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It's night. You'r
Chatterbox: Pudding's Place
It's night. You'r
It's night. You're sitting in your bed, staring out the window, searching for something lost. But you can't remember what it is, or was. All you know is that it's out there...it's important...and it was once yours.
Perhaps you never used it, perhaps you did--once, maybe twice. Or more. But for some strange reason, you can't remember if you did or didn't. Or what effect it had on you. Or...where it is now.
As you awoke from a particularly bland and boring dream, the memory that you were missing this...thing slid into your head. As you sat in a haze between asleep and awake, you stared outside, scouring the landscape that, for one fleeting moment, was no longer the familiar world you saw every day.
So here you are, staring outside, searching.
And then you finish waking up.
And here you are, trying to remember what you were just doing.
Hm, you think, smacking your dry lips. The covers rustle as you reach for your water glass, which sits by your lamp on your nightstand like it does every night. That's really wierd...I can't remember my dream. It seemed important--almost real. Your hand meets cold glass and you close your fingers around it. You bring it to your lips for a satisfying sip, but you realize that it's empty.
"Darn," you whisper. You'll have to get out of bed to fill it up--but it's really cold, and you don't have socks on.
Eh, it's no big deal. You'll fill it up.
Throwing the covers to the side, you haul yourself out of bed. With every footstep towards the kitchen all memory of strange dreams and searches leaves you, and by the time you return to your comfy nest of blankets with your full cup of water, the night seems almost normal. That is, until you glance outside the window.
Something moves across the front of the moon, which is full and shines right through the middle of your window, lighting up your comforter. What could it have been? It seemed familiar...And perhaps it's the fact that you're still half asleep, half awake that you can sense it, but a powerful force beats from it. Calling you. Presenting opportunities that you absolutely cannot miss.
Without any hesitation you get back out of bed, but before you can even leave your bedroom you notice a puddle of water near your nightstand.
So that's where all my water went, you realize. I must've knocked it over. Upon closer inspection you realize that there's writing on the carpet, glowing faintly yellow from under the patch of wetness.
The writing is so interesting you don't even realize how strange it is that the puddle isn't soaking into the carpet, or wonder how the words got there. In fact, the words don't even seem scary to you, despite their suspicious nature.
Hello, person! You are one of the lucky few CBers to be chosen to go on a nice, relaxing, beautiful vacation over Lake Lelillo! (Lay-LIH-loh) If you do indeed come, and we absolutely hope you do decide to, you will be given a free getaway from work, school, and empty water glasses! Here at Lake Lelillo, you will have all-day access to the lake itself, the fun attractions, the ice cream stands, the hot dog stands, the hamburger stands, the steak stands, the spagghetti stands, and any other stand marked with a silver star. (Which is all of them, so please don't forget!) Your rooms will be huge and most of them will even overlook the lake! They will of course be inside our one and only Luxury Lake House, which you will live in until your stay comes to a close. Remember this is all completely free, free free! Please pack your things, bring an AE and/or CAPTCHA if you'd like, and wait with them by the nearest stream at sunrise tomorrow morning. As we always say: All inlets lead to Lelillo!
~Your Soon-to-be Chaperones,
Cassy and Lily of Lake Lelillo
How you read all that small print was beyond you. Will you go? It certainly seems relaxing enough. The choice is yours to make.
-------------------------
I'll tell you all when the spots are closed, so join while you still can!
Please note that this is my second ski lodge, and it's kind of linked to my first. In a sense, it's the next part. I don't know if I should call it a part two, or what, but some things might reference the first ski lodge. Don't worry--I'm not going to make things super confusing. I'll explain things as I go--and I really need new CBers to join in. But I also need some CBers from my previous ski lodge to come. ('Course, they don't have to join if they don't want to; I'll understand.)
Here's another clue (if you didn't catch the others...) for the CBers who were in my first ski lodge, or read it, and wanted to be in this one:
What do you get when you cross a scorpion and a sloth?
Hehe, my alias isn't going to last the day. :D
submitted by Your Chaperones, Cassy and Lily
(January 1, 2017 - 11:51 am)
(January 1, 2017 - 11:51 am)
SOOOOOOOOOOO AWESOMEEEEE
Micearenice, (or if someone else knows) could you possibly link the part where you said the murderer could be directly identified? It took me several days to go through the previous parts when I first started following this ski lodge, and I don't have that kind of time. I won't forgive myself if I just lift the flap to see who it is without at least trying first. Don't get me wrong, this is AMAZING and I would reread it if I could, but the way it's set up as CB comments is kind of inconvenient. I might still try to reread it though...
I have a strange feeling about hotairballoon....
(June 9, 2018 - 10:15 am)
Here you go, Jwyn!
I recommend starting at Day 10, part One and reading through the following game. (Hopefully this links!)
(June 9, 2018 - 1:17 pm)
Oh wait, that's the wrong page XD
My bad; sorry! HERE is the real page!
(June 9, 2018 - 5:27 pm)
Whoops, that's not even the right page! XD
Sorry, my bad. Here's the page where day 10 starts: http://www.cricketmagkids.com/chatterbox/puddingsplace/node/283794?page=23
(June 10, 2018 - 8:20 am)
I haven't figured it out, but I can give you my suspect list of 4 people!
(June 9, 2018 - 4:23 pm)
Got it, thanks Mice. Not sure what Gandalf has to do with any of this, though...
Oh, and Jwyn - I am but the very goodest-est of the good guys! I suggest you perish that strange feeling from your mind!
(June 9, 2018 - 5:25 pm)
Wait, but it can't be you, HAB. In one post the murderer said something like, "considering who my AE is, I probably have a strong immune system." But you AE was already dead, so you would have said "considering who my AE was..." So yes, I shall perish that strange feeling from my mind.
(June 16, 2018 - 7:04 am)
If you say so. I looked back at the first few installments, and now I have narrowed a few suspects...
(June 12, 2018 - 9:26 am)
Oh, and thank you Micearenice!! The second link was correct by the way :)
(June 12, 2018 - 9:29 am)
hOLY LATE ARRIVAL BATMAN
so, long story short, my life's falling apart, so I sincerely apologize for not being here. I promise I have been reading and screaming over what the heck has been happening and your absolutely amazing writing. I can't wait for the next part!
(June 20, 2018 - 11:57 pm)
(June 23, 2018 - 8:34 pm)
Sorry for the delay, but without further ado, here's the next part! Also, I'm trying out a new
Day Ten - Night: Behind Closed Doors (continued)
“So what did you all do outside?” Lily asked at dinnertime.
“Oh. Well, we went for a long walk,” Dragonrider offered.
“See anything interesting?” Lily wondered.
“Er, not really!” Joan replied hastily. “Just a bunch of leaves. And, er, thorns,” she went on, picking a few more brambles out of her hair.
“We...didn’t find Cassy…” Poetic Panda declared slowly, making the decision for all of them to keep the encounter a secret.
“Oh well,” Lily said. “Thanks for looking. I just hope you had a good time. Booksy, Wordsy, Jayfeather, Briar, Pierre and I had a fun game marathon while you were out.”
“Yeah, it was pretty fun,” Booksy agreed. It had been surprisingly so.
“Wait--Jayfeather?!” Cinderpelt exclaimed.
“Yep. He came down for a snack and we invited him to join us,” Briar said.
“Oh. Well okay then.”
“Does it seem like he’s feeling better?” Autumn Leaves asked.
Booksy nodded.
“That’s good. It didn’t take him too long. I guess he just needed some alone time.”
Dinner was delicious. But the CBers’ exhaustion was catching up to them, and they were in desperate need of some rest.
“I think you guys should go to bed early tonight,” Lily admonished. “You don’t want to fall asleep in the dining room.”
The CBers agreed with her through their yawns. They retreated upstairs, showered, brushed their teeth, filled up their water bottles, and collapsed into their beds as the sun began to set.
But one CBer lay awake longer than the rest. In its mind was conflict.
It took a deep, calming breath in and out. First of all, going after Cassy had not been a good idea. One part of it knew that the chaperone had to stay alive. But its unpredictable, irrational murderer-y side was acting on instinct. Calm down, the murderer thought to itself. This is Cassy you’re dealing with. She didn’t spill the beans. But she was SO CLOSE to it!
No. You saw it in her eyes. She gets it now. That’s why she DIDN’T tell them. So...calm down. Remember that you need Cassy to help you. Save that anger for whoever’s giving you this headache right now.
Speaking of which. Why did this have to be so complicated?! Why couldn’t the CBers just play along and stop poking their noses where they didn’t belong? And why was the Mystery so full of holes right now?!? No matter how hard the murderer tried, even with Cassy’s help, CBers kept figuring things out. And each time one figured it out, the murderer got this terrible headache that took hours to go away. But at this point, so many CBers knew the truth that the murderer's headache could only reduce itself to a very faint ache in the back of its head.
Someone had figured something out today. The murderer didn’t know who that 'someone' could be, but whomever it was was currently thinking hard about the Mystery.
Oh well. The murderer was exhausted just as much as the other CBers were. It ignored the headache, rolled over, and slipped off into sleep.
~
And thus ends Day Ten.
Day Eleven-Part One: Ammiratio
Jayfeather yawned and opened his eyes. Agh, he felt so stiff from lying in this bed all the time! He smacked his lips, threw back the covers, hopped out of bed, and stretched lazily, popping his spine.
Jayfeather felt more energized than he had in a while. And after playing games with Booksy, Briar, Lily, Wordsy, and Pierre last night, he was feeling more than a little lonely cooped up on the top floor. Perhaps...it was time to rejoin the group.
Jayfeather got dressed in some normal clothes, opened the curtains, and started cleaning up the mess on his nightstand. It was then he heard a knock at the door.
“Come on in,” Jayfeather said.
Cinderpelt entered. “Good morning,” she said, shutting the door. “You’re up early.”
“Yeah,” Jayfeather agreed.
“You must be feeling better then! I heard that you played some games with Booksy and the others yesterday.”
Jayfeather nodded. “Yeah, it was fun. I think I’m starting to feel claustrophobic up here.”
“Do you think you’re ready to rejoin the group??”
“Yeah, probably.”
“Wow. That was a--fast, er, rest. Okay. Well, we’re all having breakfast right now, so come on down when you’re ready.”
---
Breakfast was lively again with Jayfeather back at the table. Ariel was glad to have his buddy back, and the other CBers were pleased to see Jayfeather doing better, so they kept the conversation topics to lighter things, rather than what had been going on without him. Of course he noticed the obvious absence of some of the Chatterboxers who had been there before, but he didn’t mention anything about that.
Eventually, though, their current situation came to mind, and talk about the murderer sprang up.
“So how are things going with the mystery?” Jayfeather asked.
“Uh what mystery?” Joan asked, her pancake slipping off her fork as she stared intently at Jayfeather.
Jayfeather looked at Joan oddly. “Ummmm...finding out why Cassy ran away, and getting rid of the murderer, and such?” he asked, as if that should’ve been obvious.
“Oh. Ah. Yeah. Sorry. I was joking,” stammered Joan hastily. “Um, speaking of Cassy, well we--”
Dragonrider stamped down on Joan’s foot--Lily and Pierre were sitting right there.
“Er, we almost found her the other day,” Joan mended.
“And we’re looking for her again soon!” Elvina declared. “I’m going out right after breakfast--and I have a plan. Anybody who wants to help should meet me in the lobby after we’re done here.”
“Oh, okay,” said Jayfeather. “Anything else that’s new?”
“No, not really,” the CBers replied.
“Have you been back to the water park at all?” he asked.
The CBers looked at each other. “...No, not really,” they responded. “Since Cassy’s out there we thought we should be careful for traps and not go outside.”
"Pfft. That’s not healthy at all. Seems like a shame to let all that go to waste...”
“Speak for yourself,” Cinderpelt teased gently.
“Well,” Hotairballoon said, “Jayfeather makes a good point...after all the hard work we’ve been doing, don’t you think we should just go outside and maybe just have some fun?”
“You’re one to talk about fun, Hotairballoon,” Booksy laughed. “You’ve been the one pushing us along the whole time.”
“My point exactly.”
“Guys, Hotairballoon wants us to relax for once. What do you think?” Booksy said.
“I’d love to,” Moonfrost said.
“Me too,” Brooklyn Newsie agreed.
The other CBers were hesitant to decide; after all, just because they hadn’t found traps outside yet didn’t mean they weren’t there altogether.
“Now wait, what about catching Cassy?” Elvina wondered, frowning.
“I’ll go with you,” Jayfeather offered.
“Are you sure?” Cinderpelt asked him.
“Sure I’m sure; I’ve been relaxing for the past two days and I need some action.”
“Well, okay. Just...be careful!” Cinderpelt admonished. “And bring your communications device.”
Lily and Pierre wanted to go to the water park as well. The only vacationers who would not be enjoying themselves on waterslides were Elvina, Ariel and Jayfeather, who were determined to find Cassy. Everyone, themselves included, knew that their chances of actually finding her were second to none, but they wanted to go out anyway. After breakfast, while the others were changing into their bathing suits and filling up water bottles and snack packs, Elvina, Ariel, and Jayfeather loaded up on their adventuring gear.
“Ready to go?” Elvina asked Jayfeather. The two were standing in the living room, in front of the bedroom doors. Ariel was already in the lobby, waiting.
“Yep!” Jayfeather agreed. Elvina trotted to the door, and Jayfeather was about to follow her when his eyes snagged on something close to the ground on his right--on the bottoms of the bedroom doors. There was thick paint slathered onto their bottoms, covering indiscernible divots beneath.
“Why’d you paint the bottoms of the doors?” he asked Elvina.
“What? We didn’t,” she replied. “C’mon, let’s go.”
Jayfeather bent down and traced the shapes beneath the paint with his fingers. They almost looked like words...but thanks to the new coating over them, they were no longer legible. Jayfeather felt briefly curious as to what they really said, but he shrugged and raced out of the room to follow Elvina.
---
The other CBers had a blast at the water park. At first it was almost as if they had forgotten to have fun--but once Pierre figured out how to turn the power on, and after the CBers had scoped out the area for traps, they took the first tube slide down into the pool and were immediately refreshed.
They enjoyed themselves all the way up until lunchtime, at which point they stopped to eat their snacks. Lily started up one of the old food stands and made hamburgers/hot dogs (which were still surprisingly unspoiled) as additional nutrition for the CBers.
Cinderpelt decided to check in on Elvina, Ariel, and Jayfeather while she waited for her hamburger to be done cooking.
“How goes the searching?” she asked through her earpiece.
“Shhhhhh,” came Jayfeather’s scolding response. “Um, nothing so far,” he whispered. “But Elvina’s plan is still in progress, so that’s no surprise.”
Cinderpelt wanted to ask him what exactly the plan was, but Jayfeather told her to stop distracting him, so...she did.
The CBers finished their lunches and decided to spend another hour or so at the waterpark. Since there were no employees manning the rides, they could pretty much do whatever they wanted. Hotairballoon surfed down The Twister without using a tube, which was of course completely dangerous, but he survived.
The other CBers were a little more responsible with their freedom. The same cannot be said about Lily and Pierre, though...The chaperones were as wild and hyper as children.
At around two o’clock in the afternoon, the CBers were ready to head home. They gathered their things, Pierre shut down the water park, and together they plodded back to the mansion.
When they got to the front doors the CBers saw that they were wide open. “I wonder if this means Elvina and the others are back yet,” Autumn Leaves commented.
“Well if they are they’re letting all the cool air out,” Pierre grumbled as everyone filed in. He and Lily closed the doors, and the CBers just enjoyed the air-conditioned lobby for a little while before heading upstairs to dry off, maybe take some showers, and change into normal clothes.
After changing, Cinderpelt once again decided to contact her Alter Ego. “Jayfeather? Are you guys back yet?”
“Hm? Oh, yes,” he responded happily. “We caught Cassy.”
“You’re back? Where are--wait WHAT?! You did??”
“Yep!” Jayfeather responded, sounding proud.
“Where in the house are you right now?”
“Up in the second-to-last floor,” he responded.
“What are you doing up there?!”
“I’m guarding the room Cassy’s in. Elvina and Ariel are on their way down right now.”
About five minutes later, the CBers’ communications devices buzzed and they heard Elvina calling a meeting in the sitting room near the dining room. Everyone rushed to the scene, including Lily and Pierre.
“What happened?” demanded Hotairballoon. “Did you see something while you were out? Wait--where’s Jayfeather??”
“He’s fine,” Elvina said dismissively. “Is everyone here?”
“Yeah,” Ariel confirmed. He clapped his hands together. “So. We caught Cassy.”
~ ~ ~
To be continued...
(June 26, 2018 - 8:15 pm)
Toppy top toppity top!
"Why does this thread have to be at the top, Lily?"
"So people see it, of course!"
"D'you think this will even work?"
"Hm, I dunno. Why don't we click 'submit' to find out?"
"The CAPTCHA's saying 'Wrru'."
"Oh. That means it's a sloth."
"Wait, r--"
*submit*
(June 26, 2018 - 8:19 pm)
Top!
(June 27, 2018 - 11:20 am)
This is so awesome!
I think I'm going to re-read the whole thing and search for clues. Cardinal says "chau". I have no idea what that means.
(June 27, 2018 - 4:57 pm)