Her First Spin

      The blue Aisha bounced excitedly from one paw to the other, yellow eyes fixed on her owner who was struggling along behind her through the densely thick cloud that held Faerieland.

      “Come on before all of the good prizes run out!”

      Katrina rolled her eyes at her hyper Aisha, Shironeko_Sama, or Shiro for short, and continued to struggle through the plush cloud. “Sweetie.” She began pulling her foot out of the deep cloud. “Do you seriously think that with the amount of people playing this thing that the Faeries would possibly let it run out?”

      Shiro stopped mid bounce and looked up at her Angelpuss, Nekomini, who had accompanied them to Faerieland. She finally sighed. “No, I suppose not.” She sighed before once again staring stubbornly up at her owner. “But we still need to hurry up!”

      With that, the hyperactive Aisha returned to her quick footed pouncing through the clouds, leaving her owner trudging along behind her, generally cursing the fact that clouds have a similar consistency as snow and therefore are rather difficult to walk through.

      “Why did she HAVE to choose THIS as her first game as a day old pet,” Katrina mumbled to herself as she tripped once again over a fluff of cloud. “Why couldn’t it have been ‘Coltzan’s Shrine’ or ‘The Wheel of Monotony’? Anything but the...”

      “Mom, Mom, we found it! We found it!”

      Stumbling through the last stretch of cloud, Katrina arrived to stand beside her pet, who was standing still as a Uni in a mud field at the sight of the game she had wanted to try ever since being created.

      “There it is Mom, the ‘Wheel of Excitement’!” Shiro said happily bouncing up and down in delight. “Isn’t it awesome! Isn’t it! Isn’t it!”

      “Yes, yes, it’s very lovely, but you must calm down. You’re getting Nekomini upset!” Katrina said quickly, and as if to illustrate her point, Nekomini obligingly hissed loudly and began rocketing back and forth, hissing all the while.

      Blushing at the spastic nature of her petpet, Shiro sat down quietly (thankfully, Nekomini followed suit, but not before cheekily sticking her tongue out at Katrina).

      “So, how does this work?” Shiro finally asked, looking up at her owner.

      “Well, you walk up to the Faerie, give her the neopoints to play and then spin the wheel,” Katrina responded, watching as a small red Scorchio finished his turn and ran screaming after the Pant Devil who had just flown off with his plushie.

      “Really? That’s it! I thought it would be... harder,” Shiro said quietly.

      An awkward silence followed this statement (well, it would have been silent if it wasn’t for the screaming Scorchio and oddly purring Nekomini).

      “Well,” Katrina finally said, breaking the silence. “Do you want to spin the wheel or not?”

      “YES!” the Aisha screeched, leaping to her feet and charging towards the Wheel, leaving Katrina to once again trudge along behind her.

      As they approached the wheel, the light Faerie who ran it turned to look at them. After apparently making sure that they really were coming her way, she quickly posed next to the wheel and cried, “Step right up, step right up, one and all for the Wheel of Excitement! Give it a spin and see what it lands on, only 75 neopoints a go!”

      Her smile quickly dampened however as she saw Shiro running full tilt towards her, Nekomini flying behind, both shrieking loudly.

      The Faerie shrieked in fear and shielded her face. “No, please don’t!! I swear the Pant Devil and I are not working together! It's just a fluke that people always land on his panel! A fluke, I tell you!”

      “Would you calm down? My pet just wants to spin the wheel.” Katrina sighed, having grabbed Shiro and Nekomini to prevent them from flattening the poor Faerie.

      “Oh well, of course you do!” the Faerie chirped, immediately regaining her composure and fixing her mussed hair. “That will be-”

      “My name is Shironeko_Sama but you can call me Shiro!” Shiro blurted out.

      “Well, hello there, Shiro. If you would like to spin, it will be-” the Faerie responded, smiling sweetly at the Aisha.

      “This is my first time!” Shiro interrupted.

      “Uh, first time?” the Faerie questioned. “First time at what, sweetie?”

      “Spinning the wheel, of course!” Shironeko_Sama squealed happily.

      “Oh, how lovely, so then that will be-”

      “Yup! I’m finally old enough to spin the wheel!”

      “Oh, well, yes, isn’t that lovely! That will be-”

      “I’ve always wanted to spin the wheel, though! I love Faeries, you see, and I’m going to become SUPER rich and buy all of the Faerie items available and my room in my neohome is going to be Faerie themed. Though I may have to change it when I get a brother or sister because they may not like Faeries, but I love Faeries, you see, and-”

      “Just spin the wheel, Shiro!” Katrina yelled, cutting Shiro off before she could talk anymore.

      Shironeko_Sama blushed. “Oh uh, yeah, right,” she stammered. “Here you go?”

      Taking the neopoints out of Shiro’s hand, the Faerie turned back to the wheel and with a flick of her wrist set the wheel in motion.

      “Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh! What’s it going to land on! Will it be one of the Faeries or... oooh! Maybe it will land on ten thousand neopoints!” Shiro gushed. “Mom, where do you think it will stop?!”

      “Don’t know, but I hope it stops soon. Nekomini is looking kinda sicky,” Katrina answered, watching as Nekomini once again followed the wheel on another turn, a greenish hint staining her white fur.

      “Oh dear, that does tend to happen with petpets,” the Faerie sighed watching as Nekomini fluttered awkwardly to the ground. “Puppyblews and Warfs are the absolute worst, but I suppose that Angelp-”

      “Look, look, it’s stopping!”

      They all turned and watched as the wheel's pointer went to 2000 neopoints, the question mark and the skull before stopping on-

      “A lightning bolt?” Shiro asked. “What does that mean? I’m going to be made as fast as lightning?”

      The Faerie sighed deeply. “Not quite, dear. What you DO get is... a bolt to the head!”

      “What? No, wait! AAAAAAAAAGH!”

      The Faerie never answered Shiro’s question; instead, all Shiro got was a sharp bolt of lightning directly to the head.

      Katrina had quickly shielded her eyes upon realizing her poor pet's prize. “Hey sweetie, are you okay?” she asked cautiously, uncovering her eyes. “Should I go buy a healing potion or are you, ooooooh.”

      What was once a sleek-furred Aisha was now a perfect round fluff of blue fur with two antennae and big yellow eyes peeking out.

      “Well, that’s a new reaction,” the Faerie mumbled, poking the blinking blue puffball. “Most pets just sort of fall to the ground and twitch a bit.”

      Neither pet nor owner responded for a few minutes. Finally Shiro’s mouth appeared. “Mom?” she asked.

      “Uh, yes?” Katrina answered awkwardly.

      “I have decided that I don’t like Faeries.”

      “I figured as much.”

      With that, Shiro started awkwardly shuffling away, leaving the Faerie flabbergasted by her wheel.

      “So, uh, what do you want to do now?” Katrina gently asked her fluffed up pet.

      “Three things: Healing Springs, Beauty Parlor and then my NEW favourite game.”

      “What’s that, dear?”

      “The Wheel of Misfortune!”

      Katrina stopped dead in her tracks. “After all of that, rushing to the wheel and then getting electrocuted, you now want to spin the Wheel of MISfortune?!”

      “Well, that’s simple,” Shiro responded, turning to face her owner. “It’s called the Wheel of MisFORTUNE! Anything with the word fortune in it is bound to get me something!”

      “Honey, I don’t think you quite get the meaning of Misfort--oh forget it.”

      With that, the owner lifted up her fluffy pet and headed for the Healing Springs, not even paying attention to the Faerie's screams of horror as Nekomini got over her motion sickness.

      All over the Faerie's dress.

The End