Hey, new chapter, everybody! Nice job, CM. And good luck, Danie.

I know I'm not posting as much as a lot of other CB stories GM's do, but bear with me. I am NOT letting this die just yet! But... do you guys even care anymore? Do you just want me to end it?

----------------------- 

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Danie yelled as hard and as loudly as she could. "AAAAA—" Her voice gave way before she could finish. Great! She thought. Now I can die alone, and with a sore throat! Isn't life dandy? She watched in dismay as the back of the final camper (Squeak, incidentially) disappeared down the trail to the meeting pole. This, she decided, was the absolute worst part of being stuck inside a ring, that she was so utterly dependant on her friends to carry her everywhere and feed her, even! It was like being a baby, except she couldn't even cry properly because her voice had died. 

She spotted Dev, Hotairballoon, Silvery Ink, and Volcano walking toward the outdoor recreation clearing. They were late and going the wrong direction. Silvery had a band-aid on her cheek and a Ace bandage on her left hand, so Danie assumed they had been at the nurse's office. Volcano had a few band-aids stuck on her arms and legs, and Dev and Hotairballoon both were holding bottles of... something. As they got closer, she could hear their voices.

"Hey, where is everybody?" Silvery Ink said. "The nurse said that it was free-time."

"Maybe they moved on to the next activity," Volcano suggested.

Silvery cocked her head in mock confusion. "Did you hear something?" She said, pointedly ignoring Volcano. 

"Maybe they moved on to the next activity," Hotairballoon said.

"Oh, that's it. You're a genius!" Silvery said. 

"Hey..." Volcano whined.

"This is boring." Dev said, whipping out his veggie blaster. "I betcha I can plug the ping-pong table!"

POW! POW! POW! Three broccoli stalks slid out of the barrel of his blaster and smacked into the table in quick secestion. 

"Ha!" Dev crowed, holding his gun above his head like a prizewinning boxer. "I AM THE CHAMPION!"

"Some people are really immature..." Silvery said under her breath.

---------------------

At the meeting pole, Charlie (the VUDM's counselor) had just announced that the whole camp would be having lake sports and then went into a long-winded lecture about water safety. Nobody was listening, however, instead chatting quietly amongst themselves. 

"Shifting, do you know anything else about the Taking Ring thingy?" Jarvis asked. "Because Cayke said that you're the only one that had ever heard of it."

Shifting swelled under the importance of having information that nobody else knew. "Maybe." she siad.

"You DO!?" Squeak poked his head over Jarvis' shoulder. "Why didn't you say so?"

"Yeah," Cayke and Air slipped over, crowding around Shifting. "Anything there is to know, we need to know."

Shifting looked at all the eyes on her. "Well," she said, "I don't know if this is true or not, but when I was alive people used to tell stories about it. I think I might remember a few. They're just stories, you know. They might not be true."

"Maybe you'd tell us some of them." Air said, careful to not sound too eager, for she knew that would only egg Shifting on to tease them. 

"Well," Shifting said, then paused, presumably for effect. "They used to say that there isn't just one area in the ring where stuff goes. You know, that thing has been around for centuries. If it all just collected in one space, then it would be really crowded."

Everyone thought, "So where does it go?" but nobody said anything, waiting for Shifting to continue, if she was to.

"There might be different 'rooms', per se." Shifting said. "Like, everything collected in a certain amount of time would go into one room. There would be only one active room at a time."

"Oh, okay," Squeak said. "So it's sort of like... a storage space."

"Like on a computer!" Jarvis said. "What else?"

"Well, uh..." Shifting faltered. "That's actually... all I know. Or remember anyway."

"Oh." Cayke said, disappointed. "Do you know how long a room would stay active?" 

"It would vary," Jarvis said. "The current one, maybe a month. Or so."

"Huh?" Shifting asked. "How would you know?"

"Well, since we've never heard of it, I assume it's not collecting as much stuff as it used to when Shifting heard about it. So, I was thinking, if it's like a computer, it's not by the time, but how much gets put in." 

There was a silence while everybody sorted this information out. 

"Ah." Cayke said. "Wait, let me grab the ring so we can see..." She held out her hand. "OHMYGOSH!" she yellled. "IT'S GONE!" 

Ahh! This story is awesome! Hey, maybe Danie's in another dimension now. The ring dimension. That's the secret place where everybody goes to get a ring before they propose, I think. They all pretend it's from a jeweler's shop, but really, they teleport to the ring dimension and buy it from some masked hermit who lives on a cloud.

Life is much more exciting in my head. 

(Please, keep writing! I love it so far!) 

I'm still reading!!! Please continue!!!

Puck: Yeah! I want to figure out what happens to Devil Owl in the Prank Wars!!!!

Me: You mean what could happen to YOU or Devil Owl.

Puck: Yeah, that too.

Whoof! I should really start posting more... this keeps sinking... 

This is going to be really long, just a warning. I hope you don't mind.  

There are a few people I wonder if are still reading because I haven't seen them around CB terribly much and they haven't acknowledged anything since maybe page 2... *cough*DanieSomebodySt.OwlCaykeAir*cough* 

---------------- 

"Now look, Dev!" Silvery scolded. "You've broken the ping-pong table!" One of the legs (the one that Dev had shot) was indeed bending slightly and there was a dent where one of the broccolis had struck.

"I did not!" Dev pouted. "I can fix it, see?" He jogged over, followed by Silvery, Hotairballoon, and Volcano. Dev grabbed the broken leg and pulled, straightening it slightly. Nothing happened for a moment, and Dev looked very pleased with himself. Then, the leg buckled and the whole table collapsed with a loud CRASH!

"Oooooh!" Volcano said. "That was awesome!" She high-fived Dev appreciatevely. 

"That was NOT awesome." Hotairballoon said. "Now you might have to pay for it, and we have to clean this mess up!"

That shut Dev down. For about .2 seconds. "Ah, I'll let Feather do it!" He said jovially. "Hey, Volcano, betcha that we can take a tree down!" 

"Oh, yeah!" Volcano cried, making fireworks. "All we need is a bit of velocity..."

Silvery and Hotairballoon looked at each other.  "I guess that leaves us, doesn't it?" Silvery said. Hotairballoon nodded gloomily and they set about cleaning up. Silvery propped the table against a tree (with much difficulty) and Hotairballoon searched through the leaf mould for balls and paddles. 

The latter were easy to find, and within a minute Hotairballoon had all four in a small stack. About seven minutes later, four of the five balls were found as well, but one remained elusive.

Silvery got down and helped as well, but another three minutes passed as the two looked in vain. 

"Hey, I think I have something!" Hotairballoon said loudly. Silvery went over. A small pile of leaves was a bit hard to the touch. Carefully (lest it be something dangerous), Hotairballoon parted the covering to reveal, not a ball but... 

"Hey!" Silvery said. "That ring!" She carefully lifted it and set it in her palm. "What's it doing here? Seems like somebody forgot it!"

Danie looked up. Silvery and Hotairballoon were peering into the ring. It was a little scary (even though they were her friends) to have huge beings looming over her. She felt Silvery slip the ring onto her finger. Danie flopped onto the bed with relief. She wasn't going to die in a pile of leaves. Everything was going to be all right. At least, as all right as it can be when you are trapped in a ring.

"Dev! Volcano!" Hotairballoon called. "We need to go find the others."

Relunctantly, the two AEs walked toward their companions. "Aw, man!" Dev sighed. "I was SO CLOSE to knocking that tree over! It would've been good practice for Puck..."

"That would be something to see!" Volcano crowed. Silvery sighed. 

"Can we go now?" The foursome began walking down the dirt path leading toward the meeting pole when they ran headlong into Cayke and Air.

"Hey!" Air said, dusting herself off. "What're you doing here?"

"We were looking for you guys!" Hotariballoon threw his hands up at the irony of it. "And, may I ask the same of you?"

"Well, I uh... left the ring... here...I think..." Cayke said, suddenly becoming very interested in her shoes. Air looked a bit guilty as well, wringing her hands. 

Silvery grinned and wiggled her fingers at her, raising her eyebrows questioningly. "Does it happen to look like this?"

"You found it!" Air clapped her hands in glee. "The rest of the camp is down by the lake for water activites. We just went back to try and find the ring. You guys should stop by your cabins for bathing-suits." Volcano then noticed that both girls' outfits were really bathing suits with shorts over it.

"We'll wait." Cayke added generously.

Silvery and Volcano jogged towrard G-2. Once inside, they grabbed their swimwear, Volcano taking a minute or two to sort through her incredibly messy duffel bag while Silvery tapped her food impatiently. However, they were back with Cayke and Air long before the boys. 

Dev had led the way to the cabin with Hotairballoon walking behind. HAB's trunks were draped over the side of his bunkbed, and he easily snatched them down. Dev opened his drawer. Instead of his clothes tossed in, it was empty "Hey! Where'd my stuff go?"

"I'll help you look." Hotairballoon offered, and the two scoured the cabin. Nothing. Dev, on a whim, peeked into the bathroom, just in case. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

"Oh, fishsticks!" Hotairballoon said. "What happened?" He peered around Dev. In one of the showers, Dev's suitcase was open and the water was on, drenching all his luggage. Dev went in, shell shocked, and peeled his swimsuit off the top of the pile. Bathing suits are meant to get wet, but the rest of it...

Not so much.

Dev looked in horror at his "DON'T GIVE PEAS A CHANCE" t-shirts, favorite blue jeans, all drooping under the water's spray. Hotairballoon had the good sense to switch off the faucet, but the damage had been done. Dev picked up his soaking bag and carried it into the main room, followed by the unsure HAB.

"Who—" Hotairballoon began. Dev turned to him, fire in his eyes. 

"PUCK!" he roared, flopping into a chair.

PFFFFFFFFFFFFFFT! Went a whoopie cushion.

Hotairballoon stuffed the heel of his hand into his mouth to keep from laughing.

A few minutes later, the boys rejoined the girls. "What took you so long?" Air asked. "They probably finished canoe races already."

"Ah..." Hotairballoon began, looking nervously at Dev, unsure if publicizing this humiliating tale was acceptable or not. "It's a long story." He decided on. 

Cayke raised a questioning eyebrow but said nothing. The foursome began down the path, walking in silence towards the lake. Air snuck a glance at Dev. He shuffled sullenly, glaring at his shoes as if doing so would make Puck explode into a thousand pieces. 

"If," Dev said abruptly. They all turned and looked at him. "If somebody put your clothes in the shower and whoopie cousions on all your chairs, what would you do?"

"Is this a hypothetical question?" Silvery said with a hint of a smile.

"Yes." Dev said a little too quickly. "Defenitely, totally, absolutely, purely, hypothetical." He paused. "Really." he added.

"Hmmm." Cayke considered the question. "Well, I'd be quite mad."

"Duh..." Volcano muttered under her breath with an eye roll. "I," she said louder, placing a hand on her chest, "Would explode the hypothical perpetrator."

"Hmmm." Dev considered the answer. "How?"

"Well, I would put gunpowder in their backpack and light it on fire like I did to... uh..." Volcano trailed off at a look from Silvery Ink.

"There was GUNPOWDER in there?" Silvery said.

"No, no," Volcano waved her hand like it was the most ridiculous question ever. "If there was, you would be dead." She added in a whisper, "Which might not be a bad thing."

"I heard that!" Silvery said, raising a fist.

"Hey!" Air held her back. "Stop. Volcano's weird, just accept it." Silvery reluctantly stuffed her hand into her jacket pocket.

"Gunpowder..." Dev said. "D'you know where I can get some?" 

"Hold it," Cayke crowed triumphatly. "So it isn't so hypothetical."

"Maybe not." Dev shrugged.  

"May I ask—" Air began, "Who—"

"No names," Dev said. The girls looked disappointed. "But her initials are P-U-C-K."

"Ah..." Volcano said. "Funny initials, aren't they?"

"Yes," Dev said. "And they won't exist after I'm done with her. Who's going to help me?"

MEANWHILE

Down by the lake, Puck, Joan, and Sydney were strapping on life vests for the canoe race. Puck was recounting her elaborate scheme of sneaking into B-1's cabin and the poison ivy shirt trick. 

"All this to get back from the worm?" Sydeny said, amused by Puck's enthusiasm.

"It was disgusting!" Puck said empathetically. "It tasted like rotten apples. Rotten apples with toothpaste and dirt."

"Hmm," Squeak said, overhearing. "Doesn't sound too bad."

"Ew!" Feather squealed, turning another page in the dictionary she was reading. 

"Hey," St. Owl said. "What's that book?"

"Oh—" Feather jumped. "The Oxford Advanced English Learner's Dictionary."

"Never seen that one." St. said. "I thought I'd seen them all by now."

"Er, oh, um, uh..." Feather stumbled. What was she supposed to say, I traded it for information that Puck may well use to kill Dev. Sorry! In retrosepct, it wasn't a very good idea. "It's new." She said, which was true. "I got it at the new bookstore," she added, which wasn't.  

"Hmm." St. Owl said a tad skeptically, but she shrugged and went back to chatting with Somebody.

"Don't you think it's a little... mean... to Dev?" Feather said to Puck as she did a boisterous reenaction of Dev's There's-Poison-Ivy-In-My-Shirt dance.

"Mean?" Puck scrunched up her nose like she had never heard the word before. "Mean?" she repeated. "It's not mean, Feather. It's justice." Puck explained. "He did something to me. Now I do something to HIM."

Feather was about to point out that once she had done that, he would retaliate, and then she would, and so forth until they all died. But she just sighed. There was no point.

Puck turned and addressed all the campers. "Hey!" she said loudly. They all turned and looked at her, confused. "It's me versus Dev. Who are you backing?" She narrowed her eyes and smiled menacingly.

Dev turned and looked at HAB, Silvery, Volcano, Air, and Cayke. Danie as well listened. "Hey," he said with a grin. "It's me versus Puck. Who are YOU backing? Hey, there's the lake!" And they ran down the path the rest of the way.

-------------------

So, guys, please tell me whose side you're on for the Prank War. Your choices are: Puck, Dev, and Neutral. Your character in the story will be as you decide. If you're on Puck's team, you're a potential victim for Dev's pranks—likewise reversed. If you're neutral, either side may try and recruit you. Cast your desicions, please, or else I'll choose for you! 

Please, pretty please tell me who you are siding with! I have a great idea for another chapter, and if you don't post by the time I'm ready to write, I will pick your side for you! 

And also...

TOP!

(You saw that coming, didn't you?) 

I'm really terrified of what Puck could do to me, but I have to pick Dev's side.

[Spyro] If I'm neutral, am I a potential victim for both sides' pranks, or will they both ignore me? 

P.S. I just realized that the invitation said there would be NO alien invasions, explosions, or murders. And there's already been explosions and a murder, so I'm hoping there's going to be aliens at some point. ;) 

I'll be neutral, but if I do end up caving I'd like to join Puck. Anyway, great chapter! I suppose the escalation of the prank war was imminent...

I'm going for Puck!!! And, so what if Dev does something to me? I have my sword that I carry at all times! (FYI: And if ANYONE STEALS IT, I GET REALLY ANGRY!!!) 

P.s. I think Puck MIGHT have a teensy, weensy, eensy, tiny, itty, bitty, crush on Dev, which might put a spin on things......

Puck: I do not!!! *Blushes silently*

Me: HA!!! Gotcha!!!!

Puck: Why You!!!!!! *Chases me while I'm laughing around the room*