CHAPTER ONE
"C'mon! Keep it movin'!" the driver shouted over the cracking of the whip and the yelping of the multicolored Yoshis. Crick wiped the sweat from his brow and tried his hardest to ignore the searing pain in what seemed like every part of his body. He imagined what this place might have been like all that time ago, when it was still called Yoshi's Island instead of Happiness City.
The island was not the Yoshis' anymore. Hundreds of years ago, it had been taken over by humans, and the natives were forced to be their slaves. Their descendants still worked in much the same way, and were whipped if they stopped to rest.
Crick was what was called a "Regular Delinquent." No matter how many scars he received on his turquoise back, he would never do a full day's work or stop pranking the other Yoshis unlucky enough to be assigned to the Diamond Mines.
He listened to the Supervisors as he struck his pickaxe against the wall of Mine 84-J. usually they had just their casual, unimportant human conversation. But now, what he heard startled him.
"'Ey! Y'know dat one Yushee, see da one right dere?"
"Yeah, 'is name's Crick, er somefin of da surt."
"Yeah, Crick. I over'eard sum of da Majors tukin' 'bout 'im."
"Well, dun kip me in suspinse! Whud dey say?"
"Sid dey might put 'im down tinite. Ya know, kill 'im."
"Serves 'im right, da lazy devil!"
The two Supervisors burst out in laughter, but Crick wasn't laughing with them. His face went pale. He was going to be put down. He was going to die.
That is, if he didn't do anything about it!
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The sound of footsteps echoed through the Sleeping Halls, waking every Yoshi that wasn't already up and setting them hoping desperately that it was not a Grimn. Grimns were the most feared positions of Yoshi Keepers. They were the ones who took disobedient Yoshis to the Execution Rooms.
The seven Yoshis in Sleeping Hall 79-B were already awake. Ellizar was on lookout duty. "You guys had better hurry up," he whispered. Everyone always whispered in Sleeping Hall 79-B. None of them wanted to be heard or to have their antics discovered. Every one of them was marked Delinquent by the Supervisors. They were a group of habitual troublemakers.
Especially Crick, the Regular Delinquent.
Rokabi's purple hands moved fast as he tied one bed sheet to another in his signature Trust Knots to make a sort of rope around his best friend's waist. "Crick, I knew it would come to this! Now we're never going to see each other again! Oh, why didn't you listen?"
"Ssh!" Graciel hissed. "I think I hear something!"
She did. Ellizar stared fearfully into the darkness to find the source of the sound…
It was a tall figure, wearing the conventional black robes and blue cape of a Grimn. "Code Licorice! Code Licorice!" he half-whispered, half-screamed.
"Code Licorice?!" Rokabi repeated in terror. "That means there's no time! Crick, you have to hurry! We've got to get you out of here—NOW!!!"
Without another word, he threw the window open, tied one of the sheets to the latch for locking out drafts and shoved Crick out into the night.