So, my boss wants me to move to Paris with him over the summer. Is that weird? Probably. But, with my family situation what it is, I don't really have much holding me back. And, come on, it's Paris! He's flying me over for the week because it's my spring break. This, unfortunately, means that I am posting while waiting for my connecter flight and that I won't be able to get anything more up in the immediate future. But, because of that fact, I tried to make this chapter extra juicy for your enjoyment!
Disclaimer: I don't own High School Musical or its characters, nor do I own Jack Bauer.
'Oh! Ms. Darbus isn't here! Because we're in front of Ms. Darbus' classroom!' Gabriella reminded herself. Finally aware of what was going on, she turned to Ryan. "Of course, don't worry about it!" She reassured him. "Sharpay obviously needs you right now. Besides, there's Kelsi. HI KELSI! I can go talk to her. See you later Ry!" She said as she skipped down the hall in Kelsi's direction.
An Unheard Tale Part 2
Gabriella approached her friend with a big grin on her face as she eased her skipping.
"Hey Gabby!" Kelsi greeted enthusiastically. "How was the Country Clubs five acre park?"
"STOP REMINDING ME THAT IT WAS JUST THE PARK!" Gabriella screeched, losing her patience with that statement.
Startled, Kelsi gave her a frightened expression and quietly apologized. Horrified by her own rude behavior, Gabriella immediately softened her face and apologized to her upset friend, "I'm so sorry, Kelsi! You did not deserve that! I've just been a little on edge today. You see, on what was supposed to be the last day of my retreat..."
Gabriella stepped towards the almost ready hot-air balloon forcibly pulling Cassandra along behind her.
"You have got to be kidding me!" Cassandra protested. "I am not getting in that thing with you!"
The girls had completed a condensed course of safety training in the morning where Cassandra had her death glare permanently set on her face. Having woken up with a horrible hang over, she was not in the mood to do more than just verbally disagree with anything that was said. Now that they had reached zero hour, Cassandra started to physically recoil at any of Gabriella's advances.
They were both sat in the crowded gondola waiting for their pilot to finish prepping the balloon and join them as Gabriella decided to continue their earlier argument. Raising her voice to be heard over the noise of the air machine, Gabriella shouted, "You could put a gold chain around the neck of a pig, dress him in a sport shirt, dab him with cologne and call him Arnold. But what is Arnold going to do when he comes to a mud puddle? He'll jump in! And why do you think he'll jump in? Because of his nature! It is the same way with people. No matter how much you change on the outside, your inner nature is still sinful. So, unless you are changed from the inside you will eventually come back to sin, just like a pig comes back to wallowing in the mud. Cassandra, you are that pig."
Completely offended at the pig statement, Cassandra let her outrage take control. Shooting Gabriella an evil smirk, Cassandra abruptly yanked on the blast valve so that the propane was rapidly shooting into the air. Then, with her Bic lighter, she ignited the burner to create the hot, blue-white flame needed to lift the balloon into the air.
"What do you think you are doing?" Gabriella shrieked. "The pilot isn't here yet!" Panicking, she started to open the basket's door but the balloon was already lifting into the air. Eye's widening in fright as she watched the ground drop away, Gabriella gasped and fell to a seated position in the bottom of the basket hugging her knees and rocking herself back and forth. Cassandra just laughed.
Down on the ground, the pilot watched helplessly as his pilots license floated away with these rogue teenagers.
"No, sorry Martha, I haven't seen him. He must be sick because I'm pretty sure he hasn't been in school all day." Kelsi was saying to Martha. Gabriella felt slightly disoriented. Where were they? And when had Martha shown up? Oh my God, is that a real Wild Cat?! But, instead of asking any of these questions, Gabriella decided to go with, "Hi Martha!"
"Hey, Gabriella! How was the Country–"
"DON'T!" Kelsi shouted urgently. Seeing Gabriella's accusatory frown, she quickly amended, "Don't, uh, forget to ask Gabriella about Zeke!"
Catching the hint and making a mental note to ask Kelsi about it later, Martha nodded and turned to Gabriella to ask, "Have you seen Zeke today?"
"Sorry, no. And you know who else I won't ever see again?"
Kelsi sighed, Martha looked worried and Gabriella paid them no mind as she flowed straight back into her story...
The two girls had been in the air for over an hour. Done were the fights about why Cassandra had done what she did. Done were the disagreements about what they should do to fix the situation. Now they were both squished as far from the other as was physically possible in the tiny gondola because they both refused to speak.
After another ten minutes, Cassandra looked over at Gabriella and snorted with laughter in a childish attempt to irritate her opponent.
Quick to defend, Gabriella snapped her head up and retorted with an angry "Shove it!" But this just made Cassandra laugh even harder. Unable to express just how angry she was feeling at that moment, Gabriella instead reached up and completely shut off the propane.
With a gasp, Cassandra shrieked "What did you do that for?"
"I don't understand why we haven't done it to begin with," Gabriella replied condescendingly.
"Because we don't know how to land this God forsaken death trap!"
"I'm sure it isn't that hard," Gabriella said but her confidence quickly vanished when she saw the balloon start to deflate from the lack of pressure.
The hot-air balloon starting sinking. Cassandra looked at Gabriella, her fear battling with her anger for dominance. "Well, it'll be even harder when we're free falling," She said sarcastically as the balloon started to sink at a quicker pace.
Grabbing onto each other, the two girls let out petrified screams as the balloon went down...
down...
down...
into a soft thicket of trees!
The nylon of the balloon caught at the top of the trees allowing enough give for the basket to bob slightly and the girls to end up unharmed, sitting in a basket hanging five feet above the ground, still screaming uncontrollably.
It took another ten minutes for either to calm down enough to realize that they were perfectly fine. Eventually steadying her shaking limbs enough to climb down, Gabriella dropped to her knees and kissed the dirt in gratification of its stability as Cassandra watched, sporting her customary aggravated scowl.
"Welcome!" Ms. Darbus's grand salutations boomed throughout the auditorium. "Come in, come in! Martha, I'm so happy to see you, Kelsi, always a pleasure! And, Gabriella? What are you doing here, dear?"
Gabriella left the sides of her friends to approach Ms. Darbus. She pulled the teacher into the corner of the auditorium so as to create some privacy. She then began her wilderness story, starting from the very beginning, in order to explain to Ms. Darbus why she had missed the auditions. She was very pleased to see Ms. Darbus nodding along to the story and exclaiming at the proper points. She didn't seem to get that kind of reaction from any of her friends, 'Must be the generation difference'.
Getting to about the point where she and Cassandra were loading onto the hot-air balloon, Ms. Darbus put her hand on Gabriella's shoulder and said in a soothing voice, "Gabriella, dear, I don't think it is humanly possible for me to listen to any more of this story. I would suggest you take a creative writing class. Now, as to the play, I have much to do to prepare for today's rehearsal and I do not have time to negotiate parts. But I will not say no to your inquiry just yet. How about you sit in on rehearsal today and I will think over what we can have you do?"
"I suppose that could work for me," Gabriella replied, contemplating the offer.
"Good, because I wasn't actually asking you."
Gabriella giggled her thanks and went to sit down next to Kelsi. She found Kelsi sitting in the middle of the auditorium next to somebody else she wasn't sure she recognized. 'Did Martha dye her hair blonde?' she wondered to herself as she recalled where she had last left off with her story.
Plopping into the seat, Gabriella resumed her seemingly endless story. "Sorry about that. Anyway, back to my story. That's when we realized that we had to put all our survival skills to test. I decided to fix the camp site as she went out in search of food. Unfortunately, I think she was eaten because she never returned."
"Who do you think you're talking to?" Gabriella jumped at the sound of Sharpay's voice. 'How did she and Kelsi do that?'
"Sharpay? I thought you were Kelsi! My bad," Gabriella laughed nervously, praying that Sharpay would let this moment slide without too much yelling and bloodshed. Standing quickly, Gabriella scooted over to where she saw Kelsi actually sitting, at the piano.
"Wow, I hope I never do that again!" She sighed as she joined Kelsi. With a deep breath, Gabriella decided it was high time for her to finish her story.
Gabriella had been huddling at her make-shift campsite for a day and a half. She didn't want to leave in case Cassandra ever returned with the food. Unfortunately, with each passing minute she became increasingly convinced that Cassandra was forever gone. Allowing her hunger to invade her thoughts, Gabriella tried unsuccessfully to distract herself. Sitting on a tree stump, she hugged her knees and softly sang to herself a song by her favorite artist ("Baby come back to me, in my heart I still believe, we were meant to be..."). Of course, instead of thinking about Troy, as was the norm for her, she was longing for Cassandra to return with some form of food.
Suddenly, as if directly out of her imagination, Gabriella smelled the wonderful aromas of a roasting turkey. Stomach flipping from the reminder of just how empty it really was, she plugged her nose and tried to tell herself that it was all an illusion. Who would be roasting a turkey in the middle of the jungle?
Unfortunately, Gabriella had been blessed with an overactive sense of curiosity. And when that smell didn't dissipate, Gabriella felt that anxious tingling in her fingers that she always felt when she knew there is a fascinating mystery to solve. Forgetting about her hunger, and instead focusing on the most logical and precise way to uncover 'The Mystery of the Mysterious Fragrance', she stood and cautiously crept through the underbrush in search of a fire.
Not ten minutes later, Gabriella stumbled across a clearing where a small, one room wood cabin sat. The lights were off but there was smoke emitting through the chimney, clueing Gabriella into the source of her mystery scent. Forgetting her manners, Gabriella ran to the door, grasped the handle and barged her way in without as much as a tap on the door to warn of her entrance.
Once inside, Gabriella slammed the door closed and took a look around. Whoever had been cooking the turkey must have just left. The fire had been doused, leaving the overwhelming scent of burn and ash along with the excess smoke from the embers. Turning the lights on, Gabriella gasped when she saw how the room was decorated. Covering every inch of wall were pictures. But they weren't just pictures of anything – they were all pictures of Sharpay.
On the wall closest to her was a large map of the world with pen marks and crosses covering its Continents. In black permanent marker somebody had written in obvious frustration considering the number of times it had been underlined, "Where are you Ashley?". Taking a step closer to examine said map, Gabriella saw that Albuquerque had been heavily circled with arrows pointing at it and the ironic statement "You are Here". The other marked cities (including London, England and Murmansk, Russia) had all been crossed out or ripped off the map.
Leaving the map, Gabriella slowly followed the wall around in order to take a closer look at some of the photos that had been pinned up. The first one she stopped at was of Sharpay in an airport wearing a very bored expression. She had been dressed in a sea-blue sweatshirt with her hood pulled onto her head. Most of her face was covered by overly large sunglasses and behind her seemed to be a wall of people. Because the camera was focused so closely on Sharpay, all the background people were fuzzy and out of focus. Strangely, though, the Disney World Epcot Center hat on the man standing directly behind Sharpay was just as clear as she was, despite the man on whom it was sitting being nebulous beyond recognition.
Taking one more step, Gabriella stopped in front of another photo. Gabriella couldn't quite understand when this could have possibly been taken. As all the others, this picture was dominated by Sharpay's figure, leaving the background elements to be very scarce and mostly blocked. In this particular image, Sharpay was wearing a gorgeous strapless, white dress. The photographer must have been slightly behind her because she was smiling at someone to the left of the frame and over her shoulder. Nobody else was in the picture with her. In fact, behind her was simply a blue wall with the Disney Channel Mickey Mouse symbol as the only decipherable image. Gabriella had no idea when Sharpay would have been at any sort of Disney film premier, but her family was rich. She supposed it could happen.
Taking a couple more steps down, Gabriella stopped and focused in one more picture. This one was of Sharpay at Lava Springs. Gabriella recognized this, it was the day she, Taylor and Sharpay had actually spent the afternoon together after the Star Dazzle Talent Competition! Sharpay was wearing that amazing blue dress that Gabriella had been so jealous of but knew she didn't have the legs for. In fact, if Gabriella wasn't mistaken, her arm had made the photo. The rest of her had been cut off, because the photographer had been meticulously sure to get as close a shot of Sharpay as was possible, but she recognized the pink chunky bracelets on that tan arm. Whoever was tailing Sharpay had certainly been following her for a long while.
Gabriella studied the pictures for a few more minutes before the severity of her situation hit her. She wasn't in just any cabin. This was obviously a cabin housing people with bad intentions. Stepping towards the door, eager to leave before anybody returned, Gabriella risked one more curious glance around the small room. That's when she read the phrase carved into the wood above the fireplace:
Terrorist Inc.
"Shoot the Stars"
Finishing her story, Gabriella watched Kelsi's reaction expectantly. Kelsi didn't look away from her sheet music. Picking up her pencil, she wrote something on the paper as she murmured "Mmm, really?"
"Kelsi?"
"Oh, wow," she mumbled, still not looking up from her music.
"Did you hear me?"
"That's too bad," Kelsi was thinking so intently about her music that she didn't even realize Gabriella had stopped telling her story.
"HAS NO ONE BEEN LISTENING TO MY STORY?!" Gabriella shrieked, releasing all her fury as she jumped up from her seated position next to Kelsi. Kelsi flinched in surprise at Gabriella's outburst. "I SAID THAT SHARPAY IS WANTED BY A TERRORIST ORGANIZATION!"
Panting, Gabriella slowly surveyed the room to watch everybody's reaction. 'Why aren't they more surprised?'
After a short pause, Ms. Darbus finally addressed the distressed girl. "Gabriella, dear. I can see you are still not feeling well. I think it would be best if you go home now. We'll discuss your participation in this production tomorrow."
Continuing with the scrutiny of her peers, Gabriella felt sick over everybody's placid responses. It was almost as though they didn't believe her. Nodding her agreement to Ms. Darbus's suggestion, Gabriella picked up her book bag and slowly stepped out of the auditorium trying to understand how this wasn't big news to them.
Closing the big double doors, Gabriella leaned herself against them with her eyes closed as she took a deep soothing breath. 'I am no longer in the jungle. I am no longer in the jungle. I am no longer–'
"Excuse me, miss?"
Gabriella snapped her eyes open at the sound of a hoarse male whisper in her ear. Standing in front of her was a very tired looking man dressed all in black including a bullet proof vest. He looked as though he had spent the past twenty four hours in physical combat; he had the sweat stains to support that notion. "My name is Jack Bauer and I'm a federal agent," he panted, clearly winded. "I couldn't help but to over hear what you screamed in that room because I was holding my ear to the door. I believe that I am going to have to trust you. You will be of great help to us."
"Us?" Gabriella asked. That wasn't really the question she was most concerned about, but that was the question that came out.
"Me and my partners back in CTU. Counter Terrorist Unit." He obliged.
"Terrorist!" Gabriella exclaimed. So somebody did believe her!
"Yes," Jack agreed. "Now, we have reason to believe that there is a group that have been hired to kill the pop star Ashley Tisdale, but we have since-"
"No, you're wrong!" Gabriella interrupted. "They aren't after Ashley Tisdale, they're after Sharpay Evans. I found their hide-out and they have the entire place covered in pictures of her. She's a very rich classmate of mine." She quickly explained at Jack's quizzical expression.
"Are you sure?" He asked as he reached into his side satchel bag and pulled out an envelope.
"Oh, yes, absolutely," Gabriella responded confidently.
Pulling out two pictures, Jack handed them to Gabriella. "This is who we believe they are contracted to kill. Can you positively I.D. this girl as Sharpay Evans?"
Gabriella took the pictures and looked at them curiously. She was surprised to see that they were two of the same pictures that the terrorists had posted on their walls. One was Sharpay at the premier and the other was her at Lava Springs. Gabriella nodded as she studied the pictures.
Just as she was about to verbally express her affirmation, the door behind her opened and out stepped Troy.
"Hey Gabby. I just wanted to see if you were OK," He said, the concern evident in his voice.
Gabriella smiled up at him. "Yeah, don't worry about me, I'm fine." An awkward silence fell between them as Gabriella fidgeted with the pictures while looking at her feet nervously and Troy tapped his finger on the auditorium door that he was half hiding behind. Unsure of what else to say, Gabriella decided she'd better introduce Jack. Turning around she started to speak but faltered when she saw that Jack had disappeared. Turning back towards Troy, she laughed nervously as Troy fixed her with a concerned expression.
"You know what? Never mind. You should probably get back in there. I don't want Ms. Darbus to yell at you on my account." She said to him flashing him one of her smiles. Troy laughed and closed the door, returning to rehearsal.
"I think I've seen that boy before." Jack mused more to himself than to Gabriella from his former position behind her.
Gabriella turned around to find Jack standing in front of her again. Her mouth dropped open in shock. "How did you? I turned around and you were. But now you're. I must be going crazy."
"Don't be ridiculous!" Jack laughed. "I just grabbed onto this protruding water pipe on the ceiling and pulled myself above your eyesight. Works every time!"
"I need to sit down." Gabriella muttered holding her hand gingerly to her forehead.
Unfortunately, before she could do anything to remove herself from this overwhelming situation, Jack jumped back up to the ceiling and the auditorium door opened for the second time. Popping his head out again, Troy looked at Gabriella's weary demeanor and inquired, "Hey Gabs, sorry, I was just curious- why are you holding pictures of Sharpay Evans and Ashley Tisdale?"
Cue ominous music...
Now we have it! The big mystery that we didn't know there was. I didn't reveal it earlier because, for the most part, this story is being presented to you the way it is being presented to Sharpay. Therefore, neither you nor she even knew that there was a mystery over who's trying to kill her and why. But now you know. I have a bunch of clues as to who and why in my other chapters. If you ever get bored one day you can re-read and speculate. I know, fun fun.
Well, you've read the chapter, you know what to do next.
