A/N: I am so sincerely sorry. This was totally forgotten in my mind. I will post three chapters. Please forgive me. And drop a review, too.

We started walking around. There were different battle armors like you see in movies at castles, but these were big for trolls or small for goblins. We saw portraits, I'm guessing, of the heir line of the King and Queen's family, going way back. It was an awesome and awe-some sight. The coolest and best thing was the bedrooms. They were humongous! The beds were all king size and there was at least two dressers and two night tables in each. There were bathrooms connecting to all rooms. The bathroom in the room I took was just wow. A hot tub to the right, a regular shower to the left, a bathtub in the left corner stretching along the wall the door was on, and a golden toilet! I was ecstatic. The tiles were pure white granite and the appliances were all gold, not just the toilet. The walls were tiled light blue and white. In the bed chamber, the bed had curtains that were red, the carpet was soft and red, the curtains on my French doors were red, the flowers sitting outside on the patio were red, and the wall paper was red striped with pale red. See a connection? I love red, like I mentioned before.

In the drawers of the dressers were clothes, all the color red except for the shorts which were tan. They were khakis with many pockets so I was happy. I changed into one of them and a red shirt. I put my leather wallet in a Velcro pocket at the bottom of my shorts. The shorts go to the bottom of my knee. That's how I like'em! They were a bit baggy too. Cool! And new pair of skater shoes at the bottom of my bed. Sweet! I put them on. Then I saw on the other dresser a jewelry kit. I only wear earrings and a choker from down the shore. Red hoop earrings and a gray choker made down at the beach. This day couldn't get any better. I washed my face and went to Val's room. It was all like her favorite color: blue. Lona's was orange. Pam's was pink. Mick's was purple... And Pete's was, um, black? He said he had a bad childhood. Oh well, but I did take note of it just in case he turned out bad. We all had changed. Pete was in all black. A t-shirt that showed his muscle and loose nylon shorts. Mick was wearing the same thing, but in tan shorts and white shirt. He had put gel in his hair to spike it up and he had sunglasses on which looked cool on him. Pam was wearing a skort that poofed out at the bottom and a tight t-shirt which I did not approve of, but the thing she liked most was the 80's. She also had hoop earrings but everything was pink. Ew for me. Lona was in jean shorts and a long sleeved shirt that was orange. The shorts were jean-blue. It was a good combo, except the shorts were too short for me. Val was wearing a long sleeved turtle neck that was light, not heavy like wool. Her shorts were just above the knee and everything was blue. The earrings she had in were blue studs. Everyone was looking at each other. Mick was closely examining Pam's top. Pam was looking at Mick's muscles through his shirt. Lona was looking at herself and kept pulling at her sleeves as if they weren't long enough even though they went past her knuckles. Val was looking at Pete who was looking at me who I was avoiding eyes with. I wished everyone would stop looking at each other. It was embarrassing.

All the servants were walking around with smug smiles. I took note of the smiling for no reason. By then, one of them stopped in front of me and said the Queen wanted tea with all of us. We followed him down the hall, down a stairway, across an open room, through a library, and into the tearoom.

This room had a circular table in the center of the room with chairs around it. The Queen was in the biggest chair facing the doorway. The carpet was yellow and the walls were sky blue. We all sat down. I was at her right hand and Pete on her left. Val was to the right of me and to the right of her was Lona. To the left of Pete was Mick and to the left of him was Pam who was to the right of Lona. Whew, confusing, right? Anyway, we all sat down.
"Welcome to the tearoom. You should have had a tour of the castle sooner, but we had no time. We will always have tea in here before dinner while, usually, the boys will meet Dr. K in his study. He has work to do right now." The Queen said. Servants, meaning ghosts, brought tea to us. We helped ourselves to sugar and milk and lemon juice and honey. For me, I put in like six scoops of sugar, because I like my tea sweet and 1/4 (I think) of a cup of milk or until it is light-ish brown. We sipped our tea and chatted about up there and down here. It was pleasing. It went quite well. Haha! I felt like we were in the 1800's sipping tea and chatting. I really did like it. Sometimes, for no reason, I would make tea for myself and drink it. Val thought I was weird in that way. We all finished our tea just in time for dinner. We had skipped lunch, because of our big breakfast so we were hungry. They had roast chicken that was so good it was like heaven on Earth. They also made mashed potatoes and gravy, corn on the cob, rolls and butter, spaghetti, a lot of vegetables, and whatever drink you wanted without it being alcoholic, of course. (Mick: "Aw, man!" jokingly said.) We were all stuffed and ready to go to bed. We all sleepily marched up the stairs to our rooms. I took off my shoes and just plopped in bed. I sank a couple inches. That's how soft it was. The pillows were feathers under my head. I was just about to doze off when there was a knock on my door.

"Come in?" I said.
"I need to talk to you." It was Pete.
"Quickly. I'm dead tired," which meant 'Go away. I'm dead tired.'
"You know whose voice that was on the recording right?"
"Yes."
"You know what this means?"
"No. It doesn't mean anything. There is no proof it was him. It just sounds like him. People on the phone don't sound like themselves too. So it could have been anyone." I said defensively. I don't like talking about people behind their backs.
"Fine. Then tomorrow, what gun are you using?" We had to use guns, because they had guns. I would have preferred bow and arrow but it wasn't that age...
"Sniper. We are all snipers. Unless they want to fight with magic from the battlements." We weren't going into the fight. We needed to stay alive.
"I'm going to be front line." He admitted like it was a burden on his shoulders. He sat down on my bed. I was already in sitting position. I looked around the room, because of the awkwardness. They put roses on one night table. Red everything and red roses. Red either means blood or...romance. I looked back at him right in the eye.
"Be careful." I said with anguish, with real feeling I hadn't meant to expose. He was my friend, that's all, right?
"I will try." He leaned closer to me. I leaned closer to him. I closed my eyes and we were kissing. I didn't even think about Bon. Who cares about him! I still did, but hel-lo Pete. I put my hands around his neck and he put a hand on the small of my back and the other on my cheek. Intimate. We stopped and rested our foreheads together with our noses touching.
"Be careful." I said with the same as before.
"For you, I will be." Cheesy, but okay in this setting, I thought. We kissed shortly and he left. He looked at me when he closed the door. When it was shut I thought he would come rushing back in, but that was just my imagination. I went to lay down again, but another person knocked.
"Come in." I said annoyed. I really was extremely tired.
"Hey." It was Lona.
"Hey." I said inviting her to say what she came for.
"Is everything okay?" She meant with Pete and me.
I blushed, "Fantastic."
"Good. I had a mini prediction. I'm sorry about Bon. It is true."
"That's okay. I'm over him for now. Later it will come back head on and I'll be sad about it, but not now. Just not now."
"That's good." Lona said smiling. She kissed me on the cheek and said goodnight. She turned off the light for me and closed the door. I fell back into my feathers and went out like my light.

We all woke early for the next day. Like 5 in the morning early. We all dressed and ate as much as our nervous stomachs could take. We were told how to hold, load, and shoot a gun. I'm a pretty good shot. But even this won't be fun. Killing other people. Like they don't have families! If Val died, I would die with her or a huge chunk of my heart would go down the drain. Let's not think that, I thought restraining tears. The shooting captain said it was fine if we didn't shoot. We went to the battlements and set up the guns. We were all going to use disarming magic that either disarmed the guy, disarmed his mind, or disarmed him physically. Well, scratch that last one. We all separated to different places. Pete came with me. Hand in hand we walked to my bedroom where we could get some peace and privacy. We sat down on my bed like last night.
"Be careful." I said again. That's getting to be like a cliché.
"I will."
"I'll be covering your back. Don't worry, I'm a good shot." I added when I saw him readying an answer that would decline my help.
"I hope you're as good at shooting as you are at kissing." He kissed me quickly, teasing me. I kissed him, but we both jumped at the sound of the horn. The attack was upon us. I didn't know how scared I was, but right then a whole load of dread filled my insides. I looked at Pete.
"Good-bye, Nicki." He ran off to be in the front line. Oh God, I prayed, please help him. Keep him safe. I ran to my place at the battlements. I scanned the crowd of Creatures for my beloved Peter. I spied him behind a tree. The trolls were really the front line, because they could take bullets and not die, but Pete was in the front line of Creatures that had soft skin. They all had a hiding place, so they could surprise the enemy.
"You ready, girls?" Val asked determinedly.
"Yes." I said, not feeling as courageous as my voice.
"Yes." Pam and Lona said in unison.
"We only kill if our friends are in danger or if they break our defenses all the way to the front steps." Val said.
"Yes." We said.
"Be strong. Use magic at first. Pam and Lona stay at the guns. Nicki and I will fight with magic." Val said.
"Yes." We repeated.
"Let's do this!" I shouted to get the tension out of me. It echoed. I thought I heard Pete respond to that with a cry of his own. I also told Lona to watch Pete for me and tell me when he was in danger.
"I love you." I heard Pam say for Mick and there was a cry from in the distance. Then the enemy came rushing at us.