"Ce n'est pas... AHHH!" The writer wailed, and a bat timidly came to her side.
(She said, 'This is not... AHHH!')
"Venus? What is it?" He gulped as he handed her a handkerchief with the letter 'V' engraved on it.
"Oh, Monsieur Bat! It's a calamity, a disaster... I need to come up with the best script ever on teamwork and I can't think of any!"
"Oh my, that is horrible. But I think I can help you, if you don't mind, please."
"Go ahead. I need some fertilizer anyway."
"Well, why don't you do a script based on the day we went to Catastrophe...?"
The moment he reminded her of the incident, Venus was rolling on the floor laughing and as Scaredy was wiping tears of hilarity off of her typewriter with her forgotten handkerchief, she started reminiscing about the day they went to Catastrophe.
They arrived there after a long and tiring coach journey.
"Yes! Catastrophe, here we are! Well, at least the hotel near Catastrophe!" Iris whooped as she rushed into the hotel.
Mr Mumbles and Ruby briefly shared a laugh as they watched Iris play with the spinning door.
(What do you call that door? You know, the one that spins?)
"Thanks again Mr Mumbles, we're ecstatic to be here!" Ruby chirped as she helped Mr Mumbles unload his suitcase.
"No problem. I needed some school reporters to write about this place anyway. You and Skull Boy will be perfect for the job! I'll try to help you carry all that heavy luggage..." He said until he saw Skull Boy, a skeleton with only bones, casually carrying a bag that was ten times heavier than him.
The skeleton was whistling a merry tune as he unloaded all the huge cameras and took some photos before putting the equipment into his bag.
"Ok, I've taken some photos of the entrance. I'll show you them later, during dinner." He told a shocked and speechless Mr Mumbles.
The only action coming from Mr Mumbles was his pet frog croaking. The young skeleton took that as a sign of approval and grinned,
"Great! It's a good thing that I'm related to a long line of wrestlers. Hard to believe since I exercise so much, yet I cannot build up muscles that don't exist. Maybe it's cus' I drink a lot of milk, increases calcium, you know?"
...
"Well, let me help you by getting your bag..." Ruby said until she grabbed his rather small bag and grunted.
It seemed to be bringing her down to the ground. At Ruby's sharp intake of breath, Skull Boy immediately dropped the rest of their luggage before easily slinging the tiny bag over his shoulders.
"I'm so sorry Ruby. I guess that I should have warned you that it might be kinda heavy, I brought along two 50-pound dumbbells. I'm supposed to lift them over my head 500 times according to the greatest wrestler in the world, Zápasník. He drew up this exercise chart. Pretty cool, huh?" Skull Boy explained as he pulled a rolled-up poster from his pocket.
He unrolled the poster which covered a huge portion of the ground and held it in front of Ruby.
(Zápasník means 'Wrestler' in Czech... right? Anyway, this guy is not real, I think. I just can't choose a wrestler.)
"Zápasník used to be my great, great, great, great, great grandmother's friend's cousin's mailman until he became a wrestler. He invited some of my family members to watch his first match." Misery added as she accidentally got herself tangled up in Skull Boy's long poster when she tripped over it.
Thankfully, it wasn't torn and Misery seemed alright. While Ruby and Skull Boy worked on freeing Misery, the skeleton asked Misery,
"Then you know how fantastic he is, right?!"
Trying her best not to show her apathy in wrestling, she replied as they finally untangled her,
"My ancestors kept cheering him on until the day an opponent punched him so hard in the nose, he lost his memory."
"Oh. Yeah." He sighed as they approached the hotel.
"Hey, I don't see Doom, Poe, Scaredy or Frank,len and Rebecca ." Ruby noted.
"We're here!" The conjoined brothers exclaimed as they capped off their entrance with a guitar solo.
Rebecca shot a foam bullet from her nart gun and hit frank in the head
"Oww!"
"I'm here! with my Frankie" she said kissing him on the cheek as he blushed
"Ok, why did I buy you that gun?!"
"Because it was for my birthday and you deserved that you let me fall in a lake on the way here"
"And Poe's right behind us, along with Doom and Scaredy." Frank said feeling a little embarrassed
"We just stopped for a while to join this competition." Frank announced as he unrolled a poster. While it was definitely shorter than Skull Boy's poster, by a few meters or so, the skeleton was shocked,
"Wow, that is one huge poster." He said without any trace of irony as helped Doom and Scaredy carry their luggages.
"Attention all bands with crazy talent: Show that you're the best at the Catastrophe Crazy Talent Competition! The grand prize includes a recording deal with Horrorwood Jams and the chance to become as famous as Terror Swift, Justin Barfer, Paranormal, and Eerie. Double points for creativity!" Poe finished, exhaling loudly.
"That's great you guys! RIP has never participated in a competition before. This your chance to show how good you guys are against 1000 bands!" Ruby noted excitedly.
"We know! We're gonna work on a song right now!" Frank declared until Len shook his head furiously.
"Not now, unless you really wanna miss the new roller-coaster Mr Mumbles created..."
And he did not have to elaborate any further as Frank hurriedly dragged their suitcases towards the receptionist area.
"Frank?"Rebecca said
"Yeah?"
"My suitcase is really heavy"she said as she moved her suitcase inch by inch
Frank sighed and helped her
As soon as ruby was certain no one was near them, she bent down to Poe's level."Thanks for the cough mixture, Poe." Ruby whispered as she quickly snatched the bottle from Poe's wings.
"You're welcome but Ruby, do you really think it's wise since you're... mfff?!" Poe was interrupted when Ruby placed a finger on Poe's beak.
"Shh... Mr Mumbles is counting on me... so is Skull Boy. I can't disappoint them. Besides, it's just a cold, and I have a guidebook written by Misery herself." Ruby coughed slightly as she 'answered' Poe.
"You coming, Ruby?" Frank hollered.
"Yeah!" Rebecca said
Ruby whipped around to see Skull Boy taking photos of every nook and cranny of the hotel.
"Yes. Of course!" Ruby chirped as she sniffled a tiny sneeze.
