A/N: Hey, everyone! I might have this finished by Christmas! It's still a little iffy...I'm going to be pretty busy the next two days, considering Christmas and stuff. But I'm probably going to post another chapter or two tonight!
P.S. About the chapter title...um, the real title for the movie is "Madeline Lost in Paris", based on the Madeline books. But my dad thought he'd be funny and call it "Madeline Lost in Prison" or something. And I was rereading this chapter, trying to figure out what to call it, and I thought of that. So...yeah. I don't own Madeline. That belongs to...whoever wrote it (his name slips my mind at the moment...). And I do love Madeline...I just thought I'd stick that random thing in there, since I'm so random...
CHAPTER FOURTEEN: MADELINE LOST IN PRISON
"You have to come with us," Shannon told the little boy when we got in the car.
"She's…she's right…" Dad panted, out of breath.
The little boy looked up at us with his big, brown eyes. "Christmas just doesn't work out for me. Never has."
"But Christmas is such a wonderful, beautiful time!" Shannon persisted. "It's a time for giving and being thankful. For friends and family. People hang decorations and lights. And then Santa leaves presents under our Christmas trees."
"Christmas just…doesn't work out for me," the little boy said, shrugging.
Dad sighed. "Look, I don't know if Christmas is going to work out for you or not, but this is Christmas Eve. Don't stay here by yourself."
"Yeah!" I chipped in. "Don't be like me every year and exclude yourself from everyone! I mean, I have an excuse, but you don't, dude."
All three of them looked at me.
"What? That's what I do."
"Um…I think what she's trying to say is…you should come with us…" Shannon said slowly. "We'll go together."
The boy looked from me to Shannon to Dad and back again. Before he said anything, we all felt the train start to move.
Or rather…the train car start to move.
"Okay…what was that?" I asked.
Dad opened the door and revealed what I had been dreading as soon as he had stepped on: the train car had disconnected itself from the rest of the train, and we were now moving slowly away.
"Oh, snap," I said.
We all ran to the back--which was technically the front, considering that was the end that was moving first--and looked to see where we were going.
"It's gonna be okay," Dad said.
But he spoke too soon. We hit a track switcher that led to a really steep hill.
"Maybe NOOOOOOTTTT!" Dad shouted, changing his mind.
We all held on for dear life as the car plummeted down the steep hill. I, for one, had had my fill of roller coaster-like rides, so I was the one who was screaming at the top of my lungs, "WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
"THE EMERGENCY BREAK!" Dad said. "I'M GOING TO FIND THE EMERGENCY BREAK!" He began to move the other way, towards the front of the car, leaving the three of us to cling on to whatever.
"THERE'S NO BREAK!" Dad called back to us once he had reached the front. "I CAN'T FIND A BREAK!"
"OH, NOW THAT'S JUST GREAT!" I hollered. "NOW WHAT?!"
The car suddenly was plunged into darkness as we went through a tunnel.
"ONLY AT THE NORTH POLE, RIGHT?!" I remarked.
No sooner had I said this comment, we came to a circular room with a circular platform in the center. The tracks we were on led to this platform, and there was a stopper at the very middle.
"WE'RE GONNA CRASH!" Shannon said.
And we did.
Well…I wouldn't say "crashed". It was more like we "hit the stopper so hard, we all fell over onto our faces".
But, hey, at least we stopped. And that was a bonus.
However, we started to spin.
"We're spinning!" Dad said.
So we were on a spinning platform.
Great.
We finally stopped. I could hear a heartwarming Christmas song over the intercoms, one that I particularly did NOT enjoy.
"Shh," Shannon said, cocking her head. "Do you hear that? The bell!" She jumped down from the train and onto the platform.
"What bell?" my dad asked, he, the boy and I following her.
"The sleigh bell!" Shannon answered as if we all heard it.
"Sleigh bell?" the boy asked excitedly.
She pointed to one of the various openings in the room. "It's coming from that tunnel!"
We followed her to the tracks that led to this tunnel. They overlooked an icy ravine that did not look the least bit friendly.
"That's the way we should go," she said.
And then she started walking across the tracks! With every step she took, I took a sharp intake of breath, hoping she wouldn't fall off.
"Come on!" she called to us.
"Wouldn't it be safer to sit down and scoot across?" I asked.
"But this way's faster," she said.
Dad and the boy followed what she did, but I went with my technique and sat down, sliding across. And Shannon was wrong about her way being faster. I frequently had to wait for the little boy to get a little ahead of me so I wouldn't run into him.
We all, luckily, made it off those deadly tracks okay (although all of us had at least one little slip-up). We followed the tracks outside and wove our way around the little elf apartments and under the little elf bridges.
"We're lost," Dad said when we stopped at a mini tunnel.
"We're Madeline lost in prison," I muttered to myself, quoting my dad on a future thing he would say about that movie.
"Yes," Shannon said.
"What, you're admitting we're lost or that we're Madeline lost in prison?" I asked.
"Yes, I hear it," she said.
"I hear it, too!" the boy said.
"I don't hear anything," Dad said, shaking his head.
I looked at him. "That's strange, cause…I don't, either."
"Okay, it's down this way!" Shannon said, not really caring.
"Are you sure?" Dad asked.
This made her stop and turn around. I thought she'd totally bite his head off, but instead, she said, "Absolutely."
And so we followed her into the tunnel, not knowing where it would lead.