The short, brunette girl smiled excitedly as a gaggle of Neopets and a Chinese American girl came tumbling through a large gateway.
"You came!" she cheered excitedly. "Now – untie me!"
Neither the Chinese American girl nor any of the Neopets seemed keen to untie the girl.
"What... what are you waiting for?" the girl asked despondently. "I've had an itchy nose for hours!"
A loud, booming snicker started reverberating around the room. The girl tried to turn her head to look, but it was held firmly in place.
"You are all trespassers," sounded the booming voice.
A Brown Uni felt she should make her voice heard. "This is my tunnel," she informed the booming voice with an American accent. "I can't trespass in my own tunnel."
"This is my tunnel now," the voice remarked icily. "And just for that rude comment, you can go first!"
The brunette girl watched a laser beam soar over her head and hit the Brown Uni. She collapsed to the floor. The girl gulped – a little too loudly.
"Afraid, are you? Well, how about facing your fears?"
Jess opened her eyes abruptly. She stared at her surroundings for comfort, then closed her eyes and contemplated the smooth bobbing of the boat. When she'd first been taken here, she'd felt quite sick, but she'd soon gotten used to it.
Jess briefly wondered what the time was. Any later than six-thirty or so and she was bound to be dragged outside and whacked around a bit. Inwardly, she cursed her predicament. She dragged herself out of bed in order to dress and get ready for her undoubtedly awful day. With pirates, the day always was.
She stepped out off her "room" - which had been converted from a storage cupboard, naturally enough – and winced as the sun hit her eyes. It was yet another hot summer day, all right. Jess longed for the cooler days of spring and early autumn, but there was work to be done. She headed straight to the kitchen and cooked up some sloppy porridge for those pirate fiends.
It wasn't fair, really, that assorted animals should be capable of abducting human girls, but there you are.
Many kilometres away, greatly stressed school student Zoey rocketed out of her sleep, having had the same dream. All thoughts of it were soon rushed out of the Chinese girl's mind thanks to a 50cm high pile of paper next to the girl's bed.
"Science assignment..." the girl's eyes widened in horror as she listed all the things she had to do. "English essay! Two English essays! Math homework! French tasks!" A brief glance at the clock. "All due in less than four hours!"
Zoey lunged for the stack of paper next to her bed, causing countless papers to go flying.
"Magic exam," Zoey muttered, gathering her papers up off the floor. "History presentation. Physical analysis." Papers gathered, Zoey sat on the floor and leant against the wall. "Yet another typical Sunday."
aussiejewel Smith, in stark contrast to the two before her who awoke with her dream, had no real reason to bother staying awake – and indeed, she didn't try to, immediately rolling over and closing her eyes.
aussiejewel gave the appearance of having been pretty once, but the time spent locked up in this cylindrical, dark cell had long driven that beauty out of her, leaving only the impression. Funnily enough, aussiejewel didn't remember how much time she'd spent cooped up in the health & safety hellhole, though without any means of tracking time such as a calendar, a clock or even a stopwatch it was only to be expected. The only, heavily grilled, window would have helped aussiejewel keep track of the seasons, if she'd had the energy to climb onto the table to peep through it every once in a while. But she didn't.
aussiejewel's attempt at sleeping – or at least at not being awake – was rudely interrupted by the sound of a flap at the door flapping. It was her meal. Which meal it was, aussiejewel didn't know. All of them were rather the same: slushy porridge and occasionally a bit of toast.
aussiejewel ignored the bowl of slushy porridge and nestled further into her less than comfortable bed. She was, after all, on a diet.
"Make it go away! Make it go away!"
The Mutant Techo's shrieks were not, as you might have assumed, from the dream, but rather from the perfectly pink room he had woken up into.
And they were not alleviated by a beautiful Air Faerie almost breezing into the room, holding a plate of delicate china, with toast on it, in her pale white hand.
"Do not be frightened," the Faerie intoned. "I am Canda. This is Faerie Toast. It will make you feel better."
The Mutant Techo glared at Canda. "I don't want toast," he snapped irritably.
"Would you prefer pancakes?" Canda enquired sweetly.
"I would rather," the Techo announced stiffly, "find out where I am and how I got here."
"What about soup?" Canda persisted. "The Soup Faerie makes the best soup in the whole..."
"I would rather," the Techo repeated, his voice taking on a distinctly icier tone, "find out where I am and how I got here." There was a brief pause. "And who I am would be helpful, as well."
Canda sighed. "I cannot tell you who you are or how you got here," she stated apologetically, "but I can tell you where you are. Faerie City."
"Most helpful," the disgruntled Mutant Techo grumbled.
"Are you sure you don't even want a bubble?" Canda asked politely.
The Techo sighed and relented. "I suppose. Lime, please."
Tigger's head jerked off his book in alarm. Tigger woke up and stared at the unbelievably strict old Lenny Librarian who had confiscated his makeshift pillow.
"No sleeping while on the job!" she snapped at the confused Kougra.
Tigger blinked. "Sorry, ma'am," he muttered automatically. "I'll put that book away now – what is it, The Secret of Treasure Island..." Tigger tried to grab the book from the librarian's hands, but she was deceptively strong.
"Now, now, now," she said warningly, "I'm going to have to submit a complaint."
Tigger was gobsmacked. "I only fell asleep," he muttered quietly. "It's not like I stole anything... or damaged anything... or tried to escape..."
"I have no choice," the librarian informed him.
"I'll have action taken against me!"
"That's what you risked by falling asleep in the first place," the librarian stated matter-of-factly. "Wait here. The Controller will be here soon."
Tigger allowed his head to fall onto the table, followed by the rest of his body, as the Lenny Librarian strolled away. He was sunk.
A Brown Uni, Alexa, blinked several times and paused with her chipping of the smooth rock face, ostensibly hunting for Motes. Why anyone would hunt for non-tangible motes the Uni had no idea, but there you are.
Unfortunately, a supervisor noticed the Uni's pause.
"You there!" the pompous Yellow Eyrie exclaimed. "Get back to work!"
She blinked another few times and obliged, ignoring the stares of her fellow workers. She considered what had just happened.
She certainly hadn't fallen asleep – not in the middle of work! - and yet a vision had come to her, exactly like a dream. She went over the events over her dream, but found she couldn't remember anything earlier than her barging in to save this girl, when she had been halted by a shadow with a laser gun.
She was sure there was more.
She would have to wait for time to tell her.
Blanche had been daydreaming. Everyone else had been thoroughly entertained with drawing a rainbow with the colours in completely the wrong order (blue, brown, red, green, black, pink and purple in case some stupid person was interested), but that easily bored Blanche – who, after all, disagreed with everything in class. Terror Mountain was not near Krawk Island! Waset Village was not the capital of the Lost Desert! Maraqua was not the name of Neopia's moon, Kreludor was not a throwback to the jurassic era and Tyrannia was not another name for Tigersquash Corn Dogs!
Anyway, after Blanche was brought back to Earth from her daydream, Blanche suddenly realised what she had been daydreaming about.
She couldn't tell anyone, of course – they wouldn't believe her, and she was convinced that most of them had no ability of thought.
So Blanche merely went over her daydream again and again, as she was called upon to draw several other rainbows, all after each other.
Blanche couldn't wait for nap time. As a skilled lucid dreamer, Blanche knew how she could be sure of her daydream – relive it, almost.
She would dream it.