A 975th Celebration Story: Who Want to be a Questor?

     Just as the lights and camera turned on again, and Phineas was doing a recap, Petrov saw a red blur out of the corner of his eye. Lowering himself down into his seat with a slight smirk, the jelly keeper was finishing off what looked to be a lime trifle! He winked at the bruce, catching Petrov off guard.

     Phineas, not catching any of the interaction, gazed at Petrov expectantly. Petrov, a bit embarrassed, said, “Can you please repeat the question?”

     “I was just inquiring about what you planned on doing with the prize money, assuming you breeze through these final two questions,” Phineas asked again.

     “Oh, uhm… I wanted to help out less fortunate Neopians,” Petrov volunteered.

     “Well, let’s make that possible, shall we?” Phineas smiled warmly and began to ask the 9th question. “What is the main colour of the handle of the Lever of Doom on Virtupets Space Station? Your choices are- A) yellow, B) black, C) purple, or D) red?”

     Petrov tried to pull up the image of the lever in his mind, but after the unsettling jelly incident, he could feel the upset-looking jelly world keeper’s eyes boring into him. The coloured musical notes of his beloved game kept swirling around his mind, confusing his thoughts and leaving him unable to focus. He sipped on some water while repeating the question. He could still smell the lime trifle from moments ago and it evoked the strange, dream-like memories of the other day.

     Phineas smiled, “Well now, no immediate confident answer?”

     The crowd waited for the Bruce’s reply with baited breath. You could hear a Weewoo flutter in the extravagant room.

     Taking a few mental clarifying deep breaths, Petrov started to humbly smile. “Well, it’s been a while since I wanted to purposefully be robbed blind while pulling a lever I shouldn’t. But interestingly enough, my Grundo friend who is now an expert in Zurroball recently sent me a funny postcard reminding me of our younger days. We would float around the space station, eating Gargarox Isafuhlarg’s delicacies and hiding from Dr Sloth. It’s funny to me, because the postcard had the lever of doom on it. When I was a child, my friend and I actually wasted quite a bit of my allowance money on the level, since it’s said to occasionally give you a secret avatar. We never discovered if that was true, but my friend thought it would be funny to send a postcard with the lever on it to remind me of the power of friendship. I look at that postcard every night next to my bedside. The answer is C. purple. Final answer.”

     Phineas chucked while saying, “I will create no dramatic pause here my friend, you are CORRECT! One more to go!”

     The crowd erupted in cheers. While glancing into the celebratory affair, Petrov noticed the only person looking gloomy as a Grey Cirrus was the Wocky Jelly keeper. Confused, but wanting to stay in the moment of joy, Petrov brushed the foreboding feeling away, and decided to mentally start preparing himself for the final question.

     “Petrov, are you ready for the FINAL QUESTION?” Phineas asked excitedly.

     Petrov took another glance over at the Jelly Wocky who all of a sudden looked maniacal instead of gloomy. What did his red gelatinous enemy have up his sleeve? Petrov gulped. Whatever it was, now was not the time to worry about it.

     “I’m ready, Phineas. Let’s go!”

     “Remember, this question is for 9.75 MILLION NEOPOINTS! It’s all or nothing! We will learn tonight if Petrov is Neopia’s Best Questor!”

     The crowd erupted in cheers. Petrov forced himself not to look at the Jelly Wocky.

     “Here’s your final question, Petrov: in the game Carnival of—wait, this doesn’t look right. I didn’t think this was the topic of the final question?” Phineas turned around to exchange glances and whispers with the team off-stage, behind the curtain.

     Petrov stole a glance at the Jelly Wocky, who looked maniacal as ever. When the Wocky and Petrov made eye contact, the Wocky produced a Wind-Up Chia Clown toy seemingly out of thin air, wound it up, and let it walk across the front row of the audience. No one else seemed to notice. Petrov felt a terrifying chill crawl down his spine. He hates clowns.

     This act confirmed his worst fears, though: somehow, the Jelly Wocky had found out Petrov’s worst fears, and switched out the final Questor question for one about his least favourite game in all of Neopia: Carnival of Terror.

     Petrov hoped upon all hope that Phineas would come back with good news, with a brand new question.

     “Sorry about that, folks. I’m back after a brief consultation with the Questor team. I seemed to have been mixed up about the final question; there is nothing to worry about here. Let’s continue the question I was reading.”

     Petrov’s hopes were shattered.

     Phineas continued: “In the game Carnival of Terror, what is the score required to reach in order to be awarded the Carnival of Terror avatar? Is it A) 695, B) 700, C) 725, or D) 750?”

     Petrov wiped a bead of sweat from his brow. Game avatars were NOT his thing. They always felt so competitive and high stakes. This is why he was a trained rink runner from a young age. He did it for the joy of the game, and so did all of the Neopians who visited his rink to play every day.

     “Phineas, I must say, I think I prefer the other question you were going to ask.”

     “But you don’t even know what it was, my boy!” Phineas exclaimed.

     “Anything would have been better than this one!” The audience erupted in laughter. From the corner of his eye, Petrov noticed the Wind Up Chia Clown speed across the aisle in the audience.

     Petrov knew he needed to think, and fast. What did he know about Carnival of Terror, besides the fact that he avoided that game, and the Haunted Woods, at all costs?

     There was at least 97 seconds of silence before Phineas finally prodded him. “Petrov, come on, we need an answer. What is going through your mind right now?”

     “Honestly Phineas, I am terrified of clowns.” Queue more audience laughter. Petrov continued: “I have never played Carnival of Terror in my life, and honestly Phineas, I’m not much of an avatar collector. So I truly do not know the answer to this.”

     “You’ve come so far, Petrov. I believe in you. You have to think!”

     Phineas’s words echoed in his mind. You have to think! Petrov racked his memories for something about Carnival of Terror. Think, think… Petrov ran through every game player he had ever hosted at his rink. Had any of them ever talked about playing the terrorizing game?

     The Wind-Up Clown Chia danced maniacally down another aisle in the audience.

     Staring at the wind-up toy as it walked away into the audience, Petrov’s face lit up. That’s IT! He did have two Neopians visit his rink and talk about the Carnival of Terror game avatar!

     “Okay Phineas, this is going to be a doozy, but I think I can figure it out. This was back in Y21, during Charity Corner. Many Neopians had the More For Less perk, which allowed them to obtain game avatars with only 80% of the score needed. That week, my rink was EMPTY. Since Rink Runner isn’t an avatar game, no one was coming to visit! I was very bored for most of the time, until two of my regulars came to the rink. They told me they wanted to play Rink Runner to blow off some steam—they needed a break from playing all of those avatar games. As I was skating around the rink for them in the middle of their game, I overheard them talking about Carnival of Terror! I distinctly remember hearing ‘I don’t know how people can normally reach the avatar without More For Less… I can hardly reach a score of 500, much less 580!”

     Petrov took a moment to catch his breath. He was talking at a mile a minute! He took his time to look at the crowd, all of whom were at the edge of their seats, waiting for him to continue. Before he went back to explaining to Phineas, he specifically looked the jelly keeper straight in his red gelatinous eyes.

     Petrov continued: “Obviously, the avatar score is not 580. But 580 is 80% of the avatar score! I might not be a Maths Nightmare expert, but I think I can figure this one out. The score times 0.8 is 580, so to figure out what the score is, we need to divide 580 by 0.8! I must be honest Phineas, I did not think I was going to come on Questor and end up doing long division in my head, of all places. But here I am! 580 divided by 0.8 is... “ Petrov paused, to do the most difficult math he’s ever had to do in his brain. “...725! My final answer is C) 725.”

     The entire crowd sat with baited breath as they waited for Phineas to respond.

     “My boy… that is some memory you have there. Are you absolutely SURE that is your final answer?”

     “I’m sure, Phineas.”

     “Then I have some very important news for you… YOU ARE NEOPIA’S TOP QUESTOR! You are correct! You have won 9.75 million Neopoints to celebrate the 975th edition of the Neopian Times! Congratulations!!!!”

     Confetti fell from the ceiling, and the entire crowd erupted in cheers, and Petrov felt the hot burn of tears forming in his eyes. He couldn’t believe it. He was so happy. He’d done it, even if the game of Questor HAD been sabotaged by the Jelly Wocky.

     He turned his gaze to the crowd, but the jelly keeper was nowhere in sight. All he could see was the Wind-Up Chia Clown on the ground… its head was stuck in a blob of lime jelly, with its feet in the air, moving rapidly, trying to find ground. It was the funniest thing Petrov has ever seen, and he burst out laughing.

     Petrov’s attention turned back to the stage, where Phineas was finishing up his announcing stint, talking about the 975th edition. But Petrov’s mind was elsewhere. He couldn’t wait to donate his prize winnings to the Money Tree, Giant Omelette, and Soup Kitchen. He would visit tomorrow, hand delivering the bags of Neopoints himself. One thing was for sure, though: Petrov was never going to step foot in Jelly World again… if it even existed at all.

     The End.