Disclaimer: I can only claim ownership of Megan and whatever plot there might be.
Warning: If you have something against me insulting drummers and tuba players (or tubaists, as I like to call them), don't read this. ^-^
It was a sunny, yet freezing Monday morning, and the Marching Poodles were standing on the edge of their practice field, wondering whether or not they could practice outside that day. Nobody was quite sure just what it resembled, other than a lot of mud and water. That was so obvious, even a drummer could've figured that out.
One of the tubas, who were always late, ran out into the field and promptly started sinking. "Help! I'm sinking!" he shouted.
"Hey, he's actually right for once," said Megan. "Well, I guess that solves our quandary over whether or not to march on our quagmire of a field. Let's go in and have some Pixy Stix."
The band turned around and walked back to the band room, promptly forgetting all about the nameless tuba.
An hour later, the weather had decided to be completely unpredictable again, and it started snowing heavily. In fact, by lunchtime, the whole school was quite thoroughly snowed in. (In case you were wondering how that was possible, let me remind you that anything is possible in a band story.)
Megan took her Dr. Pepper to her Secret Lair and sat there, wrapped in her stylish orange stadium blanket and checking her email and the Weather Channel webpage simultaneously. According to TWC, the snow wasn't supposed to end till Wednesday. "Great," she muttered. "Who knows how long we'll be stuck here. Stupid unpredictable Illinois weather." She pulled her authentic tuba beret down over her ears and ventured out into the band room, still wrapped in a blanket. Oddly enough, half the band was huddled in the middle of the room, apparently trying to keep warm.
"Hi, stalker," said Melissa, noticing that she was there.
"Hey, Melissa, what's going on?" Megan figured that asking a drum major was always a good thing, simply because they were usually well-informed. Well, except for Erica.
"School got canceled, but we're all stuck here, so they told everybody to just hang around in their first hour class. Some people are in here, some are in study hall, and some are in chorus. Oh, and the guard's down in the gym. Except for the girls who are also in band; they're hiding in here."
"Cool beans. Well, except for the stranded part."
"Yeah, whatever."
"Hey, which tubaist was out there?" Megan wondered.
"Tubaist? Is that even a word?"
"I like it."
"Okay. Guess which one."
"The only one who knows his part?"
Melissa nodded.
"That sucks."
"Yeah, now who can we tease you about?"
Megan shrugged. "Maybe it's time to switch to Kim and Shadow."
"Burn the flags!" someone shouted suddenly.
"Isn't that illegal?" Derek asked.
"Shut up, Starkey," Megan told him, rolling her eyes.
Instead of burning the colorguard flags (partly because they were expensive and partly because the colorguard was currently practicing with them), the band gathered up all their copies of Waterloo Loyalty, Henry V, Crown Imperial, and Fantasia on the Dargason and tossed them into a sousaphone bell. Someone poured a couple of bottles of valve/slide oil over the music, then tossed a match in. A fire blazed up, singing the eyebrows of a couple of drummers who were standing too close.
"Yay!" the freshmen cheered.
"Has anybody seen Scott or Luke?" Elizabeth asked. "I'm making sure all the low brass members are all right, and they're the only two I can't find."
"I think they said they were going to go out to the field and dig up Alex," said Dustin.
"Why didn't you tell me earlier? Now somebody has to go out and save them."
"Sorry," Dustin said guiltily.
"I'll go," Melissa volunteered. "So will Megan."
Megan glared at Melissa. "Kim'll go, too."
"Go where?" Kim asked, hearing her name.
"We're all going to go rescue the tubas," Elizabeth explained.
"Not that they're worth saving," Megan muttered under her breath. She would've rather stayed in and roasted marshmallows with the trumpets and saxophones, but since Melissa had volunteered her to go out in the blizzard, she felt obligated to go. Plus, she enjoyed laughing at the stupidity of tuba players. Especially certain blonde ones.
"I'll be back," Melissa said. "I'm going to go get some warm clothes."
"Me, too," Megan chimed in.
"All right, let's meet back here in ten minutes.
Megan, Kim, and Melissa went to Megan's Secret Lair. Melissa and Megan both had tuba berets, around which they wrapped scarves. Kim was sporting an attractive orange and black stocking hat, as well as Christina's "scarf" scarf. All three of them had put on their uniform jackets for no particular reason; Melissa had her pleather coat, and Kim had a parka. Megan was attempting to decide between her spiffy new Adidas coat and her Mr. Mullins coat, but settled on the Adidas jacket, because it had a hood.
"Are we ready?" Melissa asked.
"Hold on." Megan grabbed her unfinished Dr. Pepper and a bag of Pixy Stix. "Now I'm ready."
They went back to the band room and joined Elizabeth, Dustin, and Minh-Bao, who had apparently decided to come along, too.
"I wonder if cymbals would work as snowshoes?" Megan wondered.
"A gong might make a good sled," Minh-Bao suggested.
"We don't have time for that," Elizabeth said impatiently. "Scott and Luke are freezing to death somewhere out there."
Megan thought about singing "Somewhere Out There," but figured that this wasn't an appropriate time.
"What about Dra-I mean Alex?" Kim asked, being the caring person that she was.
"Mud has insulating properties," Megan pointed out, grinning evilly.
Courtney, who was standing nearby, burst into tears. "You people are so insensitive!" she exclaimed. "First you don't even try to rescue Alex when he runs into the mud and starts sinking, and now you make comments about how he's not freezing because he's buried in mud!"
"Okay, that's...nice," Melissa said as everybody tried not to laugh.
"Would you react like that if Dustin sunk in the mud and got left out in a blizzard?" Minh-Bao asked Elizabeth.
"No, I'd be out there saving him," said Elizabeth. "Speaking of which, we'd better get going. Do you want to come?" she said to Courtney.
"No, thanks, I'll just stay here and keep warm."
"Hypocrite," Megan muttered, using one of her favorite words.
"Okay, that's a bit chilly," Dustin said as they walked out into the blizzard.
"I'm not cold," said Melissa. "I'm warm and toasty. In fact, I'm on a beach in the Bahamas. Or maybe Florida."
"What about Death Valley?" Megan asked.
"No, that's too hot."
She shrugged. "Well, it is the hottest place on Earth. I think."
Anyway, it was snowy. Very snowy. Really, really snowy. It was so snowy, in fact, that Megan got separated from the rest of the group.
"Where's my stalker?" Melissa asked a few minutes later.
"Yeah, Megan's disappeared," Elizabeth said.
"I know how to find her," Kim said, grinning. "Draco!" she shouted into the blizzard.
"Polo!" someone yelled back.
"Draco!"
"Polo!" The voice was getting closer.
"Draco!" Kim called one last time.
"Polo!" Megan said as she rejoined everybody.
"What was that all about?" Elizabeth wondered.
"It's an algebra thing," Kim and Megan explained.
"I don't get it," said Dustin, who was in their algebra class.
"You aren't supposed to," Kim said. "It's really just me and Megan, but we do it during algebra, so we call it an algebra thing."
"Okay, whatever." Dustin still had no idea what they were talking about, but he didn't think he really wanted to know.
"Hey, look!" Melissa exclaimed suddenly. "Tuba tracks!"
"How do you know they're tuba tracks?" Minh-Bao asked.
"Their shoes are on the wrong feet, and all the drummers are still back in the band room."
"Plus they're almost running into each other," Megan added helpfully. "Tubas are very collision-prone people."
"It's the hats," Kim suggested. "We dress using our shako plumes, but the poor tubas only have berets." Everybody else gave her a weird look.
After that, they followed the tracks out to where they thought the field was. The tracks stopped, but the field was completely deserted.
"It's like they vanished into thin air," Elizabeth said, bewildered.
Meanwhile, Kim started building an igloo.
"Why are you building an igloo?" Megan asked her.
"Because I like igloos."
"Or because you love Eskimos," said Minh-Bao.
"Don't just stand around and watch, help me build this igloo," Kim told Megan and Minh-Bao.
"Sure, whatever." Megan reached down and picked up a handful of snow, but instead of adding it to the igloo, she threw it at Kim. This, of course, kicked off a snowball fightthe three woodwinds (Megan and the two drum majors) against the low brass. It ended with both sides in a snow-coated tie.
"Okay," said Elizabeth, trying to get her breath back. "That was fun, but accomplished nothing. We still have no idea where the tubas are."
Megan shrugged. "There's only one football game left. We don't really need them. We can give their solo to...umm...the flutes."
"Why not the baritones?" Elizabeth asked plaintively.
"Because the flutes, like, never get melody and we have 208 measures of rest in the whole show."
"You counted?" Kim said incredulously.
Megan shrugged. "I get bored easily," she explained. "Hey, maybe the drum majors could stand on the podium and sing the solo."
Minh-Bao and Melissa looked at each other. "I don't think so," they said simultaneously.
"Not unless you want us to place dead last in every competition and have the audience running away in fear," Melissa added.
"Could we please manage to stay on topic for more than ten seconds?" Elizabeth asked annoyedly.
"No," Megan muttered under her breath.
"What was that, Megan?"
"I said, 'Maybe Erica kidnapped the tubas'."
"Sure," Melissa said scornfully. "And maybe aliens came down and abducted them."
"Why, because they know the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything?"
"No, because they needed stupid people and figured that you can't get much more idiotic than a couple of guys out in a blizzard, trying to dig a third person out of the completely frozen mud."
"That makes sense," Kim said.
"Maybe they just turned around and went back inside," suggested Dustin, who wanted to do just that. He hadn't actually wanted to come in the first place, but his girlfriend had dragged him along.
Elizabeth sighed, sensing she was fighting a losing battle. "Fine, we can go back in and make s'mores."
"Woohoo!" Megan exclaimed.
"S'mores!" Minh-Bao, Melissa, and Kim shouted excitedly.
With that, the group turned around and started making their way through the blizzard back to the band room.
"I hope I'm never stuck out in a blizzard," Elizabeth said. "Especially if I have to depend on you guys to rescue me."
"Oh, come on, we'd save you," Kim told her. "It's just that nobody cares about the tubas. Well, except for Courtney."
"Yeah, and who would I talk to in concert choir if you were gone?" Megan pointed out. "Plus, we all know that Dustin would lead the search party."
"Thanks, you guys. I feel so loved now."
"Well, as long as you're happy," Minh-Bao said sarcastically just before she ran into the brick wall right outside the band room. "Ouch...okay, that hurt. No need to check on me, I'm just fine."
Everybody else had run back into the band room by then, going to Megan's Secret Lair for a cup of hot chocolate and some leftover marshmallow Peeps that she swore were perfectly fine.
Click here to read the alternate ending (which is a good deal freakier than the real ending, but still of the same high quality as the rest of the story).
Five days later...(that would be Friday, for all you people who can't figure it out, like Melissa and Christina. Not that I'm naming names or anything.)
It was a dark and stormy night. As soon as the blizzard had ended a few days ago, it started raining again, so all the snow had either melted or turned into icky brown slush by now, and the mud was back. The Marching Poodles were hanging around the band room, waiting for the football game to get called off. Several people had brought Uno cards, so they had combined them all, and a huge game of Uno was in progress.
"Uno!" all the Katies declared simultaneously.
"Now that's weird," commented Breanna, who wasn't playing.
"I didn't think that could happen," said Christina.
"Neither did I," Kristy added. "Hey, where's Erica?"
"Probably late again," Megan decided. "After all, she's just such a wonderful role model for the rest of us."
"Hey, everybody," Kim said. "Shouldn't they call off the football game by now? I mean, it is lightning and practically hailing. We could have a tornado in the middle of the halftime show, or a colorguard member could get blown away or something."
Megan shuddered. "What if we wound up in Oz again? That would so not be fun."
Suddenly, the lights flickered.
"You know," Melissa said, "this would be the perfect setting for one of those creepy horror movies. Somebody hit Erica with their car, and she's come back to get revenge on all of us, or something along those lines."
"Now there's an optimistic thought," Megan said sarcastically. "We're all going to be killed by a zombie drum major."
"No," said the other Erica, a sophomore saxophonist, "it'll be her ghost."
"Or a dementor," added Jason.
Megan pretended to hide under her uniform bag. "What if Erica and Voldemort kill us?" she asked, acting as if she were scared. "And Draco Malfoy," she added, just because.
"I thought he was dead," Kim said. "Or at least missing."
Minh-Bao rolled her eyes. "No more Harry Potter books for you, Megan."
"Mean," she retorted, pouting. "Now I have to go wait in line for the movie even earlier than I had planned, since I can't read the books. Or something along those lines. And anyway, Jason started it."
Melissa sighed. "Sure, Megan, just blame your problems on the innocent little freshmen."
Jason smiled angelically.
"Jason's an innocent little freshman?" Minh-Bao asked in surprise.
"I meant freshmen in general," Melissa insisted. "Not Jason specifically."
The lights went off again, but this time, they stayed off. Megan quickly ran into her Secret Lair, grabbed two flashlights, and ran back into the band room.
"Have a flashlight," she said, tossing one to Melissa.
"But this one doesn't have any batteries," Melissa complained as she tried to turn it on.
"Drat, I knew I shouldn't have taken those batteries out and put them in my VCR remote." She dug her reading light out of her backpack. "How about this?"
Melissa never got a chance to respond, because at that exact same moment, the door flew open, and a gust of wind, rain, and wet leaves blew through the band room.
"Wh-who's there?" Melissa stammered, sweeping the faint beam of the book light around the room. Nobody answered; the only signs that someone had entered were the large splotches of mud that were now on the formerly spotless floor and podium.
"I hate it when you're right, Melissa," Megan whispered, clutching her flashlight tightly.
"Right about what?"
"The creepy horror movie thing."
"Oh. How do you know it's an evil sort of person? It could just be Mr. Mullins."
"Except that he's locked himself in his office to keep from getting injured by the psycho drummers."
"Well, then, maybe it's a friendly band parent."
Suddenly, someone grabbed the flashlight from Megan as someone else tied her up.
"Help!" she screamed at the top of her lungs. Unsurprisingly, nobody listened to her pleas, and Megan was carried out into the raging storm.
Great, she thought. Now I'll probably get counted absent and lose points. There goes my band grade, even without a seating test to ruin it. And here I had a five-year streak of straight A's in band, at least. It's not even an honors class, so my GPA and class rank will go down. Stupid kidnappers.
Megan was so caught up in this train of thought that she didn't notice that she was back inside till someone spoke.
"Oh, no, not Megan," one of her kidnappers groaned, turning the flashlight on.
I know that voice, Megan thought in surprise. I just wish I knew who it was. Unfortunately, the flashlight was shining right in her eyes, so she couldn't see anything. "What do you mean, 'Oh, no, not Megan'?" she asked indignantly. "Sheesh, that's just really good for my already-low self-esteem. Makes me feel quite wanted, too."
"Well, you know, we were kind of hoping for another drum major after the first one we grabbed turned out to be Erica," the kidnapper said apologetically. "It was really too dark to tell, and I thought she was Melissa."
Megan shook her head in disgust. "What kind of kidnappers are you? I mean, first you get the drum major everybody hates, then the sophomore everyone would love to get rid of. I really hope you aren't going to try to ransom us, 'cause you'll probably wind up paying them to take us back."
"We aren't kidnappers," said someone else. "We're" He was cut off in midsentence by something that sounded rather like a kick. "Ow! What'd you do that for?"
The first person decided not to dignify this with a response. "Actually," he said as the flashlight went out, "we did this because we want revenge, not ransom money. So there. Stupid flashlight, why on earth won't it turn on?"
"Oh," said Megan, "those are probably the batteries from my CD player that I took and put in my flashlight the last time the electricity went out. Come to think of it, they were in my Gameboy till I got that CD I wanted to listen to." She shrugged, a completely pointless action because it was pitch-black. "One of these days, I might get around to buying plenty of batteries. Maybe the next time I have to spend 20 hours on the road." Why can't I recognize that voice? she thought exasperatedly. I know I've heard it a thousand times. If only the lights would come back on...
But they didn't, a fact which greatly annoyed Megan, who thought that everything should obey her slightest whim. Then again, that was just Megan, who definitely had sanity problems, to say the least.
Megan and the kidnappers had lapsed into a slightly uncomfortable silence, and were just sitting there in the dark when the door opened.
"I'm back from McDonald's," the person who had just entered said. "Did you get another drum major yet?"
"Not quite," said the first person, sounding disgruntled. "We accidentally grabbed Megan, because she had a flashlight."
"Megan, the sophomore who plays the flute? That Megan?"
"You know," said Megan to no one in particular, "there are three people in the entire band named Megan, and two of them are flute-playing sophomores. Of course, the other one is in pit for marching season," she added, "but still, I'm the only one who gets that particular disgusted tone when people mention my name. You'd think that would be a dead giveaway."
"Uh, sure, whatever," said the third person, slightly bewildered-sounding.
"And she wonders why we said 'Oh, no, not Megan" when we saw that it was her," the first voice drawled.
"If only we hadn't used our last gag on Erica," someone sighed.
"Well, you know, we could take it out. After all, it's not like the gag's superglued to her mouth or anything."
"Actually..."
"You superglued a drum major's mouth shut?"
"I told you not to use the glue, but you were like, 'No, I'm a senior and you're a freshman, so whatever I say goes'."
"Hey, the tube said it was nontoxic."
Megan guessed that the first person, who seemed to be in charge of the other two, was rolling his eyes at their stupidity, partly because that's exactly what she was doing.
They sat there in silence some more, mostly because the kidnappers were eating their delicious-smelling fries. Megan was getting tired of referring to them as 'the first person', 'the second person', and so on in her head, so in her boredom, she randomly picked three presidents' names for her kidnappers; the smart one was Chester, the really stupid one was Woodrow, and the freshman was William, or Bill for short.
Back in the (dark) band room:
"Who was that screaming for help?" Elizabeth wondered.
"It sounded kind of like Megan," Breanna decided.
"I think it was Megan," Melissa said, "because now we don't have a flashlight. Just her reading light, with almost-dead batteries." As she said this, the reading light went out. "I take that back; now we don't have any light."
"I'll go find Bob the janitor and get a flashlight from him," Kim volunteered.
"I'll go, too," Breanna said, running off after Kim.
"I'm scared of the dark," said a freshman.
"You were being sarcastic, right, Jason?" Melissa asked him.
"Uh, yeah," Jason replied. "I guess so."
"If only we hadn't burned most of our music in that fire during the blizzard," Minh-Bao sighed.
"Wait!" Melissa exclaimed. "What about the pep band folders?"
"And the colorguard flags," added the same person who had suggested that on Monday.
Melissa and Minh-Bao pulled out the box of pep band music, tossed about half of it into a sousaphone bell, and set it on fire.
"Yay!" the band cheered, their faces illuminated by the flickering firelight.
"Watch the lights come back on now," Kristy whispered loudly.
But, of course, they didn't. The drummers found some leftover marshmallows and were roasting them on mallets and snare drum sticks, while the clarinets and saxes searched for chestnuts.
"Maybe we should try to rescue Megan," Christina suggested.
"But we don't know who kidnapped her," Elizabeth protested. "It could be a homicidal maniac or Erica or somebody. And remember what happened last time we tried to save some people? We almost got lost out in the blizzard."
"I'm back!" Kim announced, turning on her flashlight. "Bob gave us, like, five of these."
"Cool," said Minh-Bao, taking a flashlight.
"Okay," Melissa said, "let's organize a search party. I'll go, and so will Kim. How about a few more volunteers?"
Minh-Bao, Breanna, and Christina raised their hands.
"That's it?" Melissa asked, surprised.
Kindra shrugged. "Hey, it's only Megan. I mean, if it was someone else, I might go, but not her."
"Now that's an I care attitude," said Katie, a freshman flutist who hadn't actually been in English Oral yet.
"Do you have a problem with it, freshman?"
"Uh...no, not really."
"That's what I thought."
"Well," said Melissa, who didn't want Kindra to beat up any of the freshmen, "let's start looking. I guess we should check inside first."
"Maybe she's in the bomb shelter," Christina suggested.
"No," Kim said, "that's Erica's Secret Lair."
"I thought Megan was the only one with a Secret Lair," said Kristy.
"Speaking of which, why don't we check her Secret Lair?" Minh-Bao suggested.
"Who, Erica?"
"No, Megan."
"You just want to get your hands on her stash of Pixy Stix," Kim accused her.
"Besides," Melissa added, "we can't get in there. Only Megan knows how to do that."
"Darn." Minh-Bao pouted. "I needed to check my email, too."
"But the electricity's out," Kim reminded her.
"Oh, right. I'd forgotten about that."
Someone came into the band room from outside. "The football game's still on as of right now," he announced.
While most of the band was complaining loudly, Melissa and the others slipped outside after the mysterious messenger.
Back, well, wherever Megan is:
"So," Megan said to the kidnappers. "I don't suppose you'd like to tell me who you really are?"
"No, not really," said the one she referred to as Chester. "Nice try, though."
"Can I guess?"
"No."
"Mean."
"We're kidnappers. Go figure."
"I thought the stupid one said you weren't actually kidnappers."
"What does he know?"
"Yeah, well, you said that you were just in it for revenge."
"I guess I did."
"So what's your motive?"
"Wouldn't you like to know."
"If I didn't, I wouldn't have asked."
"Good point."
"Umm...well...I'm out of conversation starters now."
"Thank goodness," whispered the freshman.
Megan rolled her eyes. "Sheesh, I was just trying to be friendly and polite."
Just then, the door opened again. Coincidentally enough, the lights came back on at that exact same moment.
"Hey, look, we were right!" Minh-Bao exclaimed.
"Who thought of looking in the prop trailer?" Melissa reminded her.
"Kim," Christina said. "Oh, wait, that actually was you."
"Hey, I'm in the prop trailer," Megan said. "But where are the kidnappers?" She looked around. "Let's see...it's obviously not Melissa and everybody else, so it must be the mud-covered and frozen-looking tubaists." She grinned triumphantly.
"Well, yeah," said Alex. "After all, you were the one who decided to leave me out in the mud. I really didn't appreciate that, you know?"
Megan shrugged as Kim untied the ropes. "Hey, you're a brunette again. That should be a definite plus. And you managed to superglue Erica's mouth shut, which means the rest of the band is definitely grateful."
"You did WHAT?!" Melissa exclaimed.
"Scott superglued the gag to Erica's mouth," Megan informed her. "But don't worry, the glue is nontoxic."
"We have our tubas back, too," Kim pointed out.
"But now the flutes, drum majors, and baritones don't get a solo," Megan complained. "I was kinda looking forward to it."
"We weren't," said Minh-Bao and Melissa.
"And is getting the tubas back a good thing?" Christina wondered.
"Yes," Alex, Luke and Scott said menacingly.
"So," said Megan, changing the topic, "did they call off the football game?"
"No," Breanna said, sounding annoyed. "We still have to march."
"But what if someone sinks into the field? Then we'll have to go through this all over again, though I hope there isn't another blizzard. I can't handle two blizzards and two kidnappings in the same week."
"Hey, let's go get ready," Melissa suggested.
"Sounds like a good idea to me," Minh-Bao agreed. The group left the trailer to go get their uniforms on and march in the raging thunderstorm, because if they didn't, they would lose points from their grades, and nobody wanted that to happen.
Meanwhile, in the dark prop trailer, Erica struggled to free herself. "Mmmrrmph!" she shouted, her cries muffled by the fact that her mouth was superglued shut. Finally, she gave up and just collapsed from exhaustion. She was found several months later, when Mrs. Bailey went out to the trailer to start rounding up props for the drama club's spring play.