Disclaimer: I own a six dollar ring I bought downtown, but that's about it. The rest belongs to Tammy.

Note: when i wrote the disclaimer, i still owned that ring. i have since lost it, so i own nothing.

Italics mean sarcasm.

It's a normal day. Everyone is happy. For about two minutes. Then, people start disappearing. Just out of thin air and no one knows where they go. Then they're all gone, so there's no one to tell anyone else about it.

On a stage in an auditorium, the really big kind used for talk shows, there is a row of human sized cages along the back wall. In front of them, there are four cushy chairs, all empty. Suddenly, the cages begin filling up. One by one, strange people appear until they're all full. Then the screaming starts.

"What am I doing here?" "What are you doing here?" "Where are we?" "Where am I?" "What is this place?" "Who are all those people?" (Referring to the packed audience) "How did I get here?" "When can we go home?" "How can we go home?" "I want my blanky!" "I want my mother!"

"SHUT UP!" A cricket chirps. Then dies from a glare. A teen-aged, brown haired girl runs in, skidding to a halt on the polished wood. She's wearing faded jeans, a navy paisley braided belt, a light blue tank top, and black flip flops. The captives are stunned at the weird apparel of everyone.

"Hi, this is your host, Darth Tater, and welcome to my show, Tortallen TV Lunch Bunch. I have made sure to fill the audience with TP fans only so they know what's going on. I've also taken the liberty of restraining everyone so none of the prisoners… err… I mean guests, turn up mysteriously missing. Since I know that all you fan girls will be trying to kidnap them. Well guess what. THEY'RE MINE! I KIDNAPPED THEM FAIR AND SQUARE! MUAHAHA! Okay, I'm done now."

A few audience members clap hesitantly, before it's silent again.

"Okay, will the, um, help crew please take all the cages backstage to prevent interruptions. But leave Neal, Dom, and Kel here. Oh, and for anyone who didn't see everyone before they were transported, and for the benefit of the people as pathetic as me who are reading this fic, the cages hold Alanna, Jon, Gary, Cythera, Raoul, Buri, Thayet, George, Daine, Numair, Onua, Kel, Neal, Yuki, Dom, Aly, Nawat, and Dove, just for fun.

Some really hot strong guys who look like hot actors such as Orlando Bloom and Michael Shanks (if you don't know who he is, watch the TV show Stargate SG-1 on the sci-fi channel. More references later.) take the cages backstage. Another one opens the doors to the cages to let Neal, Dom and Kel, who is by now wearing her lumpiest expression ever, out.

Darth Tater slounges in a chair with her legs over the side, Neal plops down and leans back with an expectant smirk, Dom sits on the arm confusedly, and Kel perches on the edge of a seat nervously.

"Um, now that we're seated and being treated as humans, I have a few questions. One: How did we get here? Two: Why are we here? Three: Who are you? Four: Can I go home please? Five: Why do you have us here without everyone else? And six: Who are all those people?"
------A/N symbols R fun 2 play with. Okay, forget this, change of format.

Sighing with their curiosity, Darth tater began with a looooong run on sentence. "I brought you here, cuz I can do that, cuz I'm the author, you're here because I'm bored and I have a talk show that you have the honor of being on, I'm Darth Tater, No, You can't go home, Everyone else would make too many people, And all those people are other fans of yours and of everything ever created by Tamora Pierce. That answer your questions?"

"Yes, but not very well. Though I doubt I'll get better ones out of you. Now, what's going on?" By this time Kel was virtually pissed.

This prompted a sarcastic "I do say, what is going on?" from Neal.

Dom snickered. "Meathead, what do you know? Fess up. I'm older than you, and I doubt you can go calling for daddy Baird again from here."

"Again? Oh right. I remember." Darth tater leaned back again with an all knowing grin.

Neal Who Shall Evermore Be Referred To As Meathead: You do?

"Yes, and I think I'll tell Kel, and everyone else during their turns."

Going pale, Neal stuttered, "You wouldn't."

Calmed down, Kel started some chatter. "Neal, you know she probably would. So, Darth Tater, What happened?"

"Oh, Neal dropped his meat on the floor, slipped on it, it landed on his head, Dom called him Meathead, Neal attacked him, Dom pinned him down, Neal whined and screamed for his daddy. It was all really rather comical."

"How do you know all that? Dom hasn't had time to tell you." Neal was practically hyperventilating.

"I'm the author. What'd you expect? You know Kel, we could be a really good pair together. But first we need to go shopping." She snapped her fingers and a little remote appeared, she pushes a button, everyone but her and Kel freeze.

"Um, what just happened? And why do we need to go shopping?" this was seriously strange. If she didn't seem to be so friendly, Kel might have stabbed her by now.

"Oh, I froze everyone so they wouldn't notice the few days we spent shopping. And we need to go shopping because 1: I like shopping and I can shop here cuz in real life I'm broke cuz I spend all my money on geek stuff, 2: You need some new non-Tortall clothes, and 3: I've been wearing this same outfit for a few months cuz that's how long it's been since I've worked on this."

Looking a little confused, Kel accepted this madness. Barely. "Okay. But do I have to get dresses?"

This drew a disgusted screech from Darth Tater. "Goodness no, but you do have to get some fun skirts. Oh my gosh, I love skirts. I think the word has a different meaning here though. It's like the bottom part of a dress, but you can wear it with whatever top you want. Like no one wears dresses anymore. And now they have some uber cute tops! No, don't look at me like I'm crazy."

"That's all very well, but it sounds hard to carry a weapon with that manner of clothing."

"Oh, that won't be necessary. Downtown is safe, the only people who go there are those who shop and those who work there. And Downtown is nothing like the marketplaces from your world. It's all really lovely. But if you insist, I suppose we can get you some nice boots to put a knife in. Oh, and if any reviewers say anything to you about going to malls instead, tell them malls are evil and overpriced and that Darth Tater comes from a town with no mall, but a downtown. One that people actually shop in, heaven forbid."

Kel's ears perk up at the word boots. "What do you mean 'unnecessary'?"

"Oh, nowadays rapists and murderers work in bad neighborhoods, which only have places we don't want to go to, and in the dark of night."

Kel, shrugging, merely followed Darth Tater offstage. "Whatever. Okay, so let's go."

One week later……………………………………………………………………………………...

"Mithros, I cannot believe we just spent like an entire week shopping."

"I know, isn't it great? See, I told you shopping was fun, and skirts weren't nearly as bad as dresses, and boots rock, and weapons are unnecessary nowadays. Except maybe a Swiss Army knife, but that's just practical." Now that this was a fanfic and Darth Tater no longer had to go to school where they believe weapons are Satan-spawn, she had a knife. With a built in screwdriver. And saw. And scissors. And can-opener. They hadn't really figured out what that was doing there, but it was kind of cool.

They walked back onto the stage where they left Neal and Dom sitting confusedly and the audience a mix between cheering and looking disgusted, with Kel wearing dark grey faded flared jeans, a wavy blue and purple sash, black high-heeled knee length leather boots, a dark blue three quarter sleeve top emphasizing her cleavage and that has a large black and blue yin yang embroidered on the front, and blue teardrop earrings. (A/N Wow, that was all one sentence. Can you say run-on sentence?)

Darth Tater is wearing multi-colored striped toe socks with pastel green sequin flip-flops, dark blue flared jeans, and a pastel green t-shirt. Her earrings were little green flower studs, meant for someone with a December birthday. Psh, who cares her birthday was in September.

Ok, so describing an OUTFIT is only descriptive if one describes everything else. Believe me, I know. For example:

In the middle of the forest was a girl. She was sad.

Psh, no. That's not descriptive at all. Another example:

In the middle of the forest was a sad girl all bedecked in green, with pastel gauze covering her arms, a darker green bodice, and a deep velvet jade skirt spanning from a bejeweled V-shape at her waist to a full expansion touching the ground; on her throat were emerald jewels. On her feet, which she tapped, were green satin slippers with tiny viridian beads.

Psh, better, but not "descriptive". No, describing outfits not "descriptive". It means you're fashionably obsessed, you psycho.

In the very center of a wood under the calming throes of autumn, I said where it was already a young girl on the edge of pubescence I said she was a teenager, so I have that aspect covered examined the interwoven limbs above her head, mentally remarking how the leaves were no longer the exact pastel of her gauzy sleeves, how the forest floor, once a deep jade like her full skirt, was dark brown, deep as the secrets of trees and the hair of the girl; her breath mingled with the cool wind, and it in turn caressed the emeralds hanging low on the dark bodice of her gown, and dangling from a V-shape at her waist. The viridian beads on her satin slippers bounced with the soft continuous patient pat of one who knows where she is, but wonders why salty drops of crystal are flowing down her cheeks. I described the outfit, and I mean, how can people not get that the 'mood' is funny? I mean, it's a parody.

Psh, better. Describe the person, things around her, and the mood… in this case, reflective or sad. Not reflexive, that's something else…but in any case. It's possible to put far more thought and characterization into description than in quotations, if one does it right and doesn't describe ONLY OUTFITS. Gracious. Don't just say someone is "pretty" or "disgruntled"… unless nondescription is your writing style. Wow, this sounds mean, but I'm really just trying to help.

Yeah, well, its not that easy to describe people you've already described, and an auditorium you've already described, and the mood… well, its supposed to be funny, but I mean, come on, it's a fan fic, a parody at that, I don't have to describe the mood. Step it up. That was my sister, and I decided to leave that little tidbit in incase any of you real writers got fed up with me, just to say, ur not the only ones. But I did add some commentary in there. It's the non italicized stuff. Aaaaaaaaanyway…….

Having converted Kel to her evil ways, Darth Tater snapped her fingers again and everyone resumed their positions, with comments such as, "what just happened?

"What's going on?"

"What are they wearing?"

"Did she freeze time?"

"Where'd they go shopping?"

"What are we doing here anyway?"

And,

"What's my mother doing here anyway?"

"Did you die?"

Many of these comments were incredibly off topic, but they were ignored.

"We did not die. And, since I can no longer remember why Neal and Kel Dom were here, I'm brining everyone else out to carry on with my plot. Aaaaaaaannnnd……..

Chapter. rr plz