Chapter 9: Ella Stellar

It was a normal morning in the water tower. We got up, got dressed, brushed our hair and went downstairs for Yakko's famous pancakes. Today I had brought butterscotch, mint, and white chocolate chips to go with the normal ones, and also M&Ms and walnuts for Skippy's. That made me pretty popular. We spent the morning watching funny videos on the computer, and then it was time for lunch.
We had decided that we wanted to do a double sleepover, and luckily both my parents and Slappy agreed. We ate mac and cheese, and then decided to play charades, and after that, duck duck goose.
As we were all sitting on the floor, a deep rumbling started. It felt like a 9.5 earthquake!
Pinky and I let out identical shrieks, Brain let out a yell as he toppled to the ground, Francesca screamed and held onto Wakko and poor yelping Bubba, and Skippy squealed, jumped into my arms, and squeezed me tight.
But the Warner reactions were the funniest: Dot jumped into Wakko's lap, Wakko jumped into Yakko's, and Yakko jumped into mine, nearly squashing poor Skippy flat. Then a voice boomed around the room. "FOLLOW THE LINE OR FACE MY WRATH. YOU HAVE ONE HOUR." a shimmering gold line suddenly trailed across the floor. The shaking stopped. The only sounds were whimpering.
"Well… I - I guess we should follow the line," whispered Francesca. We agreed. We followed the line down the ladder, where there was a tunnel in the ground. Wakko went first, holding Francesca's hand. Then Dot came, bringing Skippy behind her. Now it was time for Yakko and me. Suddenly a few tears started running down my face. "Sorry," I sniffed. Yakko put an arm around me. "I'm just scared. We don't know who it is, and it could be the person who was giving me nightmares!"
"It's fine, whoever it is, we'll give 'em the ol' mallet!" grinned Yakko. I smiled and took a deep breath.

"I'm ready."

We crawled along the tunnel for a while, and then finally reached the end. As we pushed our way out, my blood ran cold.

This was the arena from my dream.

Suddenly, the lights flickered and faded. A voice echoed around the room. "Hello. My name is Cassie Stellar. And up until now you've been playing easy mode. Luckily for you that's about to change." just then, the lights turned back on.
"You know, you should really keep these lights on," said Yakko, who was holding a giant light switch from his hammerspace. I gasped. Standing in front of us was the most hideous creature I had ever seen. It had the face of a Warner, but there were some details that were way off.
For instance, it had Pinky's long bucktoothed snout. Her head was as large and round as Brain's. Her eyes, instead of black, were a dark shade of brown exactly like Francesca's. She had her ears pinned together with a flower like Dot's, had Wakko's red backwards cap and sticking out tongue, and… was that my dark brown ponytail!? She was wearing Wakko's blue turtleneck, but it said Kitten Love on it. Wait… that was on Francesca's shirt! Dot's short pink skirt was around her waist, but she also had on Yakko's slacks and belt. There were swirly patterns on them, just like on my pants. And poking out of the backside was Skippy's bushy brown tail! I was dumbstruck.
"Why?" was all I could say.
Cassie laughed. "Simple. All of you are greater than me. But when I get rid of you, I will be the greatest! MWAHAHAHAHA!"
I longed to take an anvil out of my hammerspace and smash her head in. I couldn't, though. I could take smaller things out, like rubber duckies and glasses of water, but nothing big yet.
"Get rid of us? Exsqueeze me? Sorry, but uhhhh, I think it's the other way round." said Yakko smoothly.
With that, he pulled out a mallet and stood poised to strike. In the blink of an eye, Cassie lifted him into the air without touching him. An invisible force closed around his throat and he began to struggle, looking shocked and scared. I barely noticed the screams of his siblings, the cries of Skippy and Francesca, the gasps of Pinky and the Brain. All I could think was Yakko.

The one who had comforted me during my awful visions.

The one who had serenaded me with his universe song.

The one who had made the best pancakes for me.

Almost without thinking, I reached into my hammerspace, and pulled out a mallet. A mallet.
I barely even realized. I ran forward and smashed it into Cassie's foot, Bubba was also trying to attack her. She yelled in pain and dropped Yakko. I managed to catch him and lower him to the ground, and he immediately scrambled to his feet, gasping and rubbing his throat. He was safe, for now.
But I was not.
She turned her rage filled face toward me and lifted her hand, and suddenly I was flying backwards. My body slammed into something, and my head smacked against stone. In the fraction of a single second, my world went red, then white, then gray, then black, the screams of my friends still echoing in my ears. After that, there was no more noise, no more pain.
Just darkness.

OH NOES D: What will happen now? Will Yakko be ok? Will I ever wake up? Will Cassie crush us all?

Read on...