Dinner

     Czenko was home early from her hard day of work. This was not normal for Czenko. She is always making money. "Hey guys, I got good news," Czenko shouted through the living room in joy. "We're going out to eat."

     All three of us stopped moving. We stared at her blankly. So, were we supposed to jump up in joy? None of us knew what to do about the words, "we're going out to eat."

     "So…" Lavalilly spoke up over her book. "Where are we going exactly?"

     A huge grin spread across Czenko's face. "The Golden Dubloon of course. What other restaurant would you expect? I have enough dubloons for a good meal for all of us. It's going to be just wonderful."

     No words can describe how shocked each one of us looked. All of our face structures were completely different, but we all looked so similar at this moment.

     "Uh, Mom," It is rare for any of us to call Czenko "mom", "the Golden Dubloon is for pirates, right?" Lavalilly never really liked pirates too much.

     Misha's eyes grew wide. "Pirates!? How cool is that?" Misha jumped. He always loved fighting, weapons, and toughness. His dream in life was to be one of the strongest Neopets in Neopia, but all of us knew that was never going to happen. He began chasing his tail.

     Czenko smiled, thinking that she did make a good decision. She then looked at me, keeping her silly smile. She must have expected me to say something just because the other two had said something.

     "What's the catch?" I said to her. "You can't be acting so nice for no reason." To my surprise, my words spoke the truth. I knew Czenko enough. There was no way she was going to take an Island Kougra and her siblings out for actual food for no reason. There had to be a reason or a "catch."

     "There is no catch, Silver. I want to take my favorite pets to a nice dinner. Now you have to get ready. We have to grab the boat to Krawk Island."

     So Misha and Lavalilly dashed out of the room in a hurry to prepare to leave. I didn't know what to do with myself. I was ready. What did Czenko want me to do, brush my fur? So I just sat on the couch and waited for my family to show up in the living room once again.

     It didn't take too long. Misha appeared. He was brushed and a grey bandana pulled back the ears on top of his head. Misha wore a fake eye-patch that he wore for Halloween, and he had a cheap ring hanging from his tail like my silver one hung from mine. He looked prepared for any pirate that came his way. He looked sort of like them.

     Lavalilly came in with tons of makeup and a purse. She wore purple mascara, blue lipstick, black eyeliner, and her eyelashes were curled. It must be weird of me to notice, but she had so much makeup on her face; how could you not notice? The pink fluffy purse she carried blended in with her stripes.

     Czenko emerged with her brushed hair and her I Love The Neopian Times T-Shirt on. The only thing different really was the brushed golden brown hair. "So, is everybody ready to go?" she asked her family. She looked around at the three of us and nodded of approval. She glanced at her watch. "It's time to go anyway."

     So we all marched off to the boat that was going to take us to Krawk Island. It was only a matter of minutes before we took off.

     ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

     "Krawk Island is coming up. Krawk Island is the next stop," shouted the Kougra that was driving the boat. All four of us stood up and walked off of the boat when it came to a stop.

     Pirate boats surrounded the island. Each boat had its own name written on the side of it. One of them was the Grey Weewoo and another was called the Golden Pteri. I noticed that they seemed to name their boats after particular colored flying pets. All of them were very pretty in their own way side by side. Some of them weren't even well taken care of, but that's part of the reason of what makes all the boats look so pretty together.

     "Over there," Czenko said after stepping onto the land. I was surprised that we were standing right in front of the Golden Dubloon. Czenko's finger pointed to it. All it looked like was a ship. That's what it was. "Come on," Czenko said to us. "We better get going."

     So I cautiously walked into the pirate ship known as the Golden Dubloon. It gave me a cool and kind of creepy feeling, but the feeling was gone when I was inside.

     I was now inside the Golden Dubloon. Voices of pirates laughed throughout the restaurant. Clinging of pots and pans could be heard from the kitchen. It sounded sort of busy.

     "Ahoy," a Blue Lupe welcomed us. "Welcome to me restaurant." This wasn't an ordinary looking Blue Lupe. He wore a pirate hat, one huge gold ring, a puffy vest, and an eye patch. He wasn't the prettiest Lupe I have ever seen.

     "I'll lead you to your seats," a pink Aisha that suddenly appeared spoke up. The Aisha brought us to a table. "Now if you need anything, please just say something," she said sweetly through globs of red lipstick.

     We all looked at the menu. There was so much interesting food; I wasn't exactly sure what to pick for a while.

     After the Aisha came back again, we all ordered our first course and our drinks. I ordered Tropical Breeze, Lavalilly ordered the Caesar Salad, Misha had the Shiver me Shrimp, and Czenko had the Double Stuffed Guppy. Czenko then ordered grog for all four of us. Then she leaned over and whispered into the Aisha's ear. Czenko handed the Aisha something. I only managed to get a small glance at it. It was a bottle with a blue liquid inside. That was it.

     So we ordered the rest of our delicious meal which was a Krawk Pie for me, Barnacle Bill's Belt Busting Burger for Misha, Baby Bloater for Lavalilly, and Cap'n Threelegs Cutlass Crusade for Czenko. Let me tell you now that this food was the best thing I've ever had in my life. The food was just too delicious.

     While the food was being served, pirates from other tables started talking to us. "Oh look what the Angelpuss dragged in. It's a bunch of landlubbers from Neopia Central, I suppose." Even though that was true, it was a bad guess because I'm an Island Kougra.

     "So what brings you here? The poor life is gettin' too boring for ya?" Other pirates laughed with the Pirate Krawk sitting at the other table.

      "Ye don't know what ye talking about, pirates," Misha said, copying the Krawk's voice. "Just because we don't have those crazy outfits like you do, doesn't mean anythin'." Misha must have forgotten that he was wearing a bandana on his head. "Now leave us alone, pirates," Misha said as he gulped down his last shrimp.

     If you knew pirates, you would know that they wouldn't listen. "Ooooooh," the pirates' voices came from all directions. "I'm so scared," the Krawk said sarcastically.

     Lavalilly held a fork-full of salad up to her face. After listening to the pirates around her tease her family, she smacked the fork onto the table. "Hey, don't talk that way. We are tougher than any of you low-life pirates. Just shut up." She took her napkin and neatly spread it across her lap.

     "Well, what is a pretty young lady doin' 'er at the Golden Dubloon? Ya think ye put enough makeup on?" the Krawk teased. He was followed by laughs from a variety of different pirates.

     "I said, 'shut up!'" Lavalilly sounded like she was really getting angry.

     It was my turn to speak up, even though I'm normally the quiet one. "Hey, be nice to her. We're not doing anything to harm you. Keep your thoughts to yourself. Let us enjoy our meal." I smiled, proud of my words.

     "Oh, so a cute little Kougra thinks he can teach us some manners? Well this cute little weakling needs to be taught a lesson. Don't ya think?" a Green Eyrie spoke to the Krawk.

     The Krawk grew exited. He liked having a partner by his side. "Yeah, it's hard to believe this little Kougra is even a guy. Look how skinny he is. We can easily snap his bones in half."

     Czenko sat quietly eating her meal. She stared at all of us, like we were doing something wrong.

     My siblings were getting angry. It was totally obvious. Misha was growling to himself, and Lavalilly was crushing the fork in her hand.

     Laughs from the pirates shook the whole ship, and my family was almost ready to explode.

     "You guys better shut up soon," Lavalilly said quietly so only her table could hear it. Too bad her lips moved.

     "What was that, little Shoyru?" said the Eyrie, pretending to sound nice for a second.

     Lavalilly didn't buy it. She took a large sip from her drink, and opened her mouth to shout out something, but before any words came out of Lavalilly's mouth, a huge puff of blue smoke covered Lavalilly, causing the whole table to cough.

     "Stop making fun of us! You guys are such jerks!" a voice came from the smoke. It sounded slightly different. It was like a bird had said it. Apparently it was a bird that said it, because a Blue Pteri had emerged from the smoke where Lavalilly was. All of her makeup had disappeared. She was now the plainest looking Blue Pteri, or was it really even her?

     "Whoa!" the Krawk said. "How did you do that?" The Krawk sounded sincere. There was nothing mean about his voice, his face, or anything.

     "How did I do what, moron?" Lavalilly said rudely.

     The soft growl that Misha had maintained for a few minutes had broken out into a bark. Misha leaped out of his chair and knocked who was supposedly Lavalilly to the ground. "What did you do with Lavalilly, you beast?!" The Pteri squawked as she struggled from Misha's piercing paws.

     "What are you doing, Misha?!" Lavalilly screamed. She then brought her voice down to a whisper, "You're embarrassing me."

     "Oh yeah? Well, I don't want to see you ever again," Misha said, lost for words.

     "How can you not see me ever again? You're my-"

     "She's your sister," Czenko interrupted Lavalilly. It sort of shocked me, because she hadn't said anything to us. "Misha, will you get off of Lavalilly?"

     Misha removed himself immediately from Lavalilly. He blushed in embarrassment.

     "Look, I snuck a morphing potion in Lavalilly's drink. I'm sorry," Czenko said to the three of us.

     Lavalilly looked down at her body to find the Pteri she was. "But…I'm ugly," she said.

     I couldn't help but laughing at Lavalilly for what she said. Then I said in joy, "I knew it. I knew there was a catch to this whole meal."

     It happened that this was no laughing matter though. Nobody was laughing. In fact, the whole restaurant was quiet for a few moments.

     The silence was broken by Lavalilly's sobs. "Why did you do this to me? You didn't even ask." Lavalilly's new wings pushed us aside and she took off. She stumbled over a few tables before leaving the café.

     The silent ship suddenly broke into applause. A few pirates whistled. "What a show!" the Eyrie said. "It's definitely worth comin' 'er."

     Czenko didn't look happy though. She left the room in a hurry. "Lavalilly!" Czenko cried before she left the room while I crept behind her.

     Lavalilly was outside, drying her tears with her feathers. "How could you do this to me, Czenko," Lavalilly said. I guess she knew that Czenko was behind her. "You made me look like an idiot, and now I'm an idiot for life."

     Czenko sat down beside her. "Lilly, I didn't expect this to happen. I wanted this to be a special night. I wanted you to really like it. I wanted it to be a surprise."

     "Oh, it was a surprise all right," Lavalilly said angrily. She flapped her puny little wings.

     "Lavalilly, I know you don't enjoy how it is now, but you didn't see half of the gift. It will get better very soon, sooner then you might think," Czenko said very kindly. I wish she was talking to me. I happened to be hiding behind a bush instead. I moved in a little closer.

     "Silver!" Czenko shouted. She must have heard me. "Get out of here."

     So I left. I would have finished the story for you if I could, but I didn't get that far, but I can tell you that I managed to see a faerie paint brush dangling from Czenko's back pocket.

The End