Hey everyone!! It’s arrived! Episode 12! The most exciting episode yet!
Enjoy!
“Well…” said Fearless Fox, “looks like my weapon’s broken.”
“No way,” I said angrily. I was ticked off that we still hadn’t caught OWL.
Everyone was breathing heavily after the short but brutal fight. Fearless Fox’s face was still purple from getting punched, and I was still breathing louder than trucks vrooming down the highway.
“I need a new weapon,” Fearless Fox said again.
“We heard,” Silver Wolf said flatly.
“Well,” said Spotted Dragon, “let’s not go back to Sticky Clown’s store. That place has crazy prices.”
“I think I heard about an adventuring shop on Shark Tooth once,” Slippery Icicle said.
I sighed. “Let’s go check it out.”
We all walked over to the blimp and jumped up the rope. We piled inside, and I sent our blimp to Shark Tooth Island. I had never been to Shark Tooth before, but I tried to remember the documentary I was watching on our trip to Steamworks. I vaguely remembered something about a big shark terrorizing people and something else about ancient ruins on the island. I also remembered that they gave out free bottles of carbonated coconut milk to every visitor. Gross.
We arrived at Shark Tooth and slid down the rope. A large billboard greeted us.
“Come to Brave Sky’s shop for all of your adventuring needs! Costumes, weapons, potions, and much, much more! Right now, everything is 40% off!” Silver Wolf read.
“Of course,” I said, “that just means they jacked up the prices about 300% so 40% off seems like a good deal even though it’s not.”
“Well,” Spotted Dragon said, “this isn’t Sticky Clown’s store. Maybe whoever runs this store wouldn’t do something like that.”
We crossed the tiny Shark Tooth island and found Brave Sky’s adventuring shop. We stepped inside and found ourselves in a shop not nearly as large or as well organized as Sticky Clown’s. Capes and swords were lying on the floor; everything was a mess.
“Hello,” the person at the door greeted us, “How can I help you?”
“Yes,” Fearless Fox answered, “I’m interested in a sword, Ms.…”
“Ms. Brave Sky,” Brave Sky replied. “The swords are back here.”
She walked to the back of the store with the rest of us trailing right behind her, stepping carefully to avoid stepping on a weapon of some sort. Fearless Fox picked out a sword rather quickly and bought it. It was rather cheap; the 40% off must have been a legitimate 40% off instead of a price increase.
“Only 10 credits!?” Slippery Icicle shouted, shocked. “That’s DIRT cheap compared to Sticky Clown’s store!”
Brave Sky smiled. “Yeah, we’re…competitors, that’s for sure.”
“Sorry if this sounds a little rude,” I asked, “but why is your store such a mess? It wouldn’t hurt to clean it up a bit.”
That came out much harsher than I intended. Thank goodness I didn’t offend her.
“Actually,” she said, “believe it or not, I was just robbed.”
“WHAT?!” I screamed. “WHO DID IT?!”
Brave Sky was startled. “Uh…it was someone with brown hair and a big, red tattoo on the side of her face.”
I looked at the rest of our group. All of us knew exactly who Brave Sky was describing.
“Which way did she go?” I demanded as calmly as possible.
“Towards the ruins,” Brave Sky said.
The ruins?! What on earth could Fearless Owl be doing at the ruins? As far as I knew, there wasn’t anything down there besides bones from dead sharks. Yuck.
“Why? Do you know her?” Brave Sky asked.
“Uh…she’s an acquaintance of ours,” Silver Wolf said.
“Yeah…and we have to go!” Fearless Fox shouted, throwing 10 credits on the counter and racing out the door. The rest of us trailed right behind him.
“Why would Fearless Owl rob a store?” Slippery Icicle asked.
“Incredible Carrot robbed Sticky Clown’s store just before we came to rescue you,” Spotted Dragon replied.
“What kind of a crazy plan is she up to?!” Slippery Icicle screamed.
I was about to reply when Fearless Fox stopped in front of a gigantic building shaped like the face of a shark. The entrance was a massive mouth with two eyeballs resting on top.
“This would be the perfect place for a bad guy’s hideout,” I said. It really was. It was a dark, spooky place, a place no one would dare to enter. But I wasn’t afraid.
“Y-yeah,” Silver Wolf stammered. “I-it’s qu-quite… for-formidable.” She was completely pale.
“Well,” Fearless Fox said, “we don’t have a choice. We are going in, and we’re going to capture Fearless Owl!”
“Let’s not…” Spotted Dragon said. Everyone besides Fearless Fox and me mumbled in consent.
“Come on, guys!” I said. “The entrance is shaped like a shark’s mouth. So what?”
“It’s more than that… I’m getting a really bad vibe off this place,” Slippery Icicle faltered.
“So, Cool Smarticle and I are the fearless couple, is that it!?” Fearless Fox said angrily. “No one else is going to help?”
There was a moment of silence.
“Well, I don’t know about the rest of you, but Cool Smarticle and I are going in!” he said.
We walked in. It was pitch black.
“I can’t see anything!” I wailed.
“Our eyes will adjust. Be quiet. I thought I heard something,” he whispered.
I waited. Silence.
“Are you trying to scare me?” I asked.
“No,” he replied, and I knew he meant it.
We took a few more steps into the ruins but immediately stopped again. This time I heard something. Swish, swish, swish. It stopped almost as soon as it had started.
We started and stopped again.
Swish, swish, swish. Silence. I had heard that sound somewhere before. What was it…?
We started and stopped for a fourth time. Swish, swish, swish.
I shivered when I realized what it was.
It was the sound of two pant legs rubbing together. Someone was following us.
We started and stopped abruptly. Swish, swish, swish, swish, swish, swish. The sound did not stop this time. Our pursuer was running, running towards us at an amazing speed.
“RUN, COOL SMARTICLE, RUN!!” Fearless Fox screamed. I raced around wildly in the dark. I repeatedly ran into walls, but very slowly my eyes adjusted to the dark. I slowly could see the walls of the ruins, then the floor, then the ceilings, and then the silhouettes of a group of about five fighting someone.
I ran over. The rest of the group had arrived. They probably had heard Fearless Fox telling me to run and came in to help. They had knocked out the Poptropican that was chasing Fearless Fox and me.
“Who is it?” I asked, trying my best to stay calm. I had never seen him before.
“I have no idea if it’s even a boy or a girl – I can’t see my hand in front of my face!” Silver Wolf said.
I bent over and checked his inventory. He had a small, plastic card. It was too big to be an official Poptropica ID. It had some text of some sort on it, but it was way too dark to read it.
“I found something!” I said.
“What is it?” Spotted Dragon asked.
“A card of some sort,” I replied. “I can’t read it; it’s too dark. Does anyone have a flashlight?”
“I have a few matches,” Slippery Icicle said.
After much struggling of us trying to see to light the matches, we finally lit a match and read the card.
“This card certifies Scary Berry as an official member of the Other World League,” I read out loud, “Signed, Scary Berry. Signed, Fearless Owl.” I looked up. “Fearless Owl sent him! She probably has a whole team of guards coming!”
Just then a bunch of guards appeared. We fought them off rather quickly and continued through the ruins. Our eyes had completely adjusted to the darkness and we quickly came to a door with a pattern of buttons next to it shaped in a shark’s mouth. There were small symbols on the buttons that I immediately recognized as Shark from the first day of school years ago.
“Does anyone remember learning about the Shark hieroglyphics in school? I fell asleep that day in class,” I said. I used to be really embarrassed about that, but that was years ago.
“My class went on a field trip here in kindergarten, before we even knew each other,” Silver Wolf said as she pressed some buttons. “The code was O-P-E-N, and then you pressed the nose.”
The eyes turned red and the door remained locked.
“What?” Silver Wolf said, “I must have entered it in wrong. O-P-E-N-Nose.”
The eyes turned red again and the door remained locked.
“I guess the code isn’t O-P-E-N anymore, then,” Silver Wolf said.
That was frustrating. How were we supposed to find Fearless Owl if she was hiding behind a locked door?
“The code is B-O-N-E-S,” Fearless Fox said quietly.
“Bones?” Silver Wolf said surprised, “I’m sure it was-”
“I know this,” Fearless Fox cut her off. “It’s B-O-N-E-S.”
Silver Wolf shrugged and typed the code in. To our astonishment, the eyes turned green, and the door opened.
“How did you…?” I tried to ask, but I didn’t get a chance because more guards appeared.
“Why do we have to fight so much? Why? What did we ever do?” Silver Wolf said exasperatedly.
“Because they’re evil, that’s why!” Spotted Dragon screamed. She threw a vial at them, which shattered into broken glass. The broken glass went everywhere, and the guards screamed in pain. I can tell you, it was not a pretty sight.
While the guards were distracted, Fearless Fox ran up to them and slashed them with his sword. He probably took out around twenty guards in a minute or two.
We continued on, when all of a sudden, I stopped. I could see the silhouettes of Fearless Owl and Incredible Carrot in the distance.
“There they are!” I whispered. “They’re right down the passage! Do you think they see us?” I turned around and saw Fearless Fox behind me. His face was red with rage, but that expression quickly gave way to shock. He nodded violently.
“Yes, we do,” someone behind me said. I whirled around. Fearless Owl was standing right in front of me. She pushed me aside, walked up to Fearless Fox, and said two words that absolutely changed my life.
“Hello, brother.”
~SpiderFox{It’s our new sign off! Our new formation xD}
Poptropica Tips For Poptropicans 