The Kadoatie Katastrophe

For my little sister Jill (I love you really!)

It was a perfect summer's morning. Neoschool had broken up the day before for seven long weeks, and I had a tigersquash for breakfast. Everything was perfect. Until, that is, the door opened and in came my little sister, Billie the Usuki Usul, with an (unusually) large smile on her face.

     "Hi!" she yelled energetically.

     "Um... hello?" I replied warily. She normally ignored my very existence.

     "I love you, Katelyn!" she gushed, still wearing that huge grin.

     "What do you want?" I sighed, familiar with this process from long experience.

     "Me?" she exclaimed with an injured air. "I don't want anything! I just love you so much because you're so kind to me!"

     "Right..." I said, unconvinced.

     "Don't you just love kadoaties?" she asked me. I grinned. So this was what she wanted now. "Please?" she begged, putting on her cutest face.

     "No, you are not having a kadoatie!" I laughed. "Now go away!" With a look to show me how hard done by she thought she was, she backed slowly out of the kitchen shuffling her feet. I sighed. Billie always wanted something and generally got it. That was why she was painted Usuki while I was still an ordinary blue Aisha. I had wanted to be painted Island for as long as I could remember, while Billie had only decided she wanted to be Usuki four months ago, but guess who got the paint job? Yup, well done. My annoying brat of a sister, that's who.

     Later that day I met up with my best friend Leah, a Starry Kau, in the marketplace. We wandered around looking at all the shops, and I had a good long moan to her about Billie.

     "Come on Katelyn, cheer up!" she said when I'd finished.

     "Cheer up? Haven't you been listening to me for the past half hour?"

     "Yes, but surely it's not as bad as all that! All little kids want things!"

     "They don't get them, though," I sighed gloomily.

     "Take some revenge then!" suggested Leah brightly.

     "Such as?"

     "Well... force-feed her a green Uni morphing potion? Give her a super sour Chia pop and pretend it's super sweet?"

     "Give her an abominable snowball inside a kadoatie plushie so that she thinks she's got a real one?" I suggested.

     "You've got the idea! Buy a petpet for yourself that eats kadoaties!"

     "Eat her jelly room!"

     "Sell her at Usukiland!"

     "Challenge her to fight the Snowager!"

     "Don't be silly! It would take one look at her and run away!"

     By this time we were both giggling madly, and I felt quite happy again. Leah was really good at cheering people up. "You ought to be a psychiatrist!" I laughed.

     "What about a revenge plotter?"

     "Yeah, or that!"

     Leah glanced at the clocks in the window of a nearby shop. They all showed different times. "Do you know which of these clocks is right?" she asked me.

     "No idea," I shrugged. "Go and ask the shopkeeper."

     I watched my friend stroll into the shop. Fifteen seconds later she was out again, running at full speed. "He said that it's a quarter to six, NST," she gasped. "And he said that if I wasn't out of his shop before he could time five seconds on his inaccurate clocks, he'd throw me out!"

     *

     The second I stepped into my Neohome, I knew that something was wrong. Well, wrong for me. Billie was prancing about like a demented Buzzer, and I had a very strong (and unpleasant) suspicion that I knew why...

     "Mew!" she squealed, jumping at me.

     "Billie?" I asked warily. I would not get angry. It was just a misunderstanding, that was all. No way would my idea be right...

     "I'm getting a kadoatie! Mew! Mew!" she giggled. "Aimee and I are going straight to the petpet shop the second it opens tomorrow!"

     Slowly I turned to face our owner. She was standing in the corner looking extremely apprehensive. I glared at her.

     "Look, I'm really sorry, Katelyn," she gabbled desperately. "But Billie really wanted a kadoatie, and she got a really good report from Neoschool! You will be nice about it, won't you?"

     "Aimee!" I wailed. "You're a complete pushover! It's so unfair! I've wanted an Island paint brush for ages, and Billie's already been painted Usuki, and she went to a Jazzmosis concert with you last week while I had to stay at home because you could only afford two tickets, and she ate all of the doughnuts and didn't get punished, and now she's getting a kadoatie! AND I got better grades than her! It's so unfair!"

     Aimee stared at me with an open mouth. Billie looked horrified. I didn't care; I was so furious with them both. Aimee started to say something, but I cut her off with another glare. "I hate you!" I shouted and ran upstairs to my room, slamming every door I could find on my way. Throwing myself onto my bed, I began to cry. It wasn't fair, Billie was always given more stuff than me. All the neopoints which Aimee had been carefully saving up were not, as I had imagined, for my Island paint brush, but for Billie's stupid kadoatie. Even when she got it, she would just want something else, and would get that, too. "It's so unfair!" I muttered again.

     However much I wanted to, I couldn't cry forever. Rolling over, I surveyed my room. It was made of bamboo and decorated with a Mystery Island theme which I had started over a year ago in anticipation of the colour I would one day be. Never to happen now, of course. As I lay on my bed in the depths of despair, I heard a noise. Listening, I realised that it was my stomach rumbling, as I hadn't eaten since lunchtime. Now I was faced with a dilemma. I wanted to go downstairs and get something to eat, but I definitely did not want to meet Billie or Aimee. Quietly I tiptoed out onto the landing and was silently making my way down the stairs when my sensitive ears caught voices. I froze.

     "Yes, I know that you want a kadoatie very badly," Aimee was saying. "But don't you think that it's a bit unfair on Katelyn?"

     "But Katelyn's always moaning!" complained Billie. "She's nasty to me and she says I'm spoilt. I've been so good, I deserve a kadoatie!"

     Listening, I held my breath. Aimee, please tell Billie to get lost!

     "Well... " continued my owner. I crossed my ears for luck and shut my eyes. Please say no, please say no! "I guess it's your decision. We'll see how you feel about it in the morning, OK?"

     "Yay!" shrieked my obnoxious brat of a sister. "I'm getting a kadoatie! Mew!"

     Growling to myself, I trudged upstairs again.

     *

     When I woke up the next morning I opened my eyes cautiously, half expecting to see a kadoatie sitting on my bed, and to hear its annoying "Mew". To my very great relief, there was nothing there. Slowly I got up and went downstairs, staring glumly at my plain blue paws as I did so. As I had feared, Billie was already prancing round and round the table. Obviously the excitement of getting such an expensive petpet was strong enough to break her habit of sleeping in until lunchtime.

     "Good morning, Katelyn!" she squealed.

     "Shut up," I growled coldly.

     "Aren't you so happy!?" she shouted merrily.

     "Billie, shut up!" I shouted back, not at all merrily.

     Aimee entered the room. "We were wondering... " she began hesitantly.

     "What?" I snapped.

     "Why don't you come with us to get Billie's kadoatie?"

     "You are kidding, right!"

     "Please!"

     "No way!"

     "How about - no curfew for a week?"

     "Really?" I asked, surprised. Aimee was really strict on curfew.

     "I promise."

     "Oh - OK then," I agreed reluctantly.

     Neopia Central was extremely crowded. I didn't fancy fighting my way through the crowds in the petpet shop at the best of times, and this certainly was not the best of times. Therefore, I was quite relieved when Billie and Aimee suggested that I wait by the Rainbow Pool for them to return with the dreaded kadoatie. I was rather less pleased, however, when Billie, buzzing with pent-up excitement, insisted that I had to wear a blindfold, so that I couldn't see them coming.

     I sat in darkness for a while, extremely bored, my ears strained to hear the first "Mew". However, while my sister and owner were gone, I couldn't stay angry for very long. All around me I could hear the excited and happy talk of both pets and owners as pets dived into the magical waters blue, green, yellow, or red, and came up a whole assortment of colors. Of course, today I couldn't see this happening, but I had sat and watched the Rainbow Pool for so long that it was stuck in my memory. How I wished that I could join in!

     Suddenly, I felt a sharp push on my side and I was falling, rolling down the bank, until Splash! I landed in the Rainbow Pool. Desperately I thrashed about until at last my blindfold slipped off and I could see again.

     The first thing that I saw was Billie and Aimee standing on the bank laughing their heads off at me, having very obviously pushed me in. I began to be angry, but my attention was suddenly focused on something in the water beside me.

     A dissolving paint brush handle. It couldn't be...

     I looked down at myself. Not blue any longer, but a dusky brown with white patterns. I was painted Island! In amazement I looked back at my little sister. She didn't have a kadoatie! In a flash I was out of the magical water and hugging her. "Thank you, thank you!" I shrieked.

     *

     The next morning I was woken by Billie bursting into my room which at long last I matched, Aimee following her. In her arms, Billie was tenderly cradling a small blue kadoatie. The nametag around its neck read "Ivy". The small Usuki Usul was too excited to speak; she just hugged me. Aimee shook her head in amazement. "Wherever did you get it?" she asked in wonder.

     I simply grinned. With no curfew to worry about, it was amazing what you could find wandering the streets late at night. I shoved the Neopian Times which I had brought in when I at last arrived home further under my pillow. No need for them to read the headline.

     "Ivy the kadoatie runs away from Kadoatery."

The End