A/N: Oh. My. God.
160 REVIEWS?!
Wow. Just wow. I have nothing else to say.
Except for 'Happy 30th chapter everyone!'
Read on.
PS In Australia, 'flip-flops' are called 'thongs'.
You're gonna need to know that, otherwise I sound like a creep.
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Kids Next Door Mission...
Operation: F.O.R.G.E.T.
Fragments
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Chapter 30- In Oz at Last
Rachel had been following Nigel since early that morning. She had risen at six am to go for a run, and spotted the brit coming out of his house, hugging himself in the cold and shivering as his breath fogged in front of him. 'Odd,' she had thought to herself. 'It's winter break, why would anyone be up this early?'
Alright, so she was up early, but, as Fanny told her again and again, she was 'different'. Rachel had never really understood what her friend meant by that. Even so, there was no good reason why Nigel would have been outside his house at five past six on a freezing cold morning.
She hadn't meant to start following him. Really. She just happened to be jogging in the same direction that he was walking, when she noticed that he was acting a bit strangely. One thing lead to another, and before she knew it, Rachel was jogging about forty feet behind Nigel, and just kept that up for a while, not even sure why.
But then, Nigel made a sudden turn, and Rachel frowned in confusion. Where was he going? There was nothing but an abandoned old house down that road!
She told herself not to turn. Said; 'This is none of your buisiness. Just keep going, straight ahead, and leave the boy with the sparkly brown eyes casting careful glances left and right to go his own mysterious way on this freezing December morning.'
But, inevitably, even as she was telling herself this, she was making the right turn down the street Nigel was walking.
Not a good idea...
Oh, quiet, you.
So Rachel just kept on walking, trying to stay out of sight, and a reasonable distance behind her target.
But it wasn't until she realised where Nigel was going that she became really suspicious.
~(*)~
'Wally, honey, don't forget your carry-on luggage!'
'Ya mean the bag Ah just pulled out? Nah, I won't forget that!'
Wally rolled his eyes at his mother.
'Come on, we've got ta get out of tha way. Others are tryin' ta get past!'
'To where? There are people in front of us and people behind us! We're loike a human sandwitch!'
And he almost face palmed because of his dad.
It took them nearly fifteen minutes just to get out of the plane, shuffling down a seemingly never ending aisle, arms getting tired from holding up their bags for so long.
Eventually, though, they did reach the outside world.
The first thing that hit the Beatles family was the heat. It wasn't really a boiling hot day, but they were used to the winter weather of America in December, and immediately all of them pulled off their jackets.
~(*)~
Wow. It's really hot here..
Joey pulled off his orange and white jumper, all the while, his eyes darting around, taking in all the sights that they could harbour in so little time.
He had been excited about this ever since way back when he had been told about the trip, back when he was still clueless about who his brother was.
He got really excited once the flight attendants announced that it was time to land.
Joey looked out the window, and saw blue sky. The same blue sky that he'd been flying through less than an hour ago.
He continued his darting around as the family headed for the luggage carousel, walking next to his brother, who was smirking slightly at his reaction to their surroundings.
The luggage carousel, though, was not interesting. Joey was almost bored (almost) as he watched buhmillions of bags that all looked the same, going round, and round, and round.
And round.
Twenty minutes, and some extensive groaning later, they were good to go. One of their father's brothers' family was supposed to be there to pick them up, so they headed out into what could only be called a lobby, but was big enough to be a warehouse.
It didn't take long for the Beatles to find the... other Beatles. They were the big, boisterous family standing pretty straight ahead as Joey and Wally and their mother and father exited the luggage area.
'Sid!' Their uncle called as he recognised them.
'Grant!' The boys' father returned. The two groups headed towards each other, and hugs were exchanged between the adults and the kids, though when the kid/kid situation arose, hugs were rejected in favour of awkward handshake-y sort of things.
There were six people there, in total, to greet the Beatles as they arrived; Auntie Kel and Uncle Grant, and four of their nine cousins; Sammy, Jack, Junior and Gabbie.
After the usual 'Look how big you are!' and 'Merry Christmas!' and 'How are things back in...' they all headed out to the cars. Both Kel and Grant had brought their cars, since obviously neither of them had a car that seated ten people. Joey and Wally, having had enough of their parents after fifteen gruelling hours, chose to go with their uncle and two of their cousins, while the other cousins, their parents, and Auntie Kel took the other car.
'So, how're things down here?' Wally asked, sliding into the front seat, even though his cousin Sammy was older than him.
'Pretty good, pretty good. It's been a real hot summer so far, though,' his uncle returned. Joey found it a little strange listening to these people speak with the same accent as him. He was used to it only being his family, and now he was in a place where he heard it from everyone.
It took them about half an hour to get to their cousins' house, where they would be staying. Joey was feeling a little overwhelmed, a little shy, opting to answer small and short answers when he was spoken to, otherwise just listening to the others' conversation. The radio was on, turned up loud so that you had to raise your voice if you wanted to be heard.
'Psst, Joey,' Gabbie, the other cousin that was with them, poked Joey in the side gently to get his attention.
'Uh, yeah?'
'You wanna know what were doing later today?'
'Okay.'
'We're going to tha beach!'
'Really? To Bondi?' Joey had been dying to go to Bondi beach ever since he heard how famous it was.
'Nah. We need a whole day ta do Bondi, mate. We're goin' down ta Manly.'
'Cool!'
Slowly, but surely, Joey began to settle in. He was sure he'd be comfortable here in no time.
~(*)~
The cars arrived at the house, a big, old place shaded by old gum trees. Joey looked around curiously, from the veranda to the balcony to the gate that lead around the back. He, Wally, and their cousins all helped to unload the bags, and, with slight difficultly, hauled them all inside.
Joey had no sooner finished dropping all his bags into a spare room than he heard barking. He went out to join the others, who were outside on the deck, and was instantly bowled over by a ball of fur, and showered with licks and a wagging tail.
'No, Jessie! Down, girl, down!' Jack scolded, rushing forward to take the dog by the collar and pull her away. Joey just laughed.
'Sorry about that. She gets excited,' Jack explained.
Jessie was a black and brown staffie, who looked only a few years old, and was now trying to jump up onto Wally, as well as their mother and father.
Wally was welcoming towards the dog, sitting down and letting it hop up into is lap. Strangely, after the incident with the were-poodles, Wally had grown to like normal dogs, mainly because normal dogs wouldn't try to eat you as well as your homework.
For a while, the adults talked, the boring 'adult' talk you couldn't even understand half of, and gruadually, the cousins drifted away into the lounge room, where Jack and Sammy set up a video game system.
'Anyone wanna play Rock Band 5?'
'Yeah! Ah've been dyin' ta play that game!' Wally enthused. Joey took a seat on the couch, assuming that the others would want to go first.
But...
'Hey, Joey? We need someone on drums, dude. You wanna give it a go?'
Joey sat up on the couch.
'Uh, alright,' he said, getting up and walking over to the plastic, coloured drumkit.
'Quick, Joe, the song's about to start!'
Joey looked from his cousins, to the TV screen, to the drumkit again. Then, a smile growing on his face, he picked up the drumsticks as the song began to play.
~(*)~
What is this guy doing? Rachel thought to herself, frowning in confusion as she ducked behind a tree.
Nigel was heading in the direction of that creepy old house with the tree out the back. But why? Why on Earth would he be going there, so early in the morning?
Rachel had to get to the bottom of this, or it was going to bother her forever.
Nigel turned into the house's drive.
Rachel followed close behind.
She hadn't known this boy for long, but she could tell that there was something different about him. He was bald, for one. What was up with that, anyway? Then, there was his mysterious past. Apparently, he had been studying overseas, when he fell and injured himself or something. But every time anyone asked him about it, he just shrugged and tried to change the subject.
There was something about this boy that Rachel felt she needed to know.
And she felt she was about to find out what it was.
So, she continued shadowing Nigel as he walked past the house and into the backyard.
Towards the tree.
In front of the tree.
Standing there, as if the tree was supposed to open like the mechanical doors at the mall.
But then...
What.
The.
HECK?!
~(*)~
'Joey, you are on fire!' Sammy exclaimed, looking back at him quickly, before switching back to the screen, unable to risk losing his combo.
Joey smiled again. He liked this game. They had it at the treehouse. He and Jake used to play it all the time.
The song finished, and Joey stepped down from the seat, heading for the couch. He'd been in for three songs, and thought it was probably time to let junior, the youngest of all of them, have a go.
'There ya go, Junior. It's your turn now,' Joey said to the seven year-old.
Joey sat on the couch, along with Jack, and joined in as he shouted 'woo, go Gabbie!' and 'Aw, come on, Wally! You can do better than that!'
And now, he thought, he was comfortable.
~(*)~
Rachel's eyes grew to the size of dinnerplates.
WHAT?
The tree -the actual tree- was beginning to slide back on itself, just like the doors at the mall.
Alarm bells went off (metaphorically) in Rachel's head. She needed to know what was going on here.
Nigel, after casting a quick look left and right, entered the tree -entered the tree- and before she knew it, the opening sealed itself up and Rachel was left wondering whether she was hallucinating.
Suddenly, she was a bit afraid. She felt sick, sort of. A kind of sick that was implanted way down deep in her stomach.
Something was wrong.
She wondered whether she should go in after Nigel, but rejected that straight away. Who knew what could be down there? Anything, for all she knew.
She kept thinking about it, about Nigel, and the people he'd been hanging around with more lately; as well as Abby and Kuki, he was now getting friendly with Wally and Hoagie. And ever since then, he'd been acting a little strangely. Could those guys have something to do with what was in that tree?
She thought, and thought, until her thoughts began to get fuzzy. The sickness was worsening now, had made its way to her head now, too. She leant against the back wall of the house, then slid down until she was hugging her knees to her chest. Throbbing headache, sick stomach, and now thoughts manifesting from nowhere. This was not good.
Thoughts, faces, images, it wasn't much, didn't make anything clear to her, even the things she thought of were fuzzy around the edges, as if being spat out half-formed, but there was definitely something down there.
And that's what scared Rachel the most.
~(*)~
'Kids! Get your bathers on, we're going soon!' Kel called to the six of them, who were still in the lounge room. There was a cheer, and everyone scattered to their various rooms to find their beach things.
Joey and Wally headed upstairs to the room they were sleeping in.
Ten minutes later, they were all downstairs, in board shorts, rashies and thongs, and decked out with bags and bags of beach things; body boards, buckets, spades, towels, and heaps of other things.
'Alright then, let's go!' Joey's mother said.
And they paraded out the door.
A/N: Okay, first and foremost, in Australia, 'flip-flops' are called 'thongs'. I'm not that inappropriate. I was debating whether to call them flip-flops or thongs, and in the end I thought that it was an Aussie chapter, so it should use Aussie language.
Okay, that's it, I apologise for the lateness and the shortness, I was tired.
NO MORE EXCUSES FROM ME FROM NOW ON! I'M MAKING THAT MY EARLY NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION. STARTING NOW, I AM A RESPONSIBLE, TRUSTWORTHY WRITER!
ehem... that is all.
-Numbuh 25 out
