadn't had dinner, and the last time she had eaten was an early lunch at eleven. It was one in the morning when she had left her computer room. She hadn't eaten dinner because she wasn't hungry, but now she was sure as hell thirsty. They had been walking for what, two-three hours? Unless she had something to eat or drink soon, she would faint or be sick. She was so tired too. Kate knew everyone else must feel the same, but at least they had eaten something in the last twelve hours.
"You okay?" Meta asked, and Kate nodded as the desert spun around her.
"One hundred thirty six." Elanna said. Everyone turned and stared at her.
"What?" Aly asked, confused.
"The hell?" Kate muttered.
"One hundred and thirty seven. We have passed one hundred and thirty seven holes. One hundred and thirtu eight.......one hundred thirty nine." Elanna said, staring around at the more frequent holes.
"We're not going to be able to shut her up, are we?" Landis groaned.
"No. It doesn't look like it, no." Heather commented.
"This is going to be one hell of a long walk." Meta groaned.
"One hundred forty six."
"So........." Kate murmured.
"Yeah." Meta agreed to apparently nothing.
"How are we going to get out of this place?" Heather asked.
"You want go get OUT? We haven't even met the guys yet!" Aly exclaimed.
"Well, no not now, but eventually, you know? We aren't here stuck permanently, are we?" Heather asked again.
"Probably not. As long as we want to be, I'd think." Landis said, being the voice of reason as Kate was being unusually quiet. "If we're supposed to believe the crazy girl's logic, of course." He gestured to Elanna who was walking happily along counting holes.
"One hundred seventy three."
"I'm thirsty." Aly commented out of the blue.
"One hundred eighty four."
"Arn't we all?" Heather asked.
"One hundred ninty one. Wow, there's getting to be a lot more holes. One hundred ninety five."
"Elanna, shut up." Landis said. "I'm thirsty, I'm going to take a wild guess the rest of you guys are."
"I am." Meta said.
"Two hundred ten."
"Shut up, Elanna." Aly said. "Well obviously. I mean, who wouldn't be incredibly thirsty in the middle of a desert?"
"Two hundred twenty one."
"Elanna, SHUT UP!" Landis yelled. "Well, now that we've all agreed that we're thirsty......" He said, rolling his eyes.
Elanna glared at him, and kept counting under her breath. The Shadow was getting darker and defiantly larger. It was defiantly something.
The group suddenly realized they had been walking along a sort of dirt path through the holes unknowingly for the past few minutes. Thus why Elanna hadn't fallen into a whole for awhile.
Kate said nothing, and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other willing herself not to pass out.
The six tiredly dragged themselves across the old, dusty road, surrounded by holes.
"HELLO!!"
They all jumped.
"Whoa," said Heather.
"Where'd you come from?" finished Aly.
The random girl pointed to a hole behind her. She sighed. "Does anyone know where we are?"
"You mean you don't know?" asked Landis.
"No."
"We're assuming that we're near Camp Green Lake. You know. From Holes?"
"Oh...."
There was silence.
"Well, anyway, my name's Relina. Relina Avanor. Just call me Ra, Re, Reli or Relina. Doesn't matter." Relina looked at the girl who looked exceptionally tired. "And who are you?"
"That's Kate," answered Heather.
"Oh," Relina said. "Can I come with you guys? I wanna meet the D-tent boys too."
"Sure, why not?" said Landis.
"Yes," Relina whispered as she jumped on the dirt road.
"Are you thirsty?" he asked.
"Hell yeah..."
"Then you'll fit right in."
((To Be Continued...)) ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* ~*~*~*~*~*~
((Notes and Editing done by Kate)) Disclaimer: We do not own Holes, as much as we would like to.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Elanna was sitting at her computer one night, or, morning rather as it was a little past one. But as school was out for the summer, finally, she didn't really care. At the moment, she was having a very spirited MSN conversation with her friend about different hair - fluffy hair, actually. The hair in question belonged to none other then Holes' very own Zero and Zigzag. In between typing messages, she was also online on three different windows. In one window, she was browsing Fanfiction.Net for Holes fics - new ones, or old ones she may have missed. In the second, she was insulting a poser who was pretending to be Khleo Thomas. And on the third window, she was exuberantly adding messages to her favorite message board, the Holes Posse's Hangout, which was made up of fellow Holes fans from the aforementioned Fanfiction.Net.
As well, being the multi-talented person Elanna made herself out to be, she was also drawing in one of her many sketchbooks. The sketchbook itself had many drawings in it - almost half the book, drawing on two sides - but it wasn't as full as she liked it to be. Which was why she was constantly adding to it. Many of the drawings were anime, with some semi-realistic drawings as well. Although a lot of the characters depicted were from various fandoms, there were many original characters there as well, complete with mini-biographies. It was a joke Elanna often laughed to herself about, "Heheh, I've got a total mix of character personalities here! Someone might end up thinking I'm a skitzo!"
The picture she was working on was of Zero. She finished the last detail of his hair happily and put her signature down with a flourish. She then stuck the sketchpad into the back pocket of her jeans along with her pencil and eraser so that she would remember to bring them upstairs with her, if and when she finally went to bed.
Elanna stayed on for another twenty minutes or so before deciding to say goodnight to her friend, sign out, and finally go to bed. She signed out, told the Khleo poser to either f*** off or get some real proof, and prepared to leave one final message at the Hangout. However, as she was tired, her head knocked against the screen of her computer when she leaned over to type. She cursed but didn't get up because the keyboard made a somewhat comfortable pillow, and she was tired, so tired . . .
Elanna fell asleep right there at her keyboard, her unfinished message still waiting to be typed, and thoughts of logging out all but gone; because there was no one awake to think them. All the other members of the Hangout were still online, and Elanna was too, technically.
And something happened there, something no one ever expected. The dedication that the members of the Hangout put into loving the book Holes, the movie Holes, the characters of Holes, and fanfiction and fanart of holes triggered something. It was like the pure dedication became a being unto itself, a being that wanted to reward the girls for their dedication ... . . wanted to bring them together into a place where there were certain people they wanted to meet at a certain place.. . . .
No one knew quite what happened, or how, but when Elanna awoke, she found herself looking up at a bright sky.. . . . a bright sky that was in the middle of a desert, where there was nothing to be seen in all directions.. . . .
***************
Kate typed at her computer, head cocked to the side, and biting her lip angrily. She had tried to download the movie Holes onto her computer, but it hadn't work. Now she was mad because she was deprived of seeing the movie. For some strange reason, movie theatres didn't sell tickets at eleven o'clock at night so she had had to resort to her computer. As well as trying desperately to find some hint of Holes in the empty black screen that was her computer, she was typing messages to other devoted fans on the Holes Posse's Hangout board.
Sighing, she pushed her light brown hair out of her eyes and typed some more into the message she was sending to the Posse board. Some music was coming unceremoniously through her speakers, and singed aloud under her breath. For some strange reason remembering school assignments study notes was the hardest thing ever for Kate, but remembering song lyrics were like a second nature. She could hear a song once and know half the words. Kate had quite the song encyclopedia stored up in her brain, ranging from the hellishly-scary Barney song to Eminem. An ongoing groan from her classmates and friends was "Oh god don't get her singing".
Kate also delved into books, which had led to writing. While in one of her 'read every book in the house' moods, Kate had stumbled across 'Holes'. She had read it again and again, never tiring of it. She wrote a few stories on the book, after seeing the movie and having her creativity sparked even more. She posted her stories on Fanfiction.net, and had come in contact with other obsessed fans, which led to the Posse board.
Suddenly, Kate's vision started to waver. The room spun and became hazy, straight lines becoming fuzzy and transparent. Colors blended in with one another and rushed around her at a dizzying pace. The girl clutched her head, and squeezed her eyes shut. When she opened them again, she was kneeling on a hard, dry surface, her hands on her face. Slowly standing up, she stared around in awe at the desert all around her with the deep blue sky overhead.
Nothing was in any direction, except for a small black figure lying on the ground about 100 feet away. As Kate started to jog toward the figure, she stopped dead staring at the ground beside her.
It was a hole, five feet deep and five feet wide.
************
Elanna's blue eyes flashed open, trying to look around at her surroundings. She quickly closed her eyes again, moaning.
"Who the hell opened my window blinds?!"
She slowly opened her eyes, blinking against the sunlight and propping her head up on her shoulder. When her eyes were opened fully and she had taken a good look at her surroundings, she made a kind of squeaky noise and her head fell off her elbow.
Where she had expected to see the familiar pink and blue flowered wall- paper of her bedroom, she only saw brown sand. A lot of brown sand. It was also very, very hot. She let out a breath she hadn't known she had been holding.
"Ah, I get it now. I'm dreaming again. Why must my dreams always be so odd? Since when have I ever dreamed about a desert before? Whurph, crap, better stop talking to myself."
The girl shifted, still lying full-length in the dirt. "Okay.. . . . Why haven't I woken up yet ... . .?" She then had a thought. "Crud, this is probably one of those nightmares where I need to force myself to wake up! Must . ... . concentrate ... . . "
Elanna lay very still in the dirt, her face screwed up in concentration.
"Aw, screw it."
She picked up a little pebble on the sandy desert floor and scratched it against her arm. It hurt, and had left plenty of red lines too. Deciding the rock wasn't working, she tried pinching herself. That hurt, too. Slowly, the thought dawned on Elanna that maybe she wasn't dreaming. She stood, glaring wearily at the sand all around her - there wasn't anything else she could glare at.
"I'm dreaming . . ... I gotta be dreaming . . . ..If I'm not dreaming, why else am I in a desert?"
Elanna liked to imagine all sorts of things when she was bored, so suddenly, the idea of her being transported somewhere didn't seem so unlikely. But that didn't make being stranded in a desert any less scary. Collapsing to the ground, she started to babble about all the things she would need to actually survive in a desert.
"IneedwaterandfoodandaplacetogotothebathroomandthisreallysucksandIwannagohom eImissmycomputerwhyisthishappeningtomeImustbedreamingI'mdreamingI'mdreamingI 'mdreamingGAH! Get a hold of yourself, girl!" She cried, slapping herself in the forward.
Grimacing, she looked down and smoothed out her olive-green t-shirt with the caption 'Bugle Boy, Combo Girl' and an army girl's silhouette. Her expression changed immediately when she caught sight of what was crawling on her front.
Crawling on her stomach was a tarantula. Elanna leaped up immediately and ran around in circles, screaming her blonde head off before remembering that tarantulas hardly bit and when they did, it wasn't dangerous. Gingerly, she plucked the leg of the large spider, and with it's hairy body dangling, she tossed it a good distance from her and scooted backwards babbling incoherently again about 'a damn big hairy spider.'
Resigned to the fact that she actually may be stranded in a desert, she started to walk. She knew that when someone is lost, they should stay in the same area so that someone could find them, but she saw just how huge the desert was and figured if someone did come looking for her, they'd be able to see her anyways. She also knew that she should find a civilization, or at least water, so that she wouldn't dehydrate. At the very least, she hoped she would run into a single person, anyone, just so she wouldn't be alone, plus, perhaps they would have water ... . .
"What I wouldn't do to meet up with someone ... . . "
******
Kate stared at the hole in shock, then looked up dazedly. The sun beat down on her face and shoulders, making her wish she were wearing cooler clothing then her jeans and t-shirt. Like, a bathing suit. Or at least a pair of shorts. She saw the little black figure that had previously been lying down was now higher, as if in the position of someone sitting. Wanting the company of something - anyone, she started running towards the figure. Not easy in searing heat and jeans. Apparently the figure hadn't noticed her yet. As she got closer, she realized with surprise and a tiny bit of amusement that the person (for she had figured out that it must be a person by now) was dancing around in circles.
She was shocked by the hole she had seen. With those dimensions, and considering her surroundings, it almost reminded her of............. No. Couldn't be. She wouldn't let her thoughts turn to what she wished it was, because she knew how disappointed she would be if it wasn't. Somehow, on a subconscious level, Kate was convinced this was a dream. But she didn't stop to think about it, because in dreams you don't stop and think that it's a dream. You just wait it out. She was going to probably wake up soon anyway. She might as well make the most of it.
Coming nearer, she slowed to a walk. The person had blonde hair and was wearing an olive green t-shirt. By the hair, Kate figured it was a girl. As Kate came up behind her, she heard the girl mumbling to herself something about spiders and meeting someone. Kate laughed to herself at the pure ironic-ness of that statement, and unconsciously tied her hair up into a ponytail with an elastic around her wrist. She stopped about five feet behind the girl and put a hand on her hip, she was exhausted from running across a desert in unimaginable heat.
"Do I count?" Kate asked, her mouth quirking into a smile
*************
Meta was sitting at her computer in the dark. It was late, and she knew she should be getting to bed soon, considering she had an exam the next day. But she was too wrapped up in her 'multi-tasking' -- reading Holes fanfics and posting on the Holes Posse message boards. At one point, she was tempted to go upstairs and get her global binder and actually study, but then a particularly interesting story caught her eyes.
All her friends called her 'obsessed.' Meta didn't really care, but was annoyed when they didn't listen to her ramble on and on about Zigzag's fun hair.
Besides, Meta had met some cool people through Fanfiction.net and the Holes Posse boards that shared her love (coughobsessioncough) for Holes.
On that particular night, there was a horrible thunderstorm. Meta knew that she should turn the computer off, but that story was SO GOOD. All of a sudden, there was a loud crash of thunder. Meta jumped and looked out the window, but turned back around to face the computer as it started to smoke. The screen began to flash, and Meta got dizzy.
She woke up seemingly hours later. She rolled over to sit up, but then realized that she was not in her bed.
"What the......" She said aloud, as she brushed sand from her hair. "Sand?"
She stood up, and then realized that the sun was beating hard on her. She looked around for any sign of life. All she saw were...holes? It kind of reminded her of a book, but there was no way that it could be real. Once again, she scanned the horizon. This time she noticed something...two somethings. It looked like two people, one laying on the hot sand, and the other standing above her. They, like her, looked completely out of place and confused in this...desert. She watched as the one standing puller her hair into a ponytail, and then jogged over to join them.
"Hey." She said to the two. "How did you guys get here?"
*************
"I wish the real world would just stop hasseling me, I wish the real world would just stop hasseling me"
Rob Thomas, and his band Matchbox Twenty were being played through two two- inch speakers on Aly's computer desk. Her parents and brother had long since gone to sleep, leaving her the only one awake, in the house, hammering away at the computer. She was still dressed in the black Dickies, and a black t-shirt that read 'SUGAR RAY' on the front, displayed a picture of the whole band, with her favorite bassist Murphy Karges in a sombrero, and had tour dates on the back, of which she wore all during the day. Hundreds of bracelets and leather spikes were displayed on her wrists, and three ball-chains hung from her neck.
She pulled a piece of purple hair out of her eyes, pushed her small black glasses onto her face, and yawned.
"I miss ya Heather" she typed into an open instant message, and sent a picture of Magnet, her Hispanic buddy, from Holes.
She couldn't never quite figure out what it was about teenage guys from broken pasts trying to make something of their lives. But whatever it was, it made her passionate, enough to write her own stories from it, and create message boards from it, and just plain obsess herself with it.
"Too bad I'd never get a chance in hell with Magnet. Or Miguel Castro. Haa......that's fun to say. Miguel......Miguel.....MIGUEL FOR PRESIDENT! Heheh. He wouldn't date a punk like me." She put her hand on her face, and reminded herself of how crazy she was, and to chill out now and then. "I wish the real world WOULD stop hasseling me."
Aly glanced at the clock on the computer. 1:37 AM. Great.
She bent over to untie the black canvas Converse shoes on her feet that she neglected to untie earlier. As she did, she groaned at the piercing sensation from the pyramid belt that dug into stomach, and pulled one of the laces from the shoes.
Suddenly though, the sensation intensified, and the piercing sensation seemed to take over her whole body. Aly fell off the chair, Matchbox Twenty CD still being played, though Real World had ended and Long Day took its place. She moaned, laying on the ground, and closed her eyes, trying to think about Magnet to calm her nerves.
She felt much hotter suddenly, and she felt she might pass out or throw up, as it began to feel like she was falling. Then it all stopped, as Aly crashed onto dusty ground, and she lay in a black and purple heap in the desert.
*******
Elanna looked up very quickly as she heard a female voice saying, "Do I count?" with a hint of a smile in her voice. The voice seemed to be responding to Elanna's mutterings from before about wanting to meet up with something in this middle of nothing.
"Aha, it is a dream, see, here's my guide and they're gonna tell me what do and I'll wake up and never eat chocolate chip cookies and coke before going to bed and-"
"Hey, are you okay?" Kate interrupted the girl, eyeing her oddly as she struggled with her ponytail. "Would you open your eyes or something, you're freaking me out!"
" . ... . oh . . ... " Elanna mumbled humorously before opening her eyes. "Hi, are you part of my dream?"
" . . ... No, I'm real . ... . "
"Are you sure?"
"Very sure."
"Positive?"
"Do I have to prove it to you?"
"Yes, that would be nice." Elanna grinned, positive it was a dream after all, and that the dream-person trying to prove it was a dream would only accidentally make the dream go away.
Kate grinned, and, leaning over, pinched Elanna on the arm, hard, but not too hard.
"OW!" The blonde shrieked, batting Kate's arm away. After her slight moment of hysteria passed, she stared at Kate, her blue eyes very wide and her blonde hair somewhat tangled as it fell down her back. "You ARE real . . . I'm not dreaming?"
"No, you're not." Kate grinned, amused by the girl's actions.
"No wonder, DAMN did that hurt."
"Sorry, hehe .... . . " Kate mumbled, smiling widely with her arm around her neck, a typical anime pose.
"So if I'm not dreaming, that means . . .... AAAAAAAAGGGHHHH! I touched a tarantula! I TOUCHED ONE!!!"
"So that's what you were muttering about . . .... "
Elanna paused in her hysterical screaming, "Huh?"
"When I was over there," Kate motioned to where she had found herself, "I saw you and came over, and when I was walking, I heard you muttering about a 'damn big hairy spider' or something and wanting to meet someone . . .... "
"Oh. . ... " Elanna was silent. "You heard that?" She asked, grinning sideways at Kate.
"Yep. Pretty funny."
"I'd like to see how you would react if you just noticed a great big bloody spider just crawling all over you . . ..."
"Not happening sweetie, don't try it." Kate answered, laughing and flipping her now tied-back hair over her shoulder.
Engrossed as they were in their conversation, they stopped talking immediately when another girl jogged up, seemingly out of nowhere.
"Hey," the girl stated. "How did you guys get here?"
"Well, I was sitting at my computer--" Elanna started.
"Hey, me too!" Kate interrupted.
"Wait...You mean you didn't come here together?" Meta asked.
"Yeah." Kate said. "I kind of, landed here, and found her. She was already laying here when I got here."
"Oh. But do you know how you got here?" Meta asked again.
"Nope, no idea." The two girls said together.
"Hmmm.....That's strange."
"Yeah it is." Agreed Kate and Elanna.
"So ummm......" Meta began. "Okay, this is weird. If I'm stuck in a desert with people I don't know, I wanna at least know their names. I'm Meta.
"I'm Kate." Said the girl with brown hair.
"Elanna." Said the third with blonde hair.
"Okay then. Let's see. We're stuck in a desert with complete strangers, holes EVERYWHERE, and no other human beings in sight."
"Yeah, basically." Kate said. "Wait, look at all these holes. Doesn't it remind you of a book?"
The three girls looked at each other, amazed.
"Uhm........." Kate mumbled.
"A certain book," Elanna trailed off.
"Lets see, five by five holes everywhere, non-ending desert, tarantulas, and not a cloud in sight." Kate said, counting it off her fingers.
"Is it just me or are these coincidences kind of creeping you out?" Meta said, staring around at the desert.
"Well, all the evidence points to one thing," Elanna said. All the girls looked at each other and said one thing.
"Holes."
"So.........." Kate murmured. "Do you think we should start randomly searching for a Camp full of boys in orange jumpsuits?
Elanna started to giggle. Meta and Kate stared at her.
"What?" She asked. Then realized she was still giggling. "Oh. You forgot to mention really hot boys in orange jumpsuits."
"Oh." Kate said, arm on the back of her neck. "Good point."
Meta grinned. "And we're standing here why?
Kate grinned. "Point taken."
"One problem." Elanna said, and Meta and Kate turned and looked at
"Ah. Which way then?" Meta asked. her. "Which way? In case you can't tell we're IN THE MIDDLE OF A FREAKING DESERT!"
Kate stood on her tiptoes in her navy sneakers and peered out in every direction. She was about an inch taller then the other two girls, not freakishly tall but a bit taller then most other girls.
"I think there's a darker spot off that way." She pointed to the shadow in the distance. "That could probably be the camp."
"What you say we head in that direction, then?" Meta asked.
They started walking but then Kate suddenly stopped. "HOLY SHIT!"
"What?" Elanna asked, staring at the ground incase there was a tarantula or yellow spotted lizard.
"We're IN HOLES! Do you know what that means?" She asked excidedly.
"We're going to have to dig five foot holes?" Meta asked.
"Zero?" Elanna asked hopefully.
"The BOYS will be there!" Kate said.
"Oh yay, we're going to a camp full of thirty-somthing girl-deprived teenage boys." Meta said sarcastically, then laughed. "What are we waiting for?"
Kate and Elanna laughed, and kept walking. But then Kate started to talk again.
"Don't you guys get it? Holes! This is like, my dream! I love Holes so much, I'm even in a Holes Posse, I even-"
"Me too." Elanna cut in.
"And me!" Said Meta.
The three girls stared at each other.
"Wait, Elanna, arn't you........." Kate started.
"Celestra." Elanna finished. "And you Meta........."
"CherryKoolAid." Meta added. Elanna and Meta turned to Kate.
"And Kate, that would make you,"
"Man." Kate confirmed. They stared at each other for a while again, then Kate stepped forward and gave Elanna a slight hug, then Meta. "So we aren't complete strangers, then."
"Nope." Elanna agreed.
As they walked towards the camp, the Holes became closer together and
more orderly. Not so randomly dug in the dirt anywhere. As they got
closer, all three girl wondered how they got here, what it would be
like when they made it to the Camp, and whether anymore Posse members
would suddenly appear out of no where.
*****************
Heather sighed and ran a hand through her long, dark blonde hair as she studied the instant message windows that were amassing themselves on her desktop. All in all, there were about seven. She grumbled something and clicked a few closed without responding. She wasn't in a very talkative mood. Alyssa was going on about how Heather should come back to Ohio, and also sending pics from one of their favorite books-turned-movie, Holes. She grinned and turned up the volume on her headphones; Holes soundtrack blaring. The Holes Posse message board was minimized on her taskbar.
Rain pounded against the windows of her home, but she barely heard it. Her alarm clock read almost one thirty A.M., and she still hadn't bothered to change out of her baggy jeans and blue MegaTokyo shirt. Paper was strewn across her desk, along with several drawing utensils, a CD case, and other miscellany. An unfinished sketch sat in front of her, having been abandoned for the time being.
She was just about to key in a response to Alyssa's IM, when a particularly loud clap of thunder sounded overhead and her computer screen blipped off, along with anything else electrical in her room that was plugged in, leaving her in complete darkness. Her headphones, which were running on batteries, continued blaring as she jumped up suddenly and succeeded in bashing her knee on the underside of her desk.
"OW! Dammit, what the....."
She tried to maneuver out of her room to get to a flashlight, managed to trip over her chair, and land face first on the carpet. She squeezed her eyes shut and put a hand to her head.
"Oww....."
When Heather opened her eyes, it was no longer dark, and it was no longer cool and comfortable, like her room. She was, in fact, lying on her stomach, in the middle of what looked like a desert. She scrambled to her feet, eyes wide. Dirt, dust, sand, and more dirt lay in every direction. She began to panic, but paused as she saw a figure staggering to their feet not six feet from her. This only alleviated her panic for a moment as recognition of the figure came to her.
Red and blonde hair, spiked. Black t-shirt, baggy jeans, red sneakers. The tall, lanky boy straightened, muttering obscenities and turned his green gaze on her. She did the only thing any logical person would do.
She screamed.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE!?" she demanded, starting to back away slowly. "You don't EXIST in the real world you live in my head you can't get out you're just my split personality and what the hell am I doing in a desert with yooouuu!? Where am I?!? I want to know what the hell is going on here!"
The boy grinned. "Oh, d'you always have to be so dramatic?"
"Landis..... you're standing in front of me. I THINK I HAVE A RIGHT TO PANIC!"
Landis shrugged and looked around. "Man, I'm having the weirdest sense of-- "
"--déjà vu..... I know......" Heather wrinkled her nose and squinted, starting out on the horizon as if she stared long enough, she could cause some sort of sign of civilaztion to appear.
"Uhh, who's that?"
Heather followed Landis's gaze to see someone trudging over to them. Purple hair, Sugar Ray t-shirt, dickies, black glasses... no way. It wasn't possible.
"ALYSSA?!?"
Lyss squinted for a moment, then her eyes widened and she ran to Heather and practically tackled her. "OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD!!! WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE!? WHERE ARE WE!? I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU'RE HERE!! AAAHH! OH MY GOD!!!"
"Lyss, Heather can't breathe."
The punk girl swiveled her head to shoot a retort at Landis, but her jaw dropped in shock. "W... ..wha..... Landex!"
************
Kate, Elanna and Meta couldn't actually see the Camp yet, but they did notice how the holes appeared more and more, as well as more orderly. Suddenly, Elanna stopped dead.
"What is it, hun?" Kate asked concernedly.
"Well, we're pretty sure that we're in Holes, right?"
"Yeah . . ... " The two other girls trailed off, wondering what the odd blonde girl meant.
"So we'll find Camp Green Lake, right?"
"Right!" Meta said exasperatedly. "We just talked about this, remember?"
"Yeah.. . . . " Elanna said slowly. "But, what if we're not in the right time?"
Kate stopped walking and turned around too, facing Elanna. "What do you mean?"
"Okay, let's say we find the camp, but when we get there, if we get there, the guys we want aren't there? What if we came here before or after our regular D-Tent guys were here?"
"WHAT?!" The other girls shrieked.
"You mean we might get here before any of the guys were here? Or after all the guys leave? But that would SUCK!" Kate complained.
"Yeah! I wanna see Ziggy at the very least!" Meta complained. "How are we supposed to know whether this is the right time?"
Elanna was quiet for quite a time, thinking. "You guys were both at the Hangout the time we got here right?"
"Yep," they both responded.
"Well, I've got a theory... "
" ... " "Oh, I was supposed to elaborate?"
Kate and Meta almost fell to the floor at the simple yet stupid add-on.
"Well, it's kinda early for me to explain it now, and I only thought of it because it sounds like something I would write, but basically, I think it might have to do with us being Holes fans. I can't really explain it right now. Besides, I'm probably wrong."
Kate cracked a grin. "You mean like how you were . . . ahem . . . confused easily?"
"Shut up, you. Anyways, I think we will be in the right setting."
"But," Meta cut in, "There are still four possibilities, even if it's the right time. It could be before, with Barf Bag instead of Stanley, in the middle with both Zero and Stanley, third with Twitch but no Zero, and fourth where both Zero and Stanley are gone."
"NOOOOO!" Elanna wailed. "Stanley and Zero are my favorites, and there's only a one out of four probability they'll both be there!"
"Hey, remember what you said about us being Holes fans? Well, we're fans of Holes in the middle of the book, with Stanley and Zero. So, if you go by what you kind of said before, they'll probably be there." Kate said logically.
"Good," Elanna pouted, twisting some blonde strands of hair behind her shoulder.
"Besides, at the very least, the other guys will be there!" Meta said enthusiastically, her eyes dancing.
"I only want Zero." Elanna said.
"I want Zero too, though! Well, kind of," Kate said, putting her arm behind her neck again in her characteristic pose.
"Aly said we have to share at the Hangout, so I guess we'll share here too," Meta replied.
"That's fine with me, besides, it's not likely either of us can actually get him as a boyfriend!" Kate said, close to laughing her head off.
"Wouldn't that be weird dating a fictional character?" Meta said, grinning.
"Yeah, but a CUTE one! He looks good in orange!" Elanna screamed, drooling slightly and collapsing into a giggle fit at the spot. Meta and Kate both stared at her. Again.
"I'll try to stop doing that," she said; almost instantly sober. Kate and Meta sighed.
There was silence as the trio started walking again, until Kate interrupted it.
"Okay, so us two," she motioned to Elanna and herself, "are sharing Zero, so who do you want, Meta?"
"I dunno, maybe Ziggy, though I'll probably have to share him too."
"Share him with who? There's only three of us," Elanna protested.
"Well, weren't the rest of the posse online at the same time as us? Maybe they got taken here too . . . " Meta trailed off.
"If they're here, where do you think they are? Semi-lost like us? Completely lost? Maybe already chilling at the camp?" Kate asked.
"Well technically, I doubt they'd be able to 'chill' within a thousand mile radius of here," Elanna quipped.
"Wait," Meta cried. "Look over there!" She pointed. A great distance away, there were three upright figures that appeared to have their backs facing the trio.
"Ooh, let's go see! Maybe it's Aly and Heather and someone!" Elanna yelled, jumping up and down hyperactively.
"Maybe it's serial killers," Kate commented. There was dead silence. "I was joking."
"Well, let's go see!" The three girls ran in the direction of the figures, yelling loudly and hoping to catch their attention.
**********
"It's too hot, Lyss, get your arm offa me." Landis moaned and pushed the girl's arm off of his shoulder.
The purple haired girl just smiled at him though. "This is crazy!" she sighed, "Crazy go nuts!"
"Guys, his is bad. We're wandering around in the desert with no food or water or cell phones or-" Heather stopped speaking suddenly, ignoring Aly's and Landis's confused stares.
"Come back to Earf, Heaver," Aly waved her hand across her face
"Sh!"
She turned around, and looked into the horizon. Then her eyes rolled down. "Look! There's like....people are over there.....screeching....eep" Aly smiled. "Screeching civilization, AHOY!"
Landis rolled his eyes. "C'mon, lets just keep going forward. I don't want to have to deal with any more psychos. I already got you and Heath."
"No! Crazy insanely people are better than no people! Least maybe they'll tell us where the hell we are!" Aly grabbed his arm, and led him back in the opposite direction, toward the strangers. Heather fallowed.
"Or, Landex," Aly continued, using her pet name for him, "Psychos are better than a band of Abercrombie models." she laughed as Landis shuddered.
'What's with these Holes,' she thought, walking at a fast pace. 'There's like a zillion of em...everywhere.' The 'Dig It' theme song from the movie Holes began to run on a familiar loop in her head.
They continued to walk forward, dodging the holes left and right as the figured became much clearer.
"ALY?!" - "HEATHER?!" - "PIZZA MAN?!"
Aly stopped dead. Landis and Heather both crashed into her back. She fell forward, and Landis and Heather fell on top of her, and rolled off to the side.
"OW! BASTARD! LYSS!" Landis cried. Heather moaned, "wassat all about?" she rubbed her head.
"Heaver...." Aly whispered, "They know our names." Heather's eyes widened, and the three of them froze as another set of figures approached them.
"It's Aly, I know it," a blond girl whispered to another with light brown hair.
Aly leaned back on Landis. "Who are you?"
The three girls smiled, and the blond put her hand on her face, and then said, "I'm Elanna. This is Kate, and that's Meta," she pointed to the other two girls. "You are Aly, right?"
"No, I'm the Easter Bunny," Aly said with thick sarcasm. Landis and Heather smirked behind her. "Tell me how you know my name."
Kate smiled, "We're psychic."
"REALLY?!" asked Landis, standing up suddenly, "COOL!"
"No, numbnuts," Heather said, also standing, and Aly followed them both.
Elanna, Kate, and Meta were giggling as Aly narrowed her eyes.
"We have a theory," Kate said. They looked at her impatiently. "If you're Aly, and I'm assuming you're Heather, right?" Kate smiled at Heather, who in turn nodded. "And whoever you are," she glanced at Landis, "Then you're obviously fans of Holes."
"Umhmm, movie and book," Aly nodded, and pushed her glasses up on her nose.
"As insane as it sounds...look around you. 5 by 5 holes in a desert. Tarantulas. No clouds." Kate said.
Landis yawned. "But to the chase." Heather elbowed him.
"Dude," Kate said, "We're at Camp Green Lake."
Aly blinked. Heather's eyebrows rose. Landis snorted.
"NO SERIOUSLY!" Meta cut in, "If you were at the Posse board at the time you somehow appeared here! IT'S NOT IMPOSSIBLE!"
"You were at my board?" Aly asked, confused.
"Yeah!" said Meta, "CherryKoolAid!"
Aly looked to the other girls.
"Celestra," said Elanna.
"Eh, Man," said Kate.
Aly looked back at Heather. "Were you at the board?"
Heather nodded. "So maybe it's not impossible...." Aly grinned.
"So have any of you seen my Hispanic buddy?"
Kate grinned, and slapped her hand to her forehead exasperatedly. "Do any of you SEE the camp?"
Aly, Heather, and Landis looked around. They all shook their heads.
"Nope." Heather said.
"Nuh-uh." Aly added.
"No." Said Landis. "Can you?"
"Uhm." Kate looked embarrassed. "Actually, no."
"I see." Landis said, raising his eyebrows.
"There's a shadow over there. Does that count? And the holes are getting more......." Elanna said, searching for a better word.
"Frequent?" Kate suggested.
"No, holey." Elanna finished.
"What the hell?" Aly asked, confused.
"But we think we're heading in the right direction. " Meta pointed out. " We also have screwed up logic that says that all our favorite characters should be there. It's........tell them your screwed up logic, Kate."
"Okay." Kate said, starting to walk in the direction of the shadow with the rest of the group following. "Because we're all really big fans of the book in the time when Stanley, Zero, X-Ray, Squid, Armpit, Magnet and Zigzag are all in D-Tent, chances are that we 'appeared' in the desert when they were all there."
"M'kay, say what about how we got here?" Heather asked, staring at the girl.
"Dunno, ask Elanna." Kate said. The girls wearing baggy pants made her feel slightly out of place with her tight jeans.
"Whatever. How'd we get here?" Aly said to Elanna. Elanna just kept walking, staring at holes.
"Uh, Elanna?" Meta asked. Elanna kept walking.
"YO! ELANNA!" Kate yelled. Elanna looked up, startled.
"Sorry, what?" Elanna asked. Kate shook her head and pointed to Aly.
"How. Did. We. Get. In. The. Friggin. Desert." Aly said slowly. Heather laughed, and Landis rolled his eyes.
"Well," Elanna said, starting again on her theory, "Since we're all holes fans, somehow that must have made us appear in where we wanted to be so much."
"Okaaaay," Heather said slowly. "Sure, why not."
"You have no idea how hard that was to get out of her the first time," Meta groaned. Kate laughed.
"That's the lamest explanation I've ever heard." Landis groaned.
"Shut up, you." Heather said.
"By any chance do any of you just randomly carry a jug of water with you?" Kate asked the tree newcomers.
"Uh. No?" Aly asked.
"Darn, I left mine at home." Elanna said. Everyone stared at her. "Just kidding. Jeez!"
Kate rolled her eyes. "Hey, is it just me, or do you see that shadow becoming darker?"
"We must be getting closer." Meta said.
"Well, this should be interesting." Kate said, staring at the shadow that was Camp Greenlake.
Meta nodded.
The group of six continued walking steadily towards the shadow on the desert floor, the shadow everyone was feverently hoping would be Camp Green Lake.
Five people in the group were walking fairly normally, but Elanna, who
seemed to run on solar energy, was skipping. Skipping in the middle of a desert with four people she knew only through the Internet and one she didn't know at all.
"Goddamn it, it's hot," Elanna griped, suddenly stopping in mid-skip and rolling up her pant legs. Landis raised an eyebrow. "I always wear my pants like this," the girl explained. Landis shrugged; rolling his eyes and went back to his place beside Heather.
"Who is this Landis guy anyways?" Meta asked, as if he weren't even there.
"Lyss knows. You could say he's kinda my split personality. I guess he's here 'cause Holes isn't technically real . . . "
"Explain later?"
"Maybe."
Elanna was bounding in circles around him. " I like your hair," she giggled. Landis stared at her uncertainly, then decided to glare, hoping to scare her off. It worked, and Elanna dashed behind Kate.
"Zero better be there to protect me," she whispered laughingly to her.
"Yep. He can ward him off with his shovel à la Pendanski!" They both laughed.
Over the few minutes that followed, the gang of teenagers participated in the things teens did. Heather and Aly were chatting non-committaly, Kate and Meta were giggling and chatting about random things and Zigzag, and Elanna was making faces at Landis, hoping to freak him out and see if he'd glare again.
It was Heather who stopped first. She bent down to tie her shoe, and the rest of the group crowded around her, wondering if something was wrong. When they realized she was only tying her shoe, and not dying as Elanna had asked, they decided it was a good time to take a break. They rested for fifteen minutes according to the watches on Elanna, Kate and Meta's wrists and stood up again.
They all looked around for the shadow so they could get back on track and find the camp (and the lovely cool water stored there that would save them from withering in the hot desert air). They looked again, and again, and quadruple-checked after that. But they couldn't see the shadow.
As one, six loud voices wailed into the air, "DON'T TELL ME WE'RE LOST IN A FREAKING DESERT!!!!"
"How could this happen?"
"What are we gonna do?"
"We're all gonna DIE!"
"I WANT MY MOMMY!!!!!"
All of the girls began to panic. They all looked to Aly, as she had been the one who started the posse, and therefore had technically gotten them into this mess. Unfortunately, Aly was doing an Elanna, and trying to annoy Landis.
"ALY!!!!!!" They all shouted at once. The girls seemed to have a psychic ability to all yell at the same time. As they were all loud, Aly immediately snapped to attention.
"What? I SWEAR TO GOD I DID NOT STEAL THE COOKIES!!" She yelled.
"What????" Elanna inquired, and by the looks on everyone's faces, they were just as confused.
"Oh. Sorry. I guess i went off into my own world there for a second."
"Um...yeah. So. What are we gonna do?"
"What are we gonna do about what?" Aly asked. This caused several of the girls to groan, and Meta smacked the palm of her hand against her forehead.
"What are we gonna do about the fact that we are LOST IN A DESERT, and have no idea how the hell we GOT HERE!!??" Kate yelled. The group of girls (plus Landis) seemed to be yelling a lot.
"Oh that. Why don't we just follow that shadow?"
"The girls looked to where the shadow had been a few minutes prior, and miraculously, it was there again.
"'kay, that's just creepy." Meta commented.
"Where'd the hell it go in the first place?" Landis inquired.
"Wait." Kate said suddenly. "When Heather tied her shoe, we stopped and turned around to ask if she was dead, right?"
"Uh, yeah. You WERE there, right?" Aly asked.
"Shut up, I'm trying to make a hypothetical conclusion here." Kate snapped.
"Sorry," Aly said, crossing her arms. "Somehow though I ain't seenin' any
conclusioning." "She's doing mental conclusioning. You can do that, right?" Elanna asked.
"Dude, I don't think conclusioning is a word, but can I get back to what I was saying?" Kate asked exasperatedly. Everyone nodded. "Okay. Jeez. ANYWAY, we turned around to watch the amazing Heather tie her shoe."
"I kick ass at tying shoes." Heather commented randomly.
"Sure, why not. Anyway, SHE WAS TYING HER SHOE." Kate tried to explain.
"We know she's tied her shoe. It was awesome, but can you get to the point?" Meta asked.
Kate was on the verge of having a mental breakdown. "ANYWAY.......we turned around, and faced the direction we came. We then decided to take a break. And sat down where we were standing. Facing the way we came. Now tell me, when we got up did ANYONE look in 360 degrees?" Kate aked.
"No?"
"Nuh-uh."
"Nope."
"I didn't."
"Three hundred and sixty degrees is a circle, right?" Elanna asked.
"Yeah." Meta nodded.
"Are we supposed to count all the degrees separately? I mean..." Elanna got up and rotated about a millimeter in each direction. She finished. "I only got thirty." She commented.
"CAN I GET TO THE POINT??" Kate yelled.
"We've been waiting." Landis said.
"Yeah I know." Aly said.
"OKAY! My hypothetical conclusion," Kate said, with a glare at Aly, "Is that nobody actually looked in that direction." She pointed in the direction of the shadow. "Because everybody thought it would be in the other direction since they thought that was the way we were going."
They all started once more walking towards the shadow.
"Too.......hot............going..............to...................die....... ...." Elanna groaned.
Kate grinned. "Don't worry, think: Zero will be there with a nice big bottle of water."
"Or Zigzag." Meta said.
"Magnet, too!" Aly added.
And with wordless grins to each other, the holes fans kept walking towards the shadow.
Are we there yet?" Heather whined as she plodded alongside Lyss and Landis.
"No," the only male present answered gruffly.
"Are we there yet?"
"No."
"Are we there yet?"
"No."
"Are we there yet?"
"NO!!! SHUT UP AND WALK!"
Heather grinned and made her way around a hole.
"The holes are getting a lot more frequent," Elanna observed. "We're probably getting close."
"It still looks pretty far away," Kate mumbled.
"I'm finally in the Holes book and I'll be dead before we ever freakin get to camp," Lyss said with a heavy sigh.
"Eurgh . . . Kate, do I look dead to you?" Elanna asked, drooping over over- dramatically.
"You don't look dead, um, whatever your name is," Landis replied, glaring again.
Elanna stared at him in a groggy sort of angry way. "I'm Elanna, and that's Kate and Meta," she growled. "And I didn't ask you."
"Lovely," Heather remarked. "By the time we get there, we're all going to bite each other's head's off."
Aly grinned madly, walking in a circle slowly around Landis as though examining him. "I dunno, this guy looks like he could definitely use some ketchup," she said.
Landis glared. Again. "Cut that out," he said, shoving Aly, who just laughed and shoved him back.
"It sure is fun tormenting the only guy in a group full of girls!" Meta quipped, amidst plenty of laughs.
"Indeed," said Elanna.
"Ha. Ha. Ha. Now shut up before you all find yourselves dead in your sleep."
There was dead silence.
"I told you they were serial killers, at least, one of them was," came Kate's voice.
There was silence once more as the group of six walked more. Those who had been more energetic in the beginning gradually slowed more and more until they were walking normally, the heat finally starting to sink in. Elanna could be heard griping about wanting her green Gilligan hat and some sunscreen, and perhaps her funky blue sunglasses, to which several of the group told her to shut up.
After passing several more holes and one scorpion (the whole group quickly shuffled to the left of it and gave it a wide berth), Elanna stopped again.
"What the hell is it now?!" Meta asked.
"I've just had a thought," Elanna responded.
"Ooh, did it hurt?" Aly joked.
"Hahah, you realize I say that to my brother everyday, right? Anyways, presuming we get to Camp Green Lake, we can't act like we know the characters."
"WHY NOT? We're NOT walking in a goddamn desert just to pretend we don't know the guys we wanted to meet in the first place!" Heather started screaming.
"Yeah, I wanna see my hispanic buddy!"
"Don't forget the Zig-man!"
"Oh please, it's not like I don't wanna just walk in there and give Hector a hug, I do, really, but here, these guys are real people, and real people would think we were freaks if we just waltzed in there and acted like we knew 'em!"
"Yeah, I think I know where you're getting at. If we act like we know them, which we do, they still won't know us, and they'll think we're uber-weird, and knowing Zigzag, he'll think we're aliens who read his mind or something." Kate said, placing her hand on her hip.
"Ooh, the blonde's a genius, she thought of something to save our asses." Landis commented dryly.
Elanna almost made a rude gesture but caught herself in time. "I'm actually smart, you know, but I think it's better for peeps to see me as a fun, hyper crazy chick rather then a know-it all brainiac turd." Screams of laughter made their way around the group, but once everyone had calmed down, all heads turned to Aly.
"What, am I the leader or something?" Aly asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Well, you did create the board that started this and all . . ."
"You people!" Aly cried, throwing up her hands in exasperation. "Yeah, okay, when we get there, act like you don't know 'em. Get to know 'em if you want, and remember to share. Y'all happy now?"
"Yep."
Pacified, the group kept walking, Elanna dancing along backwards, facing the group. All of a sudden, there was a shriek, as Elanna fell over sideways into one of the five feet wide, five feet deep holes.
"I'm okaaaaaaaaaay!" Elanna's voice warbled from inside the hole, tinged with both laughter and embarrassment.
"OH MY GOD!" Kate was shrieking, doubled over with laughter. "I just KNEW she was going to fall into a hole at least once!"
After Kate spent about fifteen minutes hauling Elanna out of the hole, which she had somehow managed to get herself stuck in, the group of six continued walking.
"You know, you're lucky as hell that there wern't any yellow spotted lizards in that hole." Aly commented after awhile.
"Mmm. Nothing like finally making it to Camp Greenlake only to become lizard food." Meta agreed.
"Well that was an awfully warm and fuzzy thought, I feel so much better about falling in a five foot hole now." Elanna snapped, brushing her blonde hair out of her eyes.
"Jeez, guys, chill." Kate said calmly, pulling her ponytail tighter. "We'll be there soon. That shadow's getting darker." The attention of the group was spiked, and six pairs of eyes gazed out across the desert to the steadily darkening shadow.
"You know, it probably would have taken shorter time to just go to big thumb from where we, er, landed." Heather said.
"But if we had we wouldn't have known which direction the camp was in." Landis said, glancing at Heather.
Kate groaned. She didn't know how much farther she could go. She hadn't had dinner, and the last time she had eaten was an early lunch at eleven. It was one in the morning when she had left her computer room. She hadn't eaten dinner because she wasn't hungry, but now she was sure as hell thirsty. They had been walking for what, two-three hours? Unless she had something to eat or drink soon, she would faint or be sick. She was so tired too. Kate knew everyone else must feel the same, but at least they had eaten something in the last twelve hours.
"You okay?" Meta asked, and Kate nodded as the desert spun around her.
"One hundred thirty six." Elanna said. Everyone turned and stared at her.
"What?" Aly asked, confused.
"The hell?" Kate muttered.
"One hundred and thirty seven. We have passed one hundred and thirty seven holes. One hundred and thirtu eight.......one hundred thirty nine." Elanna said, staring around at the more frequent holes.
"We're not going to be able to shut her up, are we?" Landis groaned.
"No. It doesn't look like it, no." Heather commented.
"This is going to be one hell of a long walk." Meta groaned.
"One hundred forty six."
"So........." Kate murmured.
"Yeah." Meta agreed to apparently nothing.
"How are we going to get out of this place?" Heather asked.
"You want go get OUT? We haven't even met the guys yet!" Aly exclaimed.
"Well, no not now, but eventually, you know? We aren't here stuck permanently, are we?" Heather asked again.
"Probably not. As long as we want to be, I'd think." Landis said, being the voice of reason as Kate was being unusually quiet. "If we're supposed to believe the crazy girl's logic, of course." He gestured to Elanna who was walking happily along counting holes.
"One hundred seventy three."
"I'm thirsty." Aly commented out of the blue.
"One hundred eighty four."
"Arn't we all?" Heather asked.
"One hundred ninty one. Wow, there's getting to be a lot more holes. One hundred ninety five."
"Elanna, shut up." Landis said. "I'm thirsty, I'm going to take a wild guess the rest of you guys are."
"I am." Meta said.
"Two hundred ten."
"Shut up, Elanna." Aly said. "Well obviously. I mean, who wouldn't be incredibly thirsty in the middle of a desert?"
"Two hundred twenty one."
"Elanna, SHUT UP!" Landis yelled. "Well, now that we've all agreed that we're thirsty......" He said, rolling his eyes.
Elanna glared at him, and kept counting under her breath. The Shadow was getting darker and defiantly larger. It was defiantly something.
The group suddenly realized they had been walking along a sort of dirt path through the holes unknowingly for the past few minutes. Thus why Elanna hadn't fallen into a whole for awhile.
Kate said nothing, and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other willing herself not to pass out.
The six tiredly dragged themselves across the old, dusty road, surrounded by holes.
"HELLO!!"
They all jumped.
"Whoa," said Heather.
"Where'd you come from?" finished Aly.
The random girl pointed to a hole behind her. She sighed. "Does anyone know where we are?"
"You mean you don't know?" asked Landis.
"No."
"We're assuming that we're near Camp Green Lake. You know. From Holes?"
"Oh...."
There was silence.
"Well, anyway, my name's Relina. Relina Avanor. Just call me Ra, Re, Reli or Relina. Doesn't matter." Relina looked at the girl who looked exceptionally tired. "And who are you?"
"That's Kate," answered Heather.
"Oh," Relina said. "Can I come with you guys? I wanna meet the D-tent boys too."
"Sure, why not?" said Landis.
"Yes," Relina whispered as she jumped on the dirt road.
"Are you thirsty?" he asked.
"Hell yeah..."
"Then you'll fit right in."
((To Be Continued...)) ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* ~*~*~*~*~*~