Hello. School starts tomorrow, I'm going to be starting my dreaded violin lessons again, I'll need to practice french horn more, I have Cross Country practice (or meets, which take up even more time) every day except Sunday, and I've promised to walk my adorable puppy after practice. Plus, on top of all of that, I have writer's block. (As I write this, I cringe at all the responsibility this stuff will take.) There may not be a new part for a couple of days or even a week. And once school really starts up, I'm afraid I'm not going to have a lot of time to write, so it may be a week between new parts.

Please help me keep this topped. Terribly sorry about the delay.

Day 5, Part 3

Anna kicked at a stone annoyedly. “How long will it take for the stupid pizzas to cook?”

“Um, Anna,” Lisbeth told her sister shyly. “It’ll take at least another half hour.”

“DARN IT!!!” Anna yelled so loudly that the CBers could hear her on top of the cliff.

“Uh-oh.” Elementgirl said. “She gets like that when she needs food.”

“Mmmm.” Lucy replied. “Scarlet does sometimes. Then Sketch punches her. Usually she shuts up.”

“That works?”

“Yep!” Lucy replied, then took a big bite of her sandwich.

Epic Fangirl, who had already devoured her lunch, asked, “So… where does the zipline end?”

Icy ate her egg in one bite, and replied, “I dunno. We may have to do quite a bit of walking.”

“Okay. Well, here goes!” Leafpool said, stuffing a couple of ziploc bags into her basket. She put on her harness and her helmet, then clipped her harness to the zipline. Then she jumped.

The other CBers watched her whoop with delight, getting farther and farther away.

Lucy shoved the last of her sandwich into her mouth and began getting ready. The other CBers did the same.

After about two minutes, Lucy said, “I think it should be safe to go now. Well, I’m off!” She clipped her harness, paused, then jumped into midair. “THIS IS TOTALLY AWESOME!” She yelled, moving away quickly. The other CBers faded from view after a minute. But still, the end was nowhere in sight. “Leafpool?” She called. “LEAFPOOL?!”

From far away she thought she heard someone yelling “Lucy!”, but perhaps it was her imagination.

After about five minutes, she thought she saw something in the distance that looked like an end. As she got nearer, the idea of her accidentally splatting against a tree didn’t seem so ridiculous. She drew nearer too quickly, far too quickly. Then she saw a platform stuck high in the tree with a handle to grab on to. The line slowly went upward, slowing her down. She grabbed on to a handle, then clipped herself to the tree, unclipping herself from the zipline. She looked down. It was a long, long way to the ground.

She looked down. “Leafpool?!”

“I’m down here! Climb down on the rope!”

Lucy looked around until she found the rope, the began climbing down the knots in it. When she was on the forest floor, she gasped.

“Holy Tolito.”

Fireburst was the last to go on the zipline. She clipped herself on. Then she hesitated. She’d never been on a zipline! What if it was totally scary? What if she hated it? What was on the other end?

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Then she jumped, and for a second it seemed like she was falling. Then she started moving, the zipline whirring as she went faster and faster. She let out a whoop of joy.

Then there was a loud noise. She looked around. The earth trembled and shook. The zipline’s line began to shake, too.

“Oh no. Earthquake.” She muttered, doing her best to stay calm. It had been about four minutes. She had to be getting close, right?

Suddenly, the line jerked downward, pulling a screaming Fireburst quickly toward the fallen tree that the other end of the zipline had been attached to.

“Oh no,” Icy muttered. “Oh no oh no oh no oh no.”

Fireburst’s stomach had left on vacation, as had her voice and possibly her lungs as she went down.

The other CBers watched as she slammed into the ground, hurrying over.

“Is she alive?” Balletandbow asked quietly. “Oh, please let her be alive, please.”

Elementgirl worked quickly, checking for a pulse.

“Um- maybe- YES! She’s alive!” Elementgirl exclaimed.

“Yes, alive, but I think she broke her leg in at least three different places. That’s gotta hurt.” General Waffleson said.

“How will we get her back? It was like a jungle in here before the earthquake, and I don’t think the earthquake improved matters!” Lucy slammed her fists into the ground, which hurt her hands.

“Stretcher?” Rae supplied. “I really don’t know.”

“Yeah, a stretcher!” Icy said. “Now, we’ll just have to find the materials.”

It took the CBers about two hours to build the stretcher and get back to the mansion.

When they finally got back, covered in twigs and leaves and dirt, some of the AEs ran to greet them.

“The earthquake messed up our pizzas!” Anna said.

“That’s not the only thing it messed up.” Bryann said. “Look.” He pointed in the direction of the mansion.

***

And, yep! More tragedy! What a wonderful day this is for all the visitors at the mansion! And it'll only get worse…. *Cackles evilly*

Thank you to all of you reading this!

I understand what you mean about being busy and having writer's block – the same thing is happening to me with my ski lodge :).

I like this zipline, but not the earthquake :(. 

i'm comin'!!!!  

"hey blazey"- "mrowlllll(i've told you a bazillion times not to call me that!)-"fine, fine, wanna come to Woodlock Mansion and Summer Excursion Hotel with me?" "mrow!(sure!)"

Thank you, Starseeker! I feel happy now.

@Kitten, have you ever been on a zipline before? I have, and one of my worst fears is there being an earthquake and me falling and OUCH! Probably a good thing I live in New York (State, not city) where there are barely any earthquakes at all.

@Solomon, I'm sorry, but I'm already quite a ways into the story. I might be able to briefly mention you at some point, though.

Day 5, Part 4

“Holy Tolito.” Lucy said for the second time that day.

“Holy things I’m not supposed to say…” Rae said. There was a big gaping hole in the side of the mansion.

“Holy a bunch of things, but we should focus on Fireburst. She’s hurt! Really, really, hurt.” Elementgirl told Bryann and Anna, who both realized that Icy, General Waffleson, Balletandbow and Epic Fangirl were all carrying a stretcher.

“What happened?” Bryann asked, who was trembling a little bit.

“Long story.” Icy told him. “Any idea where we could find the Hotel Manager?”

“Oh, um, sure! I’ll go get her.” Anna replied, then ran off.

As the CBers and the crowd of gathering AEs and Captchas waited for the Hotel Manager, Fireburst lay unmoving, looking oddly peaceful considering she’d nearly fallen to her death. Her hair was flopped in weird positions, but smooth and perfect. Her eyes were closed as if she’d simply gone to sleep.

“Take her pulse again!” Rae said frantically. Elementgirl knelt down and took her wrist, where she could feel the soft beat of Fireburst’s heart. “Alive. She is definitely alive.”

The Hotel Manager came running over to them. “Oh no, what happened? Quick, to the Hospital Wing!” She and Ms. Tobin took the stretcher and ran to the Hospital Wing as quickly as they could, doing their best not to upset Fireburst.

“We have a Hospital Wing?” General Waffleson asked.

“It appears to be so.” Balletandbow said.

“Yeah,” said Bryann. “You should have seen the mansion right after the earthquake. Everything was shaken up crazily. It lost maybe half of the right side, so the Hotel Manager decided to rebuild it, and with all the, um, ‘accidents’ we’ve been having lately, she decided to put in a Hospital Wing.” He pointed to where the CBers could now see bricks flying into place and cementing themselves together. “But there is still a lot of construction that needs to be done.”

“Yikes.” Rae muttered.

The CBers followed Ms. Tobin and the Hotel Manager’s muddy footsteps up several flights of stairs and through a couple of closets and corridors until they finally reached the Hospital Wing where Fireburst now lay, in a bed packed with soft, fluffy pillows and comfy sheets and blankets. Next to her bed, there was a Book-O-Matic™.

The CBers waited and watched as the Hotel Manager and Ms. Tobin busied themselves tending to Fireburst, who was just beginning to stir.

“What? Where am I?” Fireburst asked.

“Here, take this.” The Hotel Manager said, giving Fireburst a medicine cup with some swirly cream coloured liquid. “There was an earthquake, and you fell off the zipline rather hard, I’m afraid. You’ve broken your left leg in three places.”

“WHAT?!” Fireburst yelped. Then, “Hey! Ow, please, don’t touch my leg.”

“I’m sorry, Fireburst, but we have to do a quick examination.” Ms. Tobin told her, continuing to examine her leg. “Hmm, this should take about a week or two to mend.”

“Only a week or two?” Icy asked. “I thought it took at least two months, and possibly more if you broke your leg in three places! And that you might never be able to move your leg again!”

Fireburst turned pale.

“We have our own special methods- I’m a chemist- not to mention a sculptor-, and Ms. Tobin here is, or was, a doctor.” The Hotel Manager said cheerily.

“Was?” Rae asked.

The Hotel Manager pretended she hadn’t heard anything.

“Yes, so you will need quite a bit rest, but it should heal up quite nicely.” Ms. Tobin continued.

The CBers took this as their cue to leave.