Quintet: Part Five
by Martial Arts Master
All PBS Kids characters copyright of PBS, PBS Kids, and the shows' respective creators. This fanfiction idea came to me in a dream. In my dream, five PBS Kids characters were on a quest of some sort, though I don't know exactly what, so I made up the story from there in this fic. In my dream, they were known as the Heavenly Quintet. (This was a weird dream. So weird, in fact, that the word the dream actually used was "quantet", which isn't even a word.) However, I had to make a couple of changes. First of all, the Dragon Tales character that appeared in my dream was Ord, but I put Cassie in this fic instead because otherwise, Sagwa, the main character from Sagwa: The Chinese-Siamese Cat, would've been the only female in the entire quintet, which might cause female readers to accuse me of being a sexist pig, and they would have a right to do so. Therefore, Cassie will appear in this fic instead. Second of all, I changed the name of the quintet to the PBS Kids Quintet, because using the word "heavenly" would've been a blatant religious reference, and with the exception of The Adventures from the Book of Virtues, which had an episode centered around "Faith", and the Cyberchase episode that involved the Greek deity Zeus, PBS Kids is completely non-religious. I can't always say the same for the regular PBS, but PBS Kids is for the most part immune to religion. Therefore, to keep the spirit of PBS Kids, the name change stands. Also, those of you who have actually been reading this fanfic may have been wondering why I've portrayed Arthur as pessimistic and not good for much. This is not because I hate him. I don't. First of all, I try not to hate characters in general, and second of all, I can't hate a character whose show I don't even watch. The reason I've portrayed Arthur this way is because I was leaving room for character growth---growth that will be accomplished in this very chapter. First, though, Arthur's gonna have to do something that'll give him a wake-up call. Finally, as to the reviewer who suggested the "evil clown" idea, whose name is "B4 Not After", I'm going to use that idea, and I'm crediting you here. Now, on with the fanfic!
***
Our heroes had made it past the Volcano section. They were obviously very relieved that they no longer had to put up with a place that was so friggin' hot!
"So, what did Dave say came after Volcano?" Sagwa asked.
Matt thought about that for a minute. "It was the Carnival section," he finally said. "Yeah, that's it. The Carnival section for sure." "So how do we get there?" Cassie asked.
"I'll have my Skwak show us the way," Matt responded, reaching into his pocket.
Then, Matt discovered that the Skwak was not in his pocket.
"That's weird," he said to himself.
Then he noticed Arthur playing with it, looking curious, like the Skwak was a toy.
"Wait! Stop!" Matt shouted, running over to Arthur.
Arthur ignored Matt. The Skwak was neat, Arthur thought. Yeah, he knew he shouldn't be playing with the Skwak, but Arthur had always been careful with toys before. He wouldn't break this one.
At least, that's what he thought.
Unfortunately, when he was pressing the buttons to see what they did, he pressed too many too fast. The Skwak fizzled and then went out, broken.
Matt was horrified.
"You broke it!!!" Matt screamed.
"I'm sorry," Arthur muttered guiltily.
Clifford groaned.
"Now we'll never be able to find our way to the Carnival section!" he moaned in despair.
"Did I hear you say you're looking for the carnival section?" asked a voice from behind them.
Our heroes spun around and noticed a male human standing there.
Before any of them could ask who he was, the human continued, "Just continue straight ahead and you'll get to the Carnival. Perhaps you'll find someone there who can fix your Skwak, too."
Before our heroes could ask how he knew the Skwak had just been broken, the human disappeared in a flash of light.
"Who on earth was that?" Clifford asked nervously.
"Probably just this world's way of guiding us to the Carnival's challenges," Sagwa replied, shrugging.
Our heroes continued walking straight ahead, and they indeed came to a carnival.
The carnival in question had everything you could expect in a carnival. There was a lot of food, a Ferris Wheel, a roller coaster, a merry-go-round, bumper cars, a "haunted house", a huge amount of games, etc.
That's when our heroes realized that they were hungry. They hadn't eaten in quite a while.
"We'll worry about the Skwak later," Sagwa said, giving Arthur a dirty look.
Most of our heroes headed to the popcorn stand, leaving Arthur standing there pondering what he'd done.
Because he'd played with something he wasn't supposed to, they'd lost the one device that contained the map Dave had given them. Without it, how could they ever hope to reach the end of the world and claim the prize?
It occurred to him that throughout his journey, he'd been acting pessimistic, bringing everybody down. Well no more!
It occurred to Arthur that it was time to grow up, and fast. He had to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.
Speaking of a problem, once our heroes reached the popcorn stand, they found to their surprise that a clown was in charge.
"Hello...friends..." the clown said in a low voice, chuckling wickedly.
Our heroes immediately realized that something was wrong, but it was too late.
Four yellow beams shot out of the evil clown's eyes, two out of each eye.
As they struck our heroes, one by one they became zombie-like. Soon, they were completely under the clown's spell.
No one else at the park noticed except Arthur, probably because part of the challenge was not receiving help from anyone else at the park.
"Bring them back!" Arthur shouted, running over to the clown.
"Too late, kid," the evil clown said, knocking Arthur away from him. Again, no one else at the park noticed. "The only way you'll ever get them back now is to answer a riddle."
Arthur gulped and stammered, "O...o...okay."
"This riddle contains something from my past," the clown said, chuckling. "Okay, here goes."
The clown cleared his throat.
"A year ago, when I was just starting to become a clown, I was calmly walking along a path, minding my own business," the clown began. "Then, I noticed some townspeople arguing over who had stolen some money. I had a rooster and a pot with me, and I had an idea."
This was beginning to sound like something Arthur had read in a book of lateral thinking puzzles.
If only he could remember the answer...
"I told them that my rooster was magic," the clown continued. "I placed it under a pot and had everyone go inside a building. Then, I turned off the lights and ordered everyone to put their hands on the pot one by one, leaving afterward. The theory went that when the guilty person placed his/her hands on the pot, the rooster would crow. Then, someone would turn the lights back on, and the one whose hands were currently on the pot was guilty."
This was familiar to Arthur. Now he knew this was the same problem as the one he'd read. This wasn't part of the clown's past, this stupid clown had stolen the riddle.
"But when the lights were turned off, and the test was performed, my chicken never crowed," the clown continued. "I said, 'Must be a defective rooster.' Yet when the lights went on, I was able to figure out who was the thief anyway. How?"
Arthur trembled. What on earth was the answer? He had to remember!
He desperately looked at his surroundings for a clue that would jog his memory.
He noticed the rides...the games...the food...the drinks...the dirt on the ground...
The dirt!!! Now Arthur remembered, and became a lot more confident.
"The rooster wasn't magic," Arthur answered. "You said that to make everyone think it was. So since the guilty person was afraid that the rooster might really crow, he didn't put his hands on the pot at all, while everyone else did, knowing their innocence. But the pot was really dirty, so this precaution was actually the thief's downfall, since he/she was the only one in the room who didn't have dirt on his hands. Thus, you had only to look at everyone's hands to figure out who was guilty."
The clown started jumping up and down, screaming.
"Nooooooooooooo!" the clown screamed, throwing a tantrum.
This broke his concentration, and the spell on the rest of our heroes wore off.
"I feel dizzy..." Cassie complained.
"I can't believe an immature kid like you solved it!" the clown screamed at Arthur.
He then disappeared, and a gigantic bag of popcorn was left in its place.
"Oh boy, I'm starved!" Clifford declared.
Our heroes dug in, quickly consuming the entire bag of popcorn.
Then, Sagwa bit into something hard.
"OW!" she screamed, spitting the object out, her mouth bleeding.
While Cassie, ever the helpful one, took band-aids out of her pouch and placed them on Sagwa's wounds, Clifford looked the object over, poking it curiously.
Suddenly the object sprang to life, making jumps all over the place and then jumping on the Skwak. It expanded itself, to the shock of our heroes, and then there was a huge whirring sound. It eventually subsided, and the object hopped off to reveal a Skwak with the map displayed.
Apparently, the object had fixed the Skwak.
Matt was impressed.
"Wow...we pass only one challenge, and we get our Skwak fixed! Now we can go to the next section!" he declared.
Then he said to Arthur, "I forgive you for breaking it now."
"That's okay," Arthur responded. "I'm sorry I've been such a pain throughout this journey. I have to wonder though...why was that evil clown the only challenge?"
Matt thought about that.
"You know, it's almost as if we're just characters in a fanfic being written by an author who's run out of carnival ideas..." he said slowly.
Seeing the blank looks on everyone else's faces, Matt realized that none of them surfed the Internet and therefore probably didn't know what a fanfic was.
"Of course, it could be because that Ashura guy Dave spoke of is losing his touch..." he finished.
As it turns out, Matt was right on the latter.
Ashura, in his place in the Desert, was fuming.
He wondered why he had been unable to think of any other challenges our heroes could face in a carnival.
He reasoned that it was because he was losing his touch. He considered himself more creative than Dave, and therefore this shouldn't have happened.
Oh well, he thought. The next section was the Underwater section...there would be plenty of opportunities for challenges in such an environment.
Ashura chuckled to himself. This was going to be fun.
To be continued...
E-mail all other questions and comments to bleifer@comcast.net
All PBS Kids characters copyright of PBS, PBS Kids, and the shows' respective creators. This fanfiction idea came to me in a dream. In my dream, five PBS Kids characters were on a quest of some sort, though I don't know exactly what, so I made up the story from there in this fic. In my dream, they were known as the Heavenly Quintet. (This was a weird dream. So weird, in fact, that the word the dream actually used was "quantet", which isn't even a word.) However, I had to make a couple of changes. First of all, the Dragon Tales character that appeared in my dream was Ord, but I put Cassie in this fic instead because otherwise, Sagwa, the main character from Sagwa: The Chinese-Siamese Cat, would've been the only female in the entire quintet, which might cause female readers to accuse me of being a sexist pig, and they would have a right to do so. Therefore, Cassie will appear in this fic instead. Second of all, I changed the name of the quintet to the PBS Kids Quintet, because using the word "heavenly" would've been a blatant religious reference, and with the exception of The Adventures from the Book of Virtues, which had an episode centered around "Faith", and the Cyberchase episode that involved the Greek deity Zeus, PBS Kids is completely non-religious. I can't always say the same for the regular PBS, but PBS Kids is for the most part immune to religion. Therefore, to keep the spirit of PBS Kids, the name change stands. Also, those of you who have actually been reading this fanfic may have been wondering why I've portrayed Arthur as pessimistic and not good for much. This is not because I hate him. I don't. First of all, I try not to hate characters in general, and second of all, I can't hate a character whose show I don't even watch. The reason I've portrayed Arthur this way is because I was leaving room for character growth---growth that will be accomplished in this very chapter. First, though, Arthur's gonna have to do something that'll give him a wake-up call. Finally, as to the reviewer who suggested the "evil clown" idea, whose name is "B4 Not After", I'm going to use that idea, and I'm crediting you here. Now, on with the fanfic!
***
Our heroes had made it past the Volcano section. They were obviously very relieved that they no longer had to put up with a place that was so friggin' hot!
"So, what did Dave say came after Volcano?" Sagwa asked.
Matt thought about that for a minute. "It was the Carnival section," he finally said. "Yeah, that's it. The Carnival section for sure." "So how do we get there?" Cassie asked.
"I'll have my Skwak show us the way," Matt responded, reaching into his pocket.
Then, Matt discovered that the Skwak was not in his pocket.
"That's weird," he said to himself.
Then he noticed Arthur playing with it, looking curious, like the Skwak was a toy.
"Wait! Stop!" Matt shouted, running over to Arthur.
Arthur ignored Matt. The Skwak was neat, Arthur thought. Yeah, he knew he shouldn't be playing with the Skwak, but Arthur had always been careful with toys before. He wouldn't break this one.
At least, that's what he thought.
Unfortunately, when he was pressing the buttons to see what they did, he pressed too many too fast. The Skwak fizzled and then went out, broken.
Matt was horrified.
"You broke it!!!" Matt screamed.
"I'm sorry," Arthur muttered guiltily.
Clifford groaned.
"Now we'll never be able to find our way to the Carnival section!" he moaned in despair.
"Did I hear you say you're looking for the carnival section?" asked a voice from behind them.
Our heroes spun around and noticed a male human standing there.
Before any of them could ask who he was, the human continued, "Just continue straight ahead and you'll get to the Carnival. Perhaps you'll find someone there who can fix your Skwak, too."
Before our heroes could ask how he knew the Skwak had just been broken, the human disappeared in a flash of light.
"Who on earth was that?" Clifford asked nervously.
"Probably just this world's way of guiding us to the Carnival's challenges," Sagwa replied, shrugging.
Our heroes continued walking straight ahead, and they indeed came to a carnival.
The carnival in question had everything you could expect in a carnival. There was a lot of food, a Ferris Wheel, a roller coaster, a merry-go-round, bumper cars, a "haunted house", a huge amount of games, etc.
That's when our heroes realized that they were hungry. They hadn't eaten in quite a while.
"We'll worry about the Skwak later," Sagwa said, giving Arthur a dirty look.
Most of our heroes headed to the popcorn stand, leaving Arthur standing there pondering what he'd done.
Because he'd played with something he wasn't supposed to, they'd lost the one device that contained the map Dave had given them. Without it, how could they ever hope to reach the end of the world and claim the prize?
It occurred to him that throughout his journey, he'd been acting pessimistic, bringing everybody down. Well no more!
It occurred to Arthur that it was time to grow up, and fast. He had to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.
Speaking of a problem, once our heroes reached the popcorn stand, they found to their surprise that a clown was in charge.
"Hello...friends..." the clown said in a low voice, chuckling wickedly.
Our heroes immediately realized that something was wrong, but it was too late.
Four yellow beams shot out of the evil clown's eyes, two out of each eye.
As they struck our heroes, one by one they became zombie-like. Soon, they were completely under the clown's spell.
No one else at the park noticed except Arthur, probably because part of the challenge was not receiving help from anyone else at the park.
"Bring them back!" Arthur shouted, running over to the clown.
"Too late, kid," the evil clown said, knocking Arthur away from him. Again, no one else at the park noticed. "The only way you'll ever get them back now is to answer a riddle."
Arthur gulped and stammered, "O...o...okay."
"This riddle contains something from my past," the clown said, chuckling. "Okay, here goes."
The clown cleared his throat.
"A year ago, when I was just starting to become a clown, I was calmly walking along a path, minding my own business," the clown began. "Then, I noticed some townspeople arguing over who had stolen some money. I had a rooster and a pot with me, and I had an idea."
This was beginning to sound like something Arthur had read in a book of lateral thinking puzzles.
If only he could remember the answer...
"I told them that my rooster was magic," the clown continued. "I placed it under a pot and had everyone go inside a building. Then, I turned off the lights and ordered everyone to put their hands on the pot one by one, leaving afterward. The theory went that when the guilty person placed his/her hands on the pot, the rooster would crow. Then, someone would turn the lights back on, and the one whose hands were currently on the pot was guilty."
This was familiar to Arthur. Now he knew this was the same problem as the one he'd read. This wasn't part of the clown's past, this stupid clown had stolen the riddle.
"But when the lights were turned off, and the test was performed, my chicken never crowed," the clown continued. "I said, 'Must be a defective rooster.' Yet when the lights went on, I was able to figure out who was the thief anyway. How?"
Arthur trembled. What on earth was the answer? He had to remember!
He desperately looked at his surroundings for a clue that would jog his memory.
He noticed the rides...the games...the food...the drinks...the dirt on the ground...
The dirt!!! Now Arthur remembered, and became a lot more confident.
"The rooster wasn't magic," Arthur answered. "You said that to make everyone think it was. So since the guilty person was afraid that the rooster might really crow, he didn't put his hands on the pot at all, while everyone else did, knowing their innocence. But the pot was really dirty, so this precaution was actually the thief's downfall, since he/she was the only one in the room who didn't have dirt on his hands. Thus, you had only to look at everyone's hands to figure out who was guilty."
The clown started jumping up and down, screaming.
"Nooooooooooooo!" the clown screamed, throwing a tantrum.
This broke his concentration, and the spell on the rest of our heroes wore off.
"I feel dizzy..." Cassie complained.
"I can't believe an immature kid like you solved it!" the clown screamed at Arthur.
He then disappeared, and a gigantic bag of popcorn was left in its place.
"Oh boy, I'm starved!" Clifford declared.
Our heroes dug in, quickly consuming the entire bag of popcorn.
Then, Sagwa bit into something hard.
"OW!" she screamed, spitting the object out, her mouth bleeding.
While Cassie, ever the helpful one, took band-aids out of her pouch and placed them on Sagwa's wounds, Clifford looked the object over, poking it curiously.
Suddenly the object sprang to life, making jumps all over the place and then jumping on the Skwak. It expanded itself, to the shock of our heroes, and then there was a huge whirring sound. It eventually subsided, and the object hopped off to reveal a Skwak with the map displayed.
Apparently, the object had fixed the Skwak.
Matt was impressed.
"Wow...we pass only one challenge, and we get our Skwak fixed! Now we can go to the next section!" he declared.
Then he said to Arthur, "I forgive you for breaking it now."
"That's okay," Arthur responded. "I'm sorry I've been such a pain throughout this journey. I have to wonder though...why was that evil clown the only challenge?"
Matt thought about that.
"You know, it's almost as if we're just characters in a fanfic being written by an author who's run out of carnival ideas..." he said slowly.
Seeing the blank looks on everyone else's faces, Matt realized that none of them surfed the Internet and therefore probably didn't know what a fanfic was.
"Of course, it could be because that Ashura guy Dave spoke of is losing his touch..." he finished.
As it turns out, Matt was right on the latter.
Ashura, in his place in the Desert, was fuming.
He wondered why he had been unable to think of any other challenges our heroes could face in a carnival.
He reasoned that it was because he was losing his touch. He considered himself more creative than Dave, and therefore this shouldn't have happened.
Oh well, he thought. The next section was the Underwater section...there would be plenty of opportunities for challenges in such an environment.
Ashura chuckled to himself. This was going to be fun.
To be continued...
E-mail all other questions and comments to bleifer@comcast.net
