Plot: The five kids, all leading different lives, end up in Las Vegas one week. They meet and reconnect with each other after 10 years.
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Chapter 1
Mike Teavee stood behind his desk. He had finished his business for the day, but for some reason still felt miserable. He didn't know why. He ran an electronics chain worth a bundle, was getting married to a beautiful girl who was great in bed and was yet to be bumped off the list of "100 most successful people under 30." He looked at the updated list beside him. Naturally, Charlie Bucket was in the top ten and Veruca "Veronica" Salt not far behind.
He remembered back when he first met those two. In Wonkas Chocolate Factory, well now it was Charlie's. The day which changed pretty much all their lives forever. He had never spoken about it to anyone, but sometimes he wished that he could see atleast one of the other four who could understand. He needed to let it all out of his system.
Sighing, he turned on the TV in his office. News about a new chocolate casino opening in Las Vegas flashed accross the screen. He watched exactely how this was going to work. Then Charlie's face popped up onto the screen, talking about what an exciting development this was and how it would cater for all ages. Mike rolled his eyes, turning off the TV. He hated how Charlie was always so happy, all the time. Sometimes you had to be realistic about things.
He picked up a magazine sitting nearby, looking through the pages of tattoos. So absorbed in a design of a skull with a knife through the eye that he didn't hear the door open. He had to get that tattoo to add to his four others.
The voice of Mike's beautiful fiancee Belinda filled the room. "Oh honey, please don't tell me you're thinking of getting another tattoo. Don't you think the ones you have are enough?" She jumped on his lap, kissing him. "Seriously honey, the two you had when we met gave you the bad boy image, the two more I put up with. Seriously though, you are not putting that on my husbands body."
"They're art. Besides, they're not just designs they actually mean something to me." Mike closed the magazine, unable to look at the woman in his lap.
She sighed. "I'm sorry. All the wedding planning is so stressful. Maybe you could relieve me of a little of that stress tonight." Smiling suggestively she planted kisses on his neck.
"Only a week to go." Mike managed to say with everything else on his mind, wondering what his friends had planned for a bachelor party. "Then it's all official."
"Well your friends have informed me that they're kidnapping you for the week. Only god knows where they're taking you. Anyway, I thought I'd drop you off some food, and some reading material. Real reading material, not this tattoo stuff." She chucked the magazine away, and some random gossip magazine took it's place. "Omigod, Veronica Salt. What has she got that gets her on the cover of everything? Veronica is not even her real name!"
Mike looked at the picture and knew the answer to that question: long legs, a tiny waist, killer rack and a load of money. Though he simply shrugged and said, "I don't know. No-one's as beautiful as you."
"Well, she'll never have you." Belinda whispered, kissing him again, then turning back to the picture. "She's such a tramp, look at her. She'd never understand people like us."
Something inside Mike snapped, he suddenly felt like yelling at his girlfriend. "Look, thanks for everything, but I really have a lot of work to do." He lied rudely, trying his best to keep his cool.
Belinda, a little shocked replied. "Okay. I love you."
"Okay, see you soon." Mike replied. When she left he looked at the magazine. He hated how Belinda didn't understand and her saying that Veruca didn't made him realise that the singer/model probably understood him better than his fiancee.
The phone rang, interupting his thoughts. He pressed the button for speaker phone and before he could say a word a bunch of his friends shouted. "Pack your bags, we're going to VEGAS BABY YEAH"
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Violet had just finished yet another show. She sat in her dressing room, wiping off some of her make-up. Only in Vagas would her extreme flexibility be appreciated and she could pull off the blue on her skin as body paint. A lot of it had faded, though her midsection ws still completely blue, and after several showers and hair treatments her hair was blonde again. Though it was always there to remind her of why she ended up in Vegas in the first place. Then again, so was her fake passport, birth cetificate and other identification when she had changed her last name and her birthday, so she'd be considered old enough to work in Vegas.
The new casino opening up just made things worse. She had never had to confront that day until the signs showed up all over town. The day her mother basically decided she wanted nothing to do with a blue daughter who she couldn't take out in public. The day Violet knew she had to make it on her own, that the world was about survival of the fittest. She had lost more than a chocolate factory that day.
She turned on her Teavee Electronics radio, "Veronica" Salt's singing about lonliness and no-one understanding filling up the room. She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, like she would have any idea about not having things. She's married and rich!" Violet cried out to no-one in particular. She threw the radio on the ground, though it remained intact. "Damn Mike Teavee! Can't even break one of his cheap radios!"
She listened to the lyrics. As much as she hated to admit it, they struck a cord with her. After all, Violet had no-one, just a bunch of affairs that lead nowhere, a mum who abandoned her, a father who really wasn't a father (which she had found out after tracking him down) living under a fake name and birthday. Listening to the song, she couldn't help but wonder if maybe that day had changed Veruca's life, and Mike's like it had done so to hers. She thought about the other four. She had heard about Mike, Charlie and Veruca over the last ten years, but had no idea of what Augustus was doing. She felt guilty about calling them losers when she met them. As stupid as it sounded, she knew that they were the closest she had to friends over the past ten years.
She looked at the tattoo on her shoulder, a skull with a knife through the eye. A reminder to her that she shouldn't trust anyone and gradually, the lonely thoughts and memories of the many years ago faded away. So she was free to go out and plunge mindlessly into another pointless affair.
"Hey gorgeous. How are you tonight?" A random man stepped into Violet's dressing room. "You know, I wasn't going to stop in Vegas, but when I saw you on that sign. I had to have your naughty ass. Give me something to remember you by before I leave tomorrow."
Violet looked at the man, he was reasonably good looking and obviously well off due to his attire, which was the reason she picked him up when she had her post-show drink. "Well, why don't you turn off the lights, I'll show you how naughty I can be?" The moment the lights went out she danced around him, pretending to be teasing him, when really she was feeling around his pockets. Having so much experience in robbing the blind drunk businessmen, the man didn't even notice when she swiftly emptied the contents of his wallet. One step closer to getting her skin completely back to normal and leaving Las Vegas for good.