To The Rescue?: Part One

Author's Note: This is inspired by the classic game 'Petpet Rescue'. A thank you to the user john3637 for neomailing me one day and asking me to write a continuation of my story 'Caught In A Conspiracy'. Really made my day. :) This is dedicated to all the Neopet lovers out there! Even you, Mr. Coconut.

Oh, and you would probably want to read my two-part series 'Caught In A Conspiracy' for the characters to be more familiar.

     ~*~*~*~

This just in!

     Reports of missing petpets are everywhere, starting in Neopia Central and all across to Tyrannia! Petpet detectives and investigators have been on the cases but no leads have been found. Every day more and more reports of missing petpets are filed.

     Neopia is advising all owners keep their petpets inside, doors and windows locked, and not to take them outside. No one knows who is taking Neopia's beloved pets-- or where all of them are going.

     No one is sure what is happening, or why someone so cruel would separate a Neopian from their petpet. But hopefully someone can come through-- and fast. This is Rachel, Striped Xweetok reporter of the Neopian Times.

     ~*~*~*~

     Shining green eyes met my yellow ones. I watched as his mouth slowly quirked into his signature smirk, revealing a sharp fang that stood out from the rest. "Jet," I said slowly. "What are you thinking?"

     The recently turned eighteen year old shadow Kacheek before me got out of his seat, walking around the lunch table until he was right next to me. This certain Kacheek was Jet Black, the sneaky deviant I had been caught up in a conspiracy with. He was taller than me, fiercer than any Kacheek I had ever met, and had shining emerald eyes that said 'trouble' in them.

     "Jet?" I asked again. "What do you think? I think we should do something about it and investigate further into it."

     He was still smirking. "I think," he said in a drawled out voice, "we should eat some pie."

     I rolled my eyes but smiled. "Yeah? Well, you know what I think?"

     "You just told me what you think."

     "You know what I think now?"

     "Humor me."

     "I think we should investigate further into the petpet case."

     "You said that already, Red."

     "No, I was pausing to say more but you interrupted me. I think we should investigate the petpet case, and then as a job well done we can eat pie."

     Jet scoffed. "But I want pie now."

     "You just had cake."

     "Cake and pie are two very different things, Red."

     "Don't call me Red."

     "Whatever you say, Red."

     "I mean it, Jet! My name is Sky, not Red!"

     He grabbed my paw and started to drag me out of the dining area. "When did the disappearing cases start?" he asked.

     I looked at the newspaper. "Uh... it doesn't say."

     "When was the last kidnapping?"

     "It doesn't say."

     He groaned. "So we're going to have to do all this investigating ourselves, huh?"

     I groaned as well. "Looks that way." I took my arm out of his grasp. "We should start in the library," I suggested. "Or maybe we should go around and talk to the Neopians that had their petpets taken. We might find similarities in the cases that will help give us clues."

     Jet frowned. "Do I really look like the kind of guy who spends his days in libraries?"

     "Well, I'm certainly not going to do all the work."

     "Okay, here's a plan; you sit in a boring library and I'll go out and talk to people."

     "Why do I have to be at the library? I'm not really the bookworm type, I just--"

     Jet held up a paw. "Sky. Try to imagine what would happen if I sat down in a library."

     Images of fire, screaming, panic, chaos, and destruction flashed through my mind. "Okay," I sighed. "But I know you're just going to go eat pie after the first few houses."

     He smirked again. "I'll bring you back a piece."

     ~*~*~*~

     So as you probably know, my name is Sky, and as you've probably guessed, I'm a red colored Kacheek. I recently turned seventeen, and I still have leftover birthday cake in the fridge. I used to be a simple teen, a woodcutter from Meridell. That is, until I met Jet Black, and what-do-you-know I met him in jail. Yeah. Not the best story to tell my parents at Christmas.

     Well, what started out as a conspiracy ended as an adventure. I'm now apart of a club called the 'Rebels' along with Jet, a couple of his other friends, and my best friend, Caitlin.

     Caitlin is a blue Kougra who is only fifteen but very bright. She tends to get on Jet's nerves and calls everyone her best friend. She's a handful, but she's also like my younger sister.

     Plus, she was the only one who was willing to spend the day in the library with me (unlike a certain Kacheek I know). We were both sat down on the plush carpet floor, surrounded by books and coffee cake by our sides.

     "It's so sad, Sky," Cat sighed. "My neighbor had her Ona stolen from her last week. I'm afraid my little Doglefox is going to be taken from me!"

     "Don't worry," I assured her. "Jet and I are going to get to the bottom of this."

     "I am worried," she insisted. "But I think Jake is safe. He's inside the trapdoor of my house with no windows or doors."

     "Jake will be fine," I smiled. "I hate to sound insincere, but can we get to work? I'm sorry, Cat, I really am."

     "Of course," she said, smiling back. Cat turned her attention towards the piles of books in front of us. "So," she drawled, "here's to the first book."

     Twenty-three minutes, fifteen seconds,
four tigersquash swirly cakes and coffees later

     I threw down my fifth book. "Can you hand me the next one?" Cat nodded and handed me the next book. The title read Criminals of Neopia and looked to be six-hundred pages long from a rough glance. Great. When I reached out to take a bite of swirly cake I accidentally dropped the book upside down. I set down my cake and picked it up, looking at the page it fell on.

     Gargrall the Grarrl.

     His name made me laugh. "What's so funny?" she asked.

     "Gargrall the Grarrl," I giggled. "What a silly name."

     "Oh yeah," Cat agreed. "I remember reading about Samuel in the Neopian Times five or six years ago. Apparently, this Scorchio, Samuel, went inside Tyrannian ruby mines to save hundreds of petpets that Gargrall had kidnapped. The mines were supposed to be extremely dangerous. Poisonous gasses, lava tunnels, magma rivers, stalactites from the ceiling falling every second. This was a dangerous business."

     I looked down at the picture of Gargrall. His lips were drawn back to reveal sharp fangs and the gleam in his eyes were absolutely primal. There was something about him... something I couldn't place.

     "Cat... what happened to Gargrall?"

     "He was locked away."

     "What happened to the mine?"

     Cat shrugged. "Who knows. I bet you can get that information out of the Neopian Times logs." She groaned. "Wait, no you can't, you have to be apart of the Neopian Times staff to get those information logs."

     "It's okay," I assured. "It's just a suspicion."

     Funny thing about me and suspicions... they always nag at the back of my mind.

     ~*~*~*~

     "Really, Jet? A half-eaten slice of blueberry pie?"

     He smiled sheepishly. "Look Red, I really tried not to--"

     "Save it," I interrupted. "I'm just lucky you brought me a slice, right?"

     Jet wrapped an arm around my waist. "How about I just buy you a slice at the shop?"

     "I'll take you up on that later. I couldn't eat pie now anyway, Cat and I stuffed ourselves with tigersquash swirly cakes."

     Jet pulled out my chair so I could sit down, and then sat down next to me. "So," he began, "I'm guessing you want to know what I found out?" After I nodded yes, he cleared his throat. "I talked to all the owners who had their petpets stolen. Whoever took them isn't looking for a certain species, the kidnapper stole any kind he could get."

     "Any similarities?" I asked.

     "Not at first, but after my first thirty, I started to draw the line. Every single petpet was taken at night... between 2:00 and 3:00 in the morning."

     Whoa. That's very... specific. "You're sure?"

     "Positive. How about you? Did you find anyone with motive?"

     "Well... I found something interesting."

     He raised a suspicious brow. "What?"

     "Don't laugh."

     "Come on Red, just tell me."

     "Don't call me Red."

     "Sky. Just tell me."

     "Fine. Gargrall."

     "Gar what?"

     "Gargrall the Grarrl."

     "Is that some kind of cough medicine?"

     "No! Gargrall the Grarrl was who stole all the petpets to work in his ruby mines. Samuel saved him. It was all over the newspapers six years ago." I laughed. "Cough medicine. I should write that down."

     ~*~*~*~

     I stared up at the beautiful neohome that was only a few yards away. The house was painted a warm color of red with a black roof and black windows and front door. I knocked on the door and turned to Jet. "Remember to be nice."

     He scoffed. A few minutes later the door opened and there stood a starry Shoyru on the opposite side. The Shoyru looked Caitlin's age, and had a red Meepit hat on his head. He stared at us with shining black eyes and then asked plainly, "Who are you?"

     "Who are you?" Jet threw back. I elbowed him in the stomach.

     "My name is Sky Coon, and this is Jet Black," I said nicely. "We were looking for Rachel, she wrote an article in the Neopian Times and we'd like to talk to her."

     Suddenly, a pink Faellie flew up and landed on the Shoyru Chris's head. The Faellie was extremely small, the size of an orange, thin, and stared at us warily. "I'm Ello," she then said.

     "Hey there," I smiled. "You sure are--"

     "Don't call her cute," Chris warned.

     Ello's eyes narrowed into slits. She flew to me and remained eye-level with me. "I like you," she then said. Suddenly, the small Faellie smiled wide. "SO COME ON IN!"

     We followed Chris and Ello inside. "You have a lovely neohome," I complimented.

     "Thanks," Chris said. "Rachel! You have visitors!" He turned back to me and Jet. "So why are you two here?"

     "None of your business," Jet replied. I elbowed him again. "Stop that!" he hissed.

     Ello looked at Jet. "You're a meanie," she said. "I like her, I don't like you."

     "I don't care," Jet retorted. "Why should I? You're just a pipsqueak."

     The Faellie growled. "I'LL FIGHT YOU!"

     "No, Ello," Chris said, grabbing his petpet by the tail. "You need to lay low, remember?"

     She growled stubbornly. "Are you afraid she's going to be... kidnapped?" I asked Chris.

     He nodded. "Yeah. She's not allowed to leave my side."

     Suddenly a striped Xweetok entered the room with a popstar hat on her head. She looked to be fourteen or so and had bright shining eyes. "Um, hi," she greeted us.

     "Can we talk?" I asked.

     Rachel nodded. "Sure. Come on into the kitchen. Are you hungry?"

     "Meanie shall not be fed!" Ello cried.

     "No." I smiled. "We're fine."

     ~*~*~*~

     "I'm not sure. I could get in trouble with my manager for giving you information logs," Rachel stammered. The three of us were sat down at the kitchen table. We had just told her about the Rebels club we're in, and our leads about Gargrall and the Tyrannian Caves.

     "We just want to find out about Gargrall," I told her. "We're not doing this to make neopoints, we just want to help. A lot of petpets have gone missing and so far detectives have gotten nowhere. This could possibly be our first lead."

     Rachel nodded. "My Puppyblew Max was kidnapped," she said sadly. "And I've been going crazy trying to get him back." She stared up at me. "Do you think... you can save the petpets?"

     "We're going to try," I assured. "We're going to try our very best."

     She nodded. "Then I'll help. I'll get you those logs."

     "Thank you, Rachel."

     "Of course."

     I elbowed Jet. "Say thank you!" I mouthed.

     He groaned. "Yeah whatever, thanks and stuff."

     Rachel nodded. "Um... yeah."

     ~*~*~*~

     It was late at night and colder than a simple blue hoodie could handle. My teeth chattered loudly as I walked across the foothills of the mountain range, just above Tyrannia's Plateau. No, I'm not here for a concert (although I could go for a 2 Gallon Hatz showing). I was here to search for the supposed ruby mine Gargrall used.

     This is stupid, I know. Hey, I'm not perfect, sometimes I do stupid things. And sometimes, in a great while, I do stupid things that lead me in the middle of nowhere in 50 degree weather and no sense of where I'm going. Only sometimes, mind you.

     Gargrall being behind this made sense. He was locked away, yes, but he could've escaped. Rachel, Cat, and I went to the newspapers headquarters and looked up Gargrall's security logs.

     Apparently, right before the officers took him away, he looked right at the reporter and said, "One night, when you won't expect it, I'll get your petpet. I'll ruin you."

     That was the last thing he said to anyone, ever. What had me convinced? He said 'one night' instead of one day. Doesn't everyone say one day? I'll get you one day! One day you won't see me coming! I'll get you someday! Day. Not night, never night.

     And all the petpets were stolen at night. That was the kicker.

     Finally, after searching nearly two hours, I saw a cave up ahead on the hill. Slowly, quietly, I made my way towards the cave. For all I know it could be an ordinary cave.

     Poisonous gasses, lava tunnels, magma rivers, stalactites from the ceiling falling every second.

     Cat's words rang throughout my head. I held my breath and ventured inside the cave. It was dark and I used my flashlight to see in the black. Nothing. I ran out of the cave and took in a huge breath, huffing and puffing to get my air back.

     Well, I wasted my night, but at least I knew this cave was clear. I started to walk back towards the plateau. However, I only took a few steps before I heard something, something that started the first chapter of my adventure.

     I heard a small shriek, "Help us!"

     Suddenly I took off running towards the cave! "Hello! Who's in there? I'm here to help!" I cried. Quickly I turned my flashlight on and ran inside the cave. "Hello? Anyone?" There was a sudden flash of green in my light and I flashed it back in that spot.

     There, flying mid-air, was a Pawkeet. "Squawk!"

     "Hey there, come on with me. I'll help you out of the cave," I said kindly, trying to coax him. "Are there others down there?"

     "Squawk! Don't go down there! Evil, evil is down there!"

     "Let me help you," I insisted. "Fly towards me."

     "Turn back now. Never come back. Or you'll be trapped forever!"

     Suddenly there was a shower of blue and white sparks! I covered my eyes with my arms and realized the Pawkeet was a robot. After that, I took off running, out of the cave, back into the night, not even looking back!

     Trapped forever.

To be continued...

Feedback is appreciated, Sky, Jet, and Cat are characters from my comic series. Thank you!