DISCLAIMER:  I don't own the newsies.  I own myself.  And I don't own Natalie, Moni or Liz.  They own themselves.

HAVE TIME MACHINE: WILL SELL PAPES

CHAPTER 1

            "Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you!  Happy birthday dear Moni!  Happy birthday to you!" the three girls sang.  The fourth girl, Moni, sat in front of a birthday cake with sixteen candles on it.  She took a deep breath and blew them all out in one try. 

            "So what'd you wish for?" Natalie, Moni's best friend asked.

            "Natalie, she can't tell us or it won't come true" Eronn said, rolling her eyes.

            Lizzy began cutting slices of the cake she had made.  She was such a good cook, so everyone asked her to make their birthday cakes.  It had become something of a tradition. 

            The four girls sat around the table, talking and laughing and eating (but NOT talking with food in their mouths – these girls had manners).  Moni, the birthday girl who had just turned sixteen, was tall and had short, messy hair that was a bright reddish-orange color at the moment.  She loved to dye it occasionally, and right now it was far from her original color.  She was dressed somewhat wildly, in a large, bright red shirt and bright blue pants.  She had a ring on a chain around her neck that was an exact replica of the ring in The Lord of the Rings. 

            Natalie had brown hair that went a little below her shoulders and curled slightly.  Her eyes were a grayish color and she was a few inches shorter than Moni.  She was dressed a lot more conservatively in a green tee shirt and jeans with sneakers on her feet.  Her hair was gathered back into a messy ponytail. Neither she nor Moni were that into appearances.

            Liz was sitting next to Natalie, and she was a little taller than Natalie, though not as tall as Moni.  Her hair was a shoulder-length blondish color and she wore it down.  Her eyes were brown.  She was wearing her Oakcrest tee shirt and a pair of jeans.

            Eronn was sitting in between Lizzy and Moni.  She had blondish-brownish hair that went halfway down her back, and her eyes were a dark blue.  She was wearing a sleeveless blue shirt and khaki shorts.  Her hair was done neatly in two French braids.

            The four girls, who were in tenth grade, finished eating and went into Moni's room. 

            "Your house is so cool" Eronn told her, looking up the winding staircase.

            "Yeah, it looks like a church or a cathedral or something" Liz told her.

            "Thanks" Moni answered.  "You two haven't been over here before, have you?"

            They shook their heads no.  Natalie had been there tons of times, so they didn't bother asking her.  She had been at Moni's house almost every weekend since they met in eighth grade.  In fact, all the girls first met in eighth grade, when they started high school.  (AN:  I know, this sounds weird, but we went to a school that went from 7th to 12th grade.  We weren't technically in high school, but it felt like it.)

            Moni started talking about her latest fanfiction, "Samwise Gamgee Woke Up Gay".  (AN: This really is a fic my friend wrote – it's hilarious, so search for it and read it.  It's totally worth it if you've seen Lord of the Rings.)

            "That doesn't sound too good" Liz told her doubtfully.

            "Yeah, I didn't know you wrote like that Moni" Eronn told her.

            "It's not like that," Natalie said.  "It's humorous."

            "Yes, my author's trying to make Sam and Frodo gay, but the characters don't want to be, so they keep thwarting the author," Moni said, a mischievous grin on her face. 

            "Y'know, that movie was okay, but it definitely couldn't compare to Harry Potter" Eronn said.

            "NOOOO!" Lizzy whined, falling back on Moni's bed.  "Not this again, please."

            "But it's true!" Eronn protested.

            "It is not." Natalie broke in.  You know that Harry Potter can never compare to The Lord of the Rings."

            "You're not really qualified to judge Natalie" Moni told her.  "You haven't even seen Harry Potter yet, but I have, and The Lord of the Rings was definitely better."

            Eronn shook her head in mock disgust.  "Oh come on you guys" Liz interceded again.  "They're both good, we all know that.  So let's change the subject."

            At that moment, Moni's mom called from the bottom of the stairs.  "Monica, your grandmother's on the phone.  Please come talk to her!" 

            "Coming!" Moni yelled.  "I'll be right back you guys!" she said to her friends.

            As Moni ran out of her room, Eronn began looking around.  "I never knew Moni was so into science" she commented, looking at a few chemistry sets, a microscope, a telescope, and some other sciency-looking objects that she didn't recognize.  She went up to some large contraption in the corner of the room and started fiddling with it. 

            "Yeah, she's like a closet scientist" Natalie joked.  "She never tells anyone about it."

            Eronn looked at the nobs on the thingamabob, and looked up to see a map on the wall in front of her.  Eronn noticed a place on the machine that looked like longitude and latitude measures would go in, so she looked on the map and put in the coordinates for New York City.  Then she fiddled with the part that had the current date in it so that it was set back to 1899. 

            "What are you doing Eronn?" Natalie asked. 

            "I don't know.  Just looking at this thing here."

            Moni walked in a moment later, and Eronn turned to her.  "Hey, what's this thing?" she asked as she whirled around, hitting a small lever on it as she turned around.

            "NOOOO!  DON'T!" was the last thing the four remembered Moni shouting, as the room began spinning, the floor disappeared from under them, and they were dropped into a place that looked wholly unfamiliar to them.

****************************

            The girls found themselves in what appeared to be a very dirty, very smelly, and very hot alley.  Moni uttered things under her breath that are best left unsaid.  Natalie looked like she was about to faint.  Liz opened her eyes slowly, and then closed them again, as if hoping she would be back in Moni's room when she opened them again.  Eronn sat there with her mouth open and stared mutely around her, terrified. 

            The first to speak was Moni.  "ERONN!" she yelled.

            Eronn cowered behind Liz.  "Save me!" she whispered.

            "What just happened?" Natalie asked in a quiet voice.

            "Eronn messed with my time-travel device, that's what happened!"

            "YOUR WHAT?" Eronn, Natalie and Liz all yelled.

            "You heard me!" Moni said defensively. 

            "Since when have you been trying to make a time machine?" Natalie asked.

            "That's not important!  What matters is that we're stuck here!"

            "I'm your best friend and you didn't tell me?" Natalie asked, pouting.

            "Did you just say we're stuck here?" Liz asked.

            "Omigod!  You don't know how to get us back?" Eronn asked, terrified.

            "I hadn't gotten to that stage yet, no.  That's why I hadn't tried it yet!"  She was yelling again.

            "Oops" Eronn said. 

            "I'll say" Natalie said, staring ahead sadly.

            "But I didn't know!" Eronn said defensively.  "How could I have known?"

            "Well, you probably would've messed with it if you had known, though" Liz pointed out.

            "All the more reason for Moni to hide that kind of stuff from me!"

            "Hey, don't put the blame on me!"

            "Well you did invent the thing," Natalie told her.  "Are you sure we're really in a different time, though?  It's just so hard to believe."

            "I wish we weren't" Moni told her.  "But we'd better go check just to be doubly sure."

            She stood up and the other girls followed.  The alley they were in dead ended right in front of them, but in the other direction it turned and then went towards the street.

            The girls walked around the corner, saw the people in the streets, and turned right back around.

            "We're definitely in the past," Lizzy said.

            "Yup" the others agreed.

            "Exactly what time are we in though?" Natalie asked.  "And where?  That could be helpful to know."

            "What time did you put in the machine, Eronn?" Moni asked.

            "Same day, 1899, in New York City" she told them.  She laughed uncertainly.  "What can I say?  Newsies is my newest obsession."  Her eyes lit up.  "Do you think we might meet the newsies?"

            "Eronn, I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but Newsies is just a movie.  I'm sorry to have to destroy all your childhood allusions, but the things that happen in movies are not real." Lizzy told her, half seriously, half jokingly.

             "I knew that" Eronn muttered.

            "Well, we're not going to get anything done by sitting in this filthy alley" Moni pointed out.  "Maybe I can try to put together a time machine here.  If I can do that, then I can just send us into the future, back to our own times!"  She was getting excited now.

            "That's great!" Natalie said.  "But where are you going to get the stuff to make it?"

            "Yeah, won't you need money, a place to keep it?" Eronn asked.

            "Yes.  We're going to have to figure out something."

            "Can we get out of this alley, though, first?" Liz asked.  "It smells in here."

            The others agreed and they set off out of the alley.  Once on the street, they realized how strange they must look to passer-bys.  Moni especially, but all the others were getting strange looks too.  "I feel like a slut!" Eronn whispered.  She was the only one in shorts. 

            "We'd better make changing our clothes one of our first priorities" Liz said.

            "Yeah, I don't want to be thought of as a slut," Eronn added.

            "What time is it?" Liz asked.

            "Almost 12:30" Moni replied. 

            Eronn looked around a little.  "Wait a second!" she said.

            "What is it?" Natalie asked.

            "Does this look familiar to you guys?"

            They glanced around.  "Now that you mention it, it does a little" Liz told her.  "It looks a lot like –"

            "Newsies!" Eronn screeched.  "We're near Tibby's!  C'mon."

            They walked farther down the street, and sure enough, there was Tibby's.  They stood across the street, just staring at it, when Natalie whispered, "Um, does that guy look familiar to you guys?"

             Eronn almost hyperventilated.  "Is that who I think it is?" Liz asked in disbelief.

            "It sure looks like him," Moni said, as he turned and walked into Tibby's with another newsie that had just appeared.

"It's Blink!  And that other kid who just walked up was Snipes!"  Eronn jumped up and down like a hyper child.  "And they're exactly like they were in the movie.  So there!"  She stuck out her tongue at Liz.

            "That's really odd" Moni commented.  "Technically, they shouldn't look like the characters in the movie."

            "He didn't just look like him – he was the character in the movie," Natalie told her.

            Eronn gasped.  "I've got a brilliant idea!"

            "What is it?" Natalie asked.

            "We can become newsies!"

            "I don't want to be a newsie!" Moni exclaimed.

            Liz and Natalie were silent, however. 

            Natalie grinned.  "That could be so exciting!" she said cheerfully.

            "Wouldn't it?" Eronn agreed.

            "You two!" Moni said, exasperated.  "C'mon Liz, you agree with me, right?"

            "Actually…" Liz hesitated.  "It sounds kind of cool.  And I've always liked Newsies.  I say we give it a try."

            Moni sighed.  "Looks like you're outnumbered," Natalie told her.

            "C'mon, lets go into Tibby's and try to meet the newsies," Eronn told them.  "We're going to need to get to know them so we can convince them to let us stay at the lodging house.  Otherwise we'll have to sleep in the streets."

            With that, the four girls turned and walked across the street and entered Tibby's.

TBC…

AN: Thanks to Natalie for figuring out a goofy title for this goofy fic.  Please review this, pretty please.  And I'll update as soon as possible, it's just I'm now working on three fics at once, so I'll be as fast as possible, but I can't make any guarantees.