(A/N: Well, the adventure has officially begun! Enjoy!)
Could It Be
Ch. 20
In the forest, the toddlers exited the wrecked truck, luckily not injured, but now in an unfamiliar environment. "Where are we?" Shenzi wondered aloud.
"I don't know," Tommy replied, "It kinda looks like the park."
"Only biggerer," Lil added.
"Biggerer? This place is bigger than the park, and the backyard all put together," Chuckie pointed out, "This is bad, you guys."
"Real bad!" Shenzi agreed.
"Uh oh, Tommy!" Lil noticed Dil squirming and grunting on the blanket. "I think your brother is broked again."
"Oh no!" Tommy came to check on him, along with the others. "Dil, are you okay?"
"I think he's gonna explode," Phil guessed.
"Poopy," Dil grunted.
"What?" Tommy leaned in closer.
"Poopy!" Dil grunted again, and the toddlers heard a disgusting noise.
"Ew!" They all leaned away, covering their noses.
"Well, I guess we'll have to change his diapie," Tommy concluded.
"What do you mean we?" Phil glared.
At the Pickles house, police officers and a news crew arrived after the toddlers were reported missing. "I can't believe you left them with your father!" Didi chastised Stu. "The man slept through Pearl Harbor, for heaven's sakes!"
"I sounded the alarm as soon as I could!" Lou defended himself.
"Uh, Mrs. Pickle, did your son have any enemies?" A police woman asked Didi.
"Oh...!" She gasped at the shocking question.
"Uh-huh. Any underworld or mob connections?"
"He's a baby!"
In the forest, the toddlers were attempting to change a fussy Dil's diaper, coughing as Tommy tried to powder his backside. "The powder goes on his butt, Tommy!" Shenzi exclaimed, as she held onto Dil's shoulders.
"Well, I'm doing the best I can!"
Just then, Dil yanked her headband off her head. "Hey! My bow!" He threw it in the air, and a sudden slight gust of wind blew it away. "Oh no!" She went to run after it, but Chuckie stopped her, as Lil took her place.
"We don't gots time for that! We've gotta stick together!"
Dil kicked Tommy to the ground, then released some urine in the air. "Pee-pee!" The kids hastily ducked for cover.
"Look out!" Phil yelled out.
"Stop it, Dil!" Chuckie ordered the baby.
"Get off me!" Lil had landed on Phil when ducking for cover.
Chuckie fell on his stomach on the ground, so a frog jumped on his head. "Aah! Frog! Frog!" He freaked out, with everyone else watching in concern, until he fell in a leaf pile, and the frog jumped away. Now angry, he walked up to the tree stump where Dil was laying. "Your brother made a frog jump on me!"
"Ribbit!" Dil played with him.
"Stop it!" Chuckie ordered him.
"Ribbit!"
"You stop it!"
"Stop it!" Dil parroted.
"Stop it!"
"Ribbit!"
"Hey, guys!" Tommy stopped the argument. "Maybe we should stop playing around, and figure out how to get home!" He put a fresh diaper on Dil.
"Right!" Shenzi agreed.
"But Tommy, we don't even know where we are," Lil pointed out.
"Uh, I know! I've got my sponsatility!" He took his pocket watch out of his diaper.
"What's a sponsatility, Tommy?" Shenzi asked him.
"Sounds yucky," Phil remarked.
"No, it's what you get for being a big brother," Tommy explained, "It's just like Okey-Dokey Jones uses when he has to find his way home." They put Dil back in the wagon.
"Isn't that a crumpass?" Shenzi wondered aloud, dragging the duffle bag to the wagon.
"Well, my dad gave it to me, and he called it a sponsatility."
"Where's it say to go?" Phil asked him.
"Well, um, uh, hmm," Tommy tried to figure it out, "This way. Uh... That's the way! Straight up that hill!"
In another part of the forest, Angelica was still dragged along by Spike. "Aah! Bad dog, bad dog! STOP!" At the scene of the mattress truck wreckage, Spike stopped upon seeing a pacifier and sniffed at it, but Angelica kept rolling, and just before he could pick it up in his mouth, he was pulled away after her. She hit some tree branches, with Spike close behind, before she landed square on a tree trunk, being knocked unconscious. After a while, she woke up to Spike holding her hat in his mouth, and setting it down. "You know, not all dogs go to heaven," She sneered at him.
At the Pickles house, just as the parents ran outside, they were bombarded by nosy news reporters. "Mr. Pickles, is it true you shipped your own children to Tokyo in a wooden box?" The reporter from channel 3 asked Stu.
"Is it true a dingo ate your baby?" A woman from channel 11 asked Didi.
"Mr. Pickles, how many pecks of pickled peppers did you pick?"
Just then, Rex Pester, the snoopiest reporter out of all of them, came to the scene in a helicopter with his cameraman, scaring the other reporters away. "Childhood, a time of innocence, a time of joy. A time of unspeakable, unrelenting tragedy," He narrated, then turned to Didi, "Mrs. Pickles, tell us how it feels to know you may never see your children again."
"Criminy! Can't you pit bulls show some compassion?!" Betty chastised him.
"I'm so sorry. Forgive me." But he did not let up. "Please tell us how it feels to know you may never see your children again."
"Augh! Get him!" Betty was held back by Stu and Lou when she tried to attack the rude reporter. "Let me at him! All right!"
Just then, Drew and Charlotte arrived at the scene. "Hold on, Jonathan. There's an alarming crowd at my in-law's indicating either a yard sale or a family tragedy. Let me get back to you."
Rex then came up to the newcomers of the scene. "Hey, Mr. Pickles, how does it feel knowing your brother lost your only daughter?"
"He WHAT?!" Drew screamed, and his face physically turned red in fury.
"Share your pain."
"YAAA!" He tackled Stu to the ground, and forced his arm up in an unnatural way.
"You're breaking my arm!"
"Only 'cause I can't reach your neck!"
"And there you have it," Rex turned back to the camera, as Charlotte and Howard tried to break up the fight, "2 sour Pickles and: young Tammy, baby Dale, the twins Bill and Jill, little Chunky, innocent Shelly, and poor Amelia, all vanished without a trace. I'm Rex Pester, and I'll be back with more "Bi-i-ig Action Ne-e-ews"!"
Chaz came rushing from a neighbor's house, and back to the scene as Charlotte was helping Stu stand up. "Mr. Swenson said he saw Angelica and Spike run thought his garden and head north on I-99!"
"My baby!" She dropped him back to the ground, and ran after Chaz.
"Let's go!" Didi followed her lead.
Everyone started to leave, when Lou came out of the house in his military uniform. "Private First Class Pickles reporting for duty!"
"Just get in! Come on!" Friar Tuck rushed him, eager and desperate to find his daughter.
In the forest, the kids were moving the Reptar wagon up the hill, with Tommy pushing from the back, and Chuckie, Shenzi, and the twins pulling at the front. By now, Shenzi's dark hair was getting in her face, since it was not held back. "Good job, you guys!" Tommy praised them. "We're almost there! Good, Dil. Now, play nice." Dil hit his head with the bottle.
"Not much fun back there, is it?" Phil asked him with lowered eyelids.
"Oh, we're doing okay. That's some good hitting there, Dilly." He was hit again.
"I'm hungry," Shenzi remarked, "Right about now, my daddy would be making me some heartsy chicken," She licked her lips, "I can almost smell them in the marble wave." She stopped walking, and let go of the rope. "Ooh, they taste all juicy- oof!" She was surprised by the wagon bumping into her back, making her stumble.
"Stop it, Shenzi," Tommy spoke up, "You're making me hungry." Dil hit him with the bottle again.
They stopped at the top of the hill, but the twins gasped in horror at what was before them: Trees as far as their eyes could see! There was also a river gushing down below the hill. "Oh no!" Chuckie exclaimed.
"We can't see our houses from here, Tommy," Lil pointed out worriedly.
"We can't see any houses from here," Phil rephrased.
Chuckie fell to his knees in despair. "We're doomed! Doomed! Doomed, I tell you!" A distance away, a fierce wolf spotted them.
At the scene of the truck wreck, the parents waited for anything that would help in the search, when the police woman found something. "Mrs. Pickle, I know this is hard for you, but can you identify his binky?" She held up the pacifier from the road, and Stu and Didi gasped in shock.
Just then, a police man found something else on the road, close to where the pacifier was, and turned to the parents. "Were any of the missing children wearing this?" He held up a purple bow headband with some small tears in it, presumably from sharp branches. Friar Tuck reacted with horror, as all the parents' eyes were on him.
Meanwhile, Chuckie had started crying in despair, when he saw Shenzi even more upset than him. He went over, and hugged her as they cried together. She yearned to be safe in her father's arms right now, but Chuckie was second best. "This is all Dil's fault, right guys?" Phil turned to them.
"Uh," Chuckie hesitated.
"Uh-uh!" Tommy protested. "This never would've happened if you hadn't putted him in the wagon in the first place, right, guys?"
"Uh, nuh-uh!"
"It's not our fault you got a bad, naughty, stinky baby for a brother!" Lil argued.
"He's not naughty! He's just a... he's just a... a baby! How could you be mad just because you're... Dil pulled one of the tabs on Tommy's diaper, so it fell to his ankles. "...Um... standing there all nakie?" Chuckie, Shenzi, and the twins gawked in surprise, while Lil was smiling antagonistically. "I mean, I'm sure he's trying to help. And side's, it's hot, phew, 'sploring in the woods all day. Ah! A little breeze feels good. Just what I needed!" He pulled his diaper back up, as he tried to stay positive. "Oh, thank you, Dil."
Dil then started hiccuping. "His hipups are really starting to bug me," Phil growled.
"Face it, Tommy. Having a baby brother just isn't what you expected," Lil glared.
Chuckie and Shenzi then spotted something in the distance. "Hey, you guys, look!" He pointed out. "Somebody's house!"
"Tommy was right!" Shenzi added.
"Wow! My sponsatility does work!" Tommy cheered.
"Yeah, but who'd have a house way out there in the forest?" Phil wondered aloud.
"Maybe a lizard lives there," Tommy guessed.
"A lizard?" Chuckie furrowed his eyebrows in confusion.
"I thoughted lizards lived in window boxes," Shenzi expressed confusion as well.
"Not that kind! You know, a big guy with a pointy hat that grants wishes." Tommy walked up to the two-year-old girl. "All's we got to do is knock on the door and say we wanna go home. See? Then everything will be back to norman!"
"Thanks, Bob!" Phil praised.
"Thank you, Bob!" Lil added.
"Come on, guys! We're off to see the lizard!" Tommy went to lead the group, but tripped and fell on the ground.
An alarmed and concerned Chuckie ran over to check on him. "Oh, Tommy, are you okay?"
"I'm fine," Tommy stood back up, "I just tripped in a little hole, that's all."
The toddlers saw a large footprint in the ground where he had fallen. Shenzi went up to study it. "Wow, it looks kinda like Spike's feet, but more like if he were a giant."
"I saw feetprints like that in our storybook," Phil pointed out, "A wolf made them, and then he ate that Little Red Riding girl."
"The wolf ate a girl?" Chuckie's hands went up to his mouth in alarm.
"Um, well, they got her out," Phil shrugged.
"I don't think it's a wolf, guys. If it was, we'd hear him say..." Tommy went to imitate a wolf's howl, only to hear a real one.
"Hey, that was pretty good," Phil complimented him.
"I didn't do anything," Tommy pointed out, shooting fear into their hearts. After hearing a more faint howl, the toddlers screamed, and piled into the wagon, with Chuckie pushing it, then climbing in as it rolled down the hill. "Do you see the wolf?" The bald toddler asked around.
"I don't know what he looks like," Chuckie tried to look.
"Teeth! Teeth and fur! And teeth!" Phil exclaimed. "Like Shenzi, only big and scary!" She shot him a glare.
Dil scooted up to the front, and grabbed the steering wheel. "No, Dil!" Tommy tried to stop him. Bad Dil! No!" Dil drove the wagon along the path, narrowly dodging trees, and through a serene clearing.
Elsewhere in the forest, a ranger was driving a Jeep along the path, training a new recruit. "Margaret? That's your name, isn't it? I'm sure you've run afoul of many a scary pedestrian. But out here, we have what you might call... hmm, how should I put it? Actual danger."
"Danger?" Margaret gasped in surprise.
"Grizzlies that'll rip the top off your car," Ranger Frank lectured her, "Bobcats, wolves, wolverines, which are something entirely different."
Just then, the Reptar wagon zoomed behind the Jeep, and Margaret caught a quick glimpse. "And dragons?! Ha!"
"Tommy, I saw some grown-ups!" Chuckie yelled. "Stop! Stop!"
"I don't know how!" Tommy tried all the buttons, but none of them stopped the wagon.
But they started heading for the edge of a cliff! "Well, I hope you figure it out, 'cause I didn't bring no bathee suit!" Lil exclaimed.
Tommy pulled on a lever, and screeched to a stop just barely over the edge, but the wagon fell back to safety. "Any further, and I would've needed a fresh undie-pants," Shenzi remarked to Chuckie.
Out of curiosity, Dil started playing with the brake, making the wagon roll forward! "Dil, no!" Tommy tried to stop him, but he let go of the brake lever, so they drove right over the edge! The toddlers screamed, with Shenzi and Chuckie hugging each other, until the wagon landed upright in the river, so everyone was splashed with water.
Just then, a special float around the front inflated, and the tip of the tail spun like a propeller. "Aqua Reptar, engaged." The kids looked on in awe as the wagon floated along the river. They rode under a bridge to the ranger's station, just as the Jeep drove by, narrowly missing them.
"I'm telling you, I saw a dragon!" Margaret exclaimed.
"Margaret..."
"A big green, fire-breathing dragon! I've got to call headquarters!" She rushed to the phone.
"While you're at it, you might ask for a new assignment, say, a city park," Frank walked up to the telescope, "'Cause, you see, out here in the country, you have to be just a little tougher." Just then, he saw the wagon in the river. "AAH! AAH! THE DRAGON! I JUST SAW IT! I JUST SAW IT!"
"Where? Where?!" Margaret eagerly went for a look, but didn't see it. "Here? Where?"
"Bingo! Look at here!" Lou picked up a candy wrapper from the scene of the wreckage. "A wrapper from a Cynthia Sweet Bar."
"My angel!" Drew grabbed the wrapper. "She's been here!" He held it to his cheek.
"Yep, I figure she's tracking the sprouts. It's the Pickles' blood. I myself spent 15 days tracking Sitting Bull through the Northwest Territory. The year was 19..."
"Over here!" Chaz and Friar Tuck rushed over from the forest.
"We found some wheel tracks and baby footprints heading into the woods!" Chaz announced. "Actually, Tuck found them. I saw them."
"They must be in my Reptar wagon," Stu concluded.
""It's the perfect children's toy"!" Drew mocked him sarcastically. "You and your stupid inventions!"
"My stupid inventions?" He grabbed his brother's upper arms when he had an epiphany. "That's it!"
Betty grabbed an officer's bullhorn, and took charge. "All right, the pups are in the woods! You men follow those tracks!" She told the officers. "We'll head to the ranger's station and start the search from there! NOW MOVE! HUT, HUT, HUT!"
Stu, Drew Lou, Chaz, and Friar Tuck headed for the car, confusing Didi. "Stu, where are you going?!"
"Trust me, Deed! I have a plan!" He started driving back home at an illegal speed.
(A/N: Well... you know the disclaimer. XD Shenzi's "heartsy chicken" is chicken nuggets shaped like hearts. Just to avoid confusion.)