The Tale of Dough

     An hour later, she was woken up by moist licks from the tongue of her Angelpuss.

     "Hi Fluffy, what time is it?" Gilly asked, half awake. She glanced at the clock. It was 6:00! Time to feed Fluffy!

     "Sorry, Fluffy! I will get your dinner right now!" Gilly said, rushing to her kitchen. She opened a kitchen cabinet and got out a package of quality Angelpuss feed. Gilly poured the feed into Fluffy's food dish clumsily, some pieces bouncing off the dish and landing on the counter. She sleepily put the dish on the floor and Fluffy flew quickly to the food. She was about to eat, but instead, she looked up at Gilly and meowed.

     "Oops, sorry, Fluffy! Forgot the water!" Gilly apologized, rushing to the sink. She grabbed Fluffy's water dish and filled it to the brim with water. Gilly rushed the dish over to Fluffy, spilling some of the water along the way. By that time, half the bowl was empty.

     "Sorry I'm such a mess today, Fluffy. Being the star of a Neopian Plot is really hard work! Now I know how Nabile, Tomos, Jazan, Isca, Caylis, Jeran, King Skarl, King Altador, and all the others feel. Woo!" Gilly said, panting and wiping her forehead with her arm. Fluffy meowed in sympathy.

     "You know, Fluffy, I need more recreation time. Something to do that will take my mind off stardom. Hmm... I know, baking!" Gilly suggested. "Now what should I bake... how about cookies?"

     Fluffy nodded hastily in agreement.

     "Okay, baking cookies it is!" Gilly finalized, going to another kitchen cabinet and pulling out a few vital ingredients for baking cookies. She then went over to her fridge and got out some eggs and milk.

     "Okay, now I need a bowl," Gilly said to herself. Suddenly, Fluffy hopped onto the kitchen counter with a medium sized bowl she held by her mouth.

     "Thank you, Fluffy."

     "Meow!"

     "First, I need the flour," Gilly said to herself, grabbing the package of flour. She was about to pour the flour into the bowl when she realized something.

     "Wait! I need to check the expiration date. We can't have cookies made with expired flour!"

     Gilly looked at the expiration date on the back of the package.

     "Whoa! This expired so long ago! I'm glad I didn't use this!" Gilly said. "I guess I will drop by the Food Shop and get another new package. Stay out of trouble, Fluffy!"

     Gilly grabbed her coat and quickly put it on, waving bye to Fluffy in the process. It was cold outside and starting to get dark. Gilly ran quickly over to the Food Shop and called over the Chia that owned the store.

     "Welcome to the Food Shop, ma'am. How may I help you?" greeted the Chia.

     "I'm looking for a bag of flour, please," Gilly answered.

     "That will be 150 Neopoints, please."

     "Will you accept 120?"

     "I accept your offer!"

     Gilly handed the Chia shopkeeper the Neopoints and the Chia gave her a new bag of flour in return.

     "Thank you for the flour!"

     "No, thank you! Come again soon!"

     Gilly left the shop quickly, the doors of the Food Shop swinging wildly behind her.

     Just then, Gilly heard a devilish cackle from above. It was the Pant Devil! Gilly ran as fast as she could to escape the claws of the evil Pant Devil but her tries were no use. The Pant Devil dove toward Gilly and grabbed her bag of flour. Then he maneuvered quickly upward before Gilly could get a hold of him. The Pant Devil went back down to Gilly and taunted her. He would go into an area where Gilly would be able to get him, then he would fly higher so that Gilly would not be able to reach him anymore. He laughed at Gilly's useless attempts to jump and reach him.

     "Aww... little girl can't reach big bad Pant Devil?"

     "Give me back my bag of flour!"

     "Never!"

     And with that last word, he flew rapidly away from Gilly, cackling along the way as he dove down again, probably toward another innocent Neopet.

     "Now I have to go to the Food Shop again!" Gilly complained. Gilly tiredly trudged back to the Food Shop and called for the shopkeeper again.

     "Back so soon?" asked the shopkeeper.

     "Yeah, the Pant Devil stole my bag of flour. May I buy another one?" Gilly asked.

     "Sorry, but we are all sold out of flour. Maybe you should go to Merifoods in Meridell to see if they have any flour. Or you can wait until we restock," the Chia shopkeeper said.

     "But Meridell is thousands of miles away!"

     "Hmm... I know! The Bakery should have some flour!"

     "You're right! Thanks!"

     "You're welcome! Tell the Breadmaster I said hi!"

     Gilly rushed out of the Food Shop (again) and headed toward the Bakery. She was running as fast as her little Usul legs could carry her. When she finally arrived at the Bakery, she was panting as hard as a Gelert that ran twenty miles nonstop. When her breathing slowed down, she approached the Breadmaster.

     "Yo, how may I help you?"

     "Do you have any flour in stock?"

     "I think we do; let me check."

     The Breadmaster went into a back room in the store. After a few minutes, he came back out and told Gilly, "Yes, we do have bags of flour in stock. How many would you like?"

     "One please. How much would that cost?" Gilly asked.

     "130 Neopoints."

     "So you're cheaper than the Food Shop's price. Anyways, will you accept 100 Neopoints?"

     "I'm not taking less than 110 for the fantastic item."

     "Alright then, 110 Neopoints it is."

     Gilly handed the Kacheek the Neopoints and ran out of the door. She followed down the road, staying near thick foliage in case the Pant Devil would come back to her for a second stealing. She bravely but slowly came out of the protection of the foliage and exposed herself to the open sky since she realized she was slightly allergic to some of the bushes she was near.

     Suddenly, Gilly heard a crack in the evening sky. A beam of light streaked the night sky bright yellow-white and Gilly practically jumped when she heard the sudden noise. After the sound, rain came crashing down hard on the poor Usul.

     "Oh great!" Gilly yelled ironically. She kicked the dirt road and ranted on about how terrible the day had been. The rain pounded down harder on Gilly every moment and soon, the flour bag disintegrated and the flour poured out as a liquid substance. Gilly dropped the bag hopelessly and said, "Uh! This is the worst day ever! I will never have recreation time!"

     Gilly forced her body to continue walking on the dirt road to her home. On her way, she stopped by the pound to dry off.

     "Excuse me, Dr. Death; do you have a dry towel?" Gilly had asked.

     "Yup, there are many in the Pound bathroom. Go there to dry yourself off, but then leave immediately unless you want to adopt since you're hogging space!" Dr. Death said irritably.

     "Okay, okay!" Gilly rushed to the Pound bathroom (she somehow knew where it was) and dried herself off as quickly as she could with a blue towel. While she was drying off her face, she heard a whimper from behind her. Gilly, being brave, turned around to see what it was. The creature that had whimpered was a skinny looking and dirty blue Xweetok. It had a bandage on its foot and Gilly gasped in horror at its appearance.

     "E-ex-excuse me, kind la-lady. May I use the bath-bathroom after ya-you?" the Xweetok asked, shivering.

     "Of course you can. What is your name? I'm Gilly the Usul from the Tale of Woe," Gilly explained.

     The Xweetok's eyes grew larger. "You're Gilly! I love your plot! I have only read the comics, though, but have not actually participated in the plot. I'm not allowed to since Dr. Death only lets us go out of the pound occasionally since he doesn't want us to stray too far from the pound or run away." The Xweetok sighed. "If only someone would adopt me and take me away from this dreaded place. Oh yeah, and by the way, my name is Jeena," the Xweetok informed her.

     "Nice to meet you, Jeena. Well, I better get going. I don't want my Angelpuss to get into trouble," Gilly said good-naturedly.

     Jeena chuckled. "What's your Angelpuss's name?"

     "Fluffy is her name and trouble is her game," Gilly joked.

     Again, Jeena laughed. "You're funny!"

     "Well, bye. Maybe someday I will come back and visit you," Gilly said, heading out of the Pound bathroom. Gilly left the pound to find that the rain stopped. She walked carefully along the dirt path to her Neohome to make sure she didn't slip or splash in puddles.

     When she was able to see the roof of her Neohome, she saw smoke coming out of the chimney. Gilly walked a few more steps closer and saw that the smoke looked like ghosts.

     "Oh no, what had Fluffy got herself into now!" Gilly thought. She ran as quickly as she could to the door of her house. Once she was there, she practically ripped the door off and what she saw inside her once pristine Neohome shocked her.

     There were smoky ghosts everywhere and Fluffy was panicking, flying everywhere around the house, distressed and alarmed. Fire was burning the furniture and Fluffy's wings were slightly scorched.

     "Fluffy, did you try to bake cookies yourself with the expired flour?!" Gilly asked, outraged at Fluffy. Fluffy nodded in shame but continued to panic around the house, her eyes rolling around like crazy.

     After a few moments, Gilly realized why there were smoky ghosts. Gilly had forgotten to wash her hands after battling haunted trees and gravestones and when Gilly had messed around with the bag of expired flour, the germs of the haunted monsters must have contaminated the flour and turned it into ghostly flour! Gilly swiftly used her Light ability, Sun Ray, to make the evil dark ghosts run away from the bright yellow and white beam of light. Once they were gone, Gilly used her Water ability, Quench, to stop the small flames that were scorching the furniture of her once perfect Neohome. Fluffy stopped flying around and gradually halted, panting.

     Gilly ran into the kitchen and opened her oven door. The cookies were glowing, but other than that, they looked like any other cookies. She got out the tray and put them on the counter. Suddenly, Fluffy swooped down and grabbed a cookie. Before Gilly could stop her, Fluffy took a bite out of the cookie. "Fluffy! Do you know what you did?!" Fluffy swooped down once again and grabbed another cookie. Instead of eating it, she handed it to Gilly.

     "You expect me to eat one of those evil cookies?!" After some tempting and convincing, Gilly had the cookie in her hands and was about to eat it. She reluctantly took a bite and smiled.

     "Yum! Who knew evil could taste so good!"

     Gilly chuckled and Fluffy smiled. They spent the rest of the day eating the cookies. By the end of the day, they were all filled up.

     "From now on, Fluffy-" Gilly stopped to take a bite of her cookie. "You will be the baker of cookies!"

     Fluffy smiled and clapped her paws in happiness. Gilly gave Fluffy a high five and both owner and petpet lived happily ever after, eating glowing cookies for dessert after every meal made by the cute little Angelpuss of Gilly's, Fluffy.

The End