Disclaimer: I don't own the BSC members or anything having to do with
Stoneybrook. I only own the plot. This is based after a game I used to play
during recess with my best friend and it is not meant in any way to insult
anyone. Some of the characters are taken out of context for humor purposes.
That's it. Sit back and enjoy! Oh, and don't forget to R&R!
Kristy
"Zee strangest ting happened to me vile passing through zee graveyard"? Sure. Whatever Claud. But here's what happened...
It was 12:00 on the dot. Noon, that is. We (that's me, Kristy Thomas, and my friends from the Baby-Sitters Club), were about to be late for one of the most important sitting jobs of our lives. The mayor of Stoneybrook was having a very important meeting with some politicians who sounded... well, important. And she's hired us to watch her kids during the event! Not only was this job paying well, but it was being televised nationally. The chance to get the BSC on TV was too good to pass up.Talk about great publicity for your small business. But it wouldn't look good for us if we showed up behind schedule. So we decided to cut through the Stoneybrook Cemetary. After all, what could go wrong in the middle of the day?
Claudia
That's what we all thaut, anyway. But that's not exctly how it turned out. As a mater of fact...
It started out innocently enough. We were walking through the rows of tombstones when Stacey, who was in the front, stopped suddenly, nearly causing a dominoes-like collision.
"What's wrong?" I asked, from the back.
"A black cat," she murmured eerily, "just... crossed our path."
"What?!" Dawn screeched. "That's it! I'm outta here!" She attempted a mad dash, but Kristy, with Abby's help, held her back.
"Daaawn," Kristy said, "we have a commitment. We have to be there to sit for the mayor! Our country needs us!"
The rest of us, except for Dawn, giggled. Dawn shushed us with a serious glare. "Black cats are bad luck," she reminded us, backing away from the nearest grave.
"But we're only sitting for four kids! How much trouble can they be?" asked Mary Anne.
Wait a minute. Four kids? Why do they need all of us? I wondered. I heard Kristy mention Jackie Rodowsky and grinned. She was about to launch into a story about her latest Walking Disaster experience, but she was interrupted by a scream and a thud.
We all jumped a mile. Kristy quickly regrouped us, but we were one babysitter short.
"Dawn?" Mary Anne called. "Where... ow." She pointed. We looked.
Dawn lay sprawled across the ground, next to a squat gravestone. As if on cue, she followed Mary Anne's "ow" with one of her own.
"Dawn, are you okay?!" we chorused, crowding around her.
"Owwwww," she responded. But she got up, rubbing her head. "I don't know where that" she pointed at the gravestone "came from."
We all laughed then. We figured that pretty much covered our black cat bad luck. Were we ever wrong.
Stacey
That's for sure! Who would have thought we could get lost in the Stoneybrook Cemetary, especially in broad daylight?! It must have been more black cat bad luck... right?
We walked for what seemed like an eternity (although according to Mal's new digital watch it was actually only fifteen minutes). We were all getting tired. And hot. And anxious. And don't forget tired.
"I don't remember Stoneybrook Cemetary being so big!" Jessi exclaimed. "Shouldn't we be out by now?"
Mallory grinned. "Are we there yet?"
Kristy's reaction was somewhat less cheerful. "We're going to be late!" she wailed.
Mary Anne pried Dawn, who was clinging to her step-sister's shoulder nervously, away before commenting, "Didn't we see that headstone twenty minutes ago... when Dawn tripped over it?" (Dawn yelped and clutched Mary Anne's arm more tightly.)
"Imagine. We've lived here our entire lives, and now we're getting lost in this little cemetary!" Claud complained.
"Some of us," Abby corrected absently, as she glared at the tombstone Mary Anne had pointed out. "Hey, you're right. There's the dent... just kidding, Dawn." Dawn yelped again. Then she stopped and unclutched Mary Anne.
"Where'd Kristy go?" she asked, with surprising calmness.
Kristy
Well, this is where the story gets extremely strange.....
"Guys? Where are you?" I called looking around. They were right behind me a second ago....
"Kristy? Kristy, where are you?" a voice called.
"Mary Anne? I'm over here!!!!"
"Kristy?" This came from right behind me.
I turned around.
"Peace man," said the thing behind me. (Actually, it sounded more like, "Peas mon.")
I screamed and fell backwards into a tree.
"Do not be afraid, young lady." the thing, that can only be described as a man, said. "I will not harm you. But I would like to ask a favor of you."
"Wh... what kind of favor." I asked, suspiciously.
"Well, you see dear, I need a wife. I was hoping you would let me put this ring on your finger, therefore being bound by magic to marry me."
"What?! You've got to be kidding! I don't even know who you are! And I don't even know why I'm still here talking to you when I should be running!" I ran off in the direction away from the thing. I ran for what seemed like forever. Finally I looked behind me. I kept at a light jog. Then I ran into something.
Jessi
I was terrified. Completely terrified. That's all there is to it.
"AAHHHHH!!!!" I screamed as the person bumped into me from behind. The person screamed too.
"Jessi?"
"Kristy?" I turned around.
"Oh my lord! You'll never believe what just happened to me!"
Kristy relayed her story to me. When she finished she asked, "Where is everyone, anyway?"
"I actually don't know. We got split up when we went to look for you."
Just then, a scream pierced the air. Kristy and I looked at each other for a moment, then ran towards the scream. A flash ran behind a nearby monument.
"Hello?" Kristy called.
A blonde head bobbed up. "Help!"
"Dawn!"
"Old Hickory..ring....marry....run....help!" Dawn rasped out, trying to catch her breath.
"No way! That was Old Hickory? But he's dead!" Kristy cried incredulously.
"Well, not as much as we thought he was, apparently."
"I think we better find the others and get out of here as fast as we can." I said, glancing around nervously.
"Yeah-" Kristy was cut off by the appearence of another ghostly specter.
"Old Hickory needs a wife!" it said.
"Run!" Dawn shrieked.
Abby
That ghost had no sense of humor. None at all!!!! None, nil, nada, zip, the big zero... well, you get the point. But here's what happened.......
"Hey, Hicky, baby, sweetheart, dollface. Has anyone ever told you we're too young to get hitched?"
"Ohhhmmmmm... no?"
"Oh, well, in that case. I guess I should be going. Toodles!" I raced off.
"Come back my beautiful bride!!!!!"
Jeez, doesn't he ever give up? Time to bring out Plan B. And I would bring it out - when I actually had a Plan B. For now I just kept running. Run, run, run, leap, run, run, run, leap, run, run, run, leap, run, run, thud. Where'd that last headstone come from? Oh well, no time to think about that now. I stood and started to run again, but then I realized I was all turned around. And the Hick-man was no where in sight. Was this a good thing or a bad thing? I had no intention of finding out. So I raced off.
Mary Anne
Running. I never want to run again. Ever. I mean it, you guys. If I never have to run again, it will be too soon.....
I ran through the dense woods, dodging stray tombstones. I didn't know if that THING, or Old Hickory, was still behind me. I stumbled along, hoping to run into one of my friends. I lost Dawn a few miles back when she ran in the opposite direction. Suddenly, the ground was no longer under my feet. I was falling. Uh-oh! Thud! I landed on the ground.
"Owww..." I slowly got to my feet. I was in a small hole. It actually reminded me of the tiger traps I saw in Swiss Family Robinson and read about in Rudyard Kipling books.
"Haha, I got you," a monotone voice intoned. I recognized it at once. Old Hickory.
"Hee hee, now I will shrink you until someone agrees to be my wife."
Uh-oh, this didn't sound so good.
"Drooble Dribble, Shrunk and Shrink, make small the one who sunkity sinked!"
Did the hole suddenly look a lot bigger?
Mallory
Searching for the president of the Baby-Sitters Club in a graveyard. A haunted graveyard. A scary, spooky, haunted graveyard. My brothers would be so jealous. As for me, I wasn't having the time of my life...
"AAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!" No, Stacey did not see a ghost and she did not fall into or over anything. But she may have been having a heart attack because she discovered her new boots were covered in graveyard muck.
"Ew ew ew ew!!!!!!" I was not impressed. We had lost the others about an hour before.
"Where do you think the other girls are?" Stacey asked when she finally calmed down.
"I wish I knew. I wonder if they found Kristy yet." I said looking around.
A sudden scream sliced through the air.
"What the..?" We turned around.
There was our fearless leader running towards us with Jessi and Dawn right behind her. They looked very fearful.
"What's going on?" Stacey asked.
"Run! We're being chased!" Kristy yelled.
"By what?" I asked, about to run.
Something crashed through the woods.
"Old Hickory needs a wife!!!!" it yelled
"It's a ghost friend of Old Hickory!!!!!!!" Dawn wimpered, stumbling a little.
We ran and ran. Finally we lost him.
"Can someone please tell me what's going on?" I managed to say while catching my breath.
After hearing the story, we tried to figure out how to get out of the graveyard and where to find Claudia, Mary Anne and Abby.
Crunch
The noise was heard by all of us.
"What are we going to do?!" Stacey looked terrified.
"Guys?" a voice questioned.
"Abby!" Jessi exclaimed.
Sure enough, there was Abby walking towards us.
Claudia
Veery werd. A gost who shrincs poeple. I just dont get it.
"Help!!!" I could hear a faint voice yell.
"Little girl stay with me." a male voice sounded.
"Let me go! Someone help me!" the first voice yelled again.
I cautiously approached the area the voices came from. There was Old Hickory! I had ran into him a half-hour before and was still reeling from the experience. Currently, he didn't see me. But he was holding something. Or someone.....
"Help!!! Somebody!!!!" the voice cried.
I knew where I heard that voice before! It was Mary Anne! But how did she get so small? All knew was that I had to save her. I gathered up my courage and charged at Old Hickory. He didn't see me until I had gotten close enough to snatch Mary Anne from him and push him into a pit that he stood next to. Then I ran as far as I could. When I was sure we weren't being followed I looked down at my friend.
"Mary Anne! What happened to you?" I asked.
"He shrunk me! He said he wouldn't turn me back until SOMEONE married him!"
"Oh no!"
A twig snapped somewhere close by.
"We better go find the other girls. Ya know, safety in numbers."
"Where are you, my shruken bride?" a ghostly voice called.
In my palm, Mary Anne choked back a scream.
"We gotta get outta here!" she exclaimed. I put her in the front pocket on my windbreaker, making sure to leave the zipper part open. Then I began to run again.
Stacey
Ghosts who want to marry poor and defenseless teenaged girls, goo that gets all over new shoes, big pits randomly lying around, short tombstones that trip you. The Stoneybrook Cemetary has it all. So why did we decide to go in there?
We wandered around, looking for Mary Anne and Claudia.
"I hope they're alright." Abby said.
Dawn suddenly looked even more terrified than she already was (If that was possible).
"What if Old Hickory got them? What if he got them to marry him? What if they sitting in the middle of some ghost bridal room with ghost bridesmaids about to be married by a ghost reverend-guy with ghost guests and ghost ushers and a ghost bestman and-"
"Dawn! Snap out of it!" Kristy commanded, snapping her fingers in front of the girl's face. Dawn shook her head.
"Sorry."
"Guys!" a voice whispered.
"Claud?" I asked cautiously.
Claudia stepped into view.
"Claudia, are you alright?" Mal asked.
"Yeah, but Mary Anne-"
"What happened to her? Is she alright?" Kristy asked frantically.
"Well, see for yourself." Claudia pulled something from her front pocket.
"Hi guys." It was Mary Anne!
"Mary Anne, what happened?" Abby asked.
"Old Hickory. He shrunk me! He said I'll stay like this until someone agrees to be his bride."
"That's terrible!" I exclaimed.
"It's not as bad as being stuck in a bridal room about to be married by a ghost reverend-guy, though." Jessi said with a side-long glance at Dawn.
Dawn was looking at Mary Anne in horrified amazement.
"Does this mean you're my little sister now?"
I don't know what it was, probably all the tension was built up so much it had to be broken, but that innocent comment made us all crack up. Even poor Mary Anne, who still stood on Claudia's palm. When we calmed down again, we tried to determine how to get Mary Anne back to normal and make it out of the cemetary.
"I'm guessing that we really didn't have a sitting job at Town Hall today." Kristy spoke up.
"How could we have been so stupid! Eight sitters for four kids?!" I chimed in.
"We were just so excited about sitting for the mayor's family." Mary Anne put in.
"Now we have to get out of this mess." Claudia brought us back to the problem at hand.
Jessi asked the question that I knew was puzzling everyone.
"But how?"
Kristy
"Zee strangest ting happened to me vile passing through zee graveyard"? Sure. Whatever Claud. But here's what happened...
It was 12:00 on the dot. Noon, that is. We (that's me, Kristy Thomas, and my friends from the Baby-Sitters Club), were about to be late for one of the most important sitting jobs of our lives. The mayor of Stoneybrook was having a very important meeting with some politicians who sounded... well, important. And she's hired us to watch her kids during the event! Not only was this job paying well, but it was being televised nationally. The chance to get the BSC on TV was too good to pass up.Talk about great publicity for your small business. But it wouldn't look good for us if we showed up behind schedule. So we decided to cut through the Stoneybrook Cemetary. After all, what could go wrong in the middle of the day?
Claudia
That's what we all thaut, anyway. But that's not exctly how it turned out. As a mater of fact...
It started out innocently enough. We were walking through the rows of tombstones when Stacey, who was in the front, stopped suddenly, nearly causing a dominoes-like collision.
"What's wrong?" I asked, from the back.
"A black cat," she murmured eerily, "just... crossed our path."
"What?!" Dawn screeched. "That's it! I'm outta here!" She attempted a mad dash, but Kristy, with Abby's help, held her back.
"Daaawn," Kristy said, "we have a commitment. We have to be there to sit for the mayor! Our country needs us!"
The rest of us, except for Dawn, giggled. Dawn shushed us with a serious glare. "Black cats are bad luck," she reminded us, backing away from the nearest grave.
"But we're only sitting for four kids! How much trouble can they be?" asked Mary Anne.
Wait a minute. Four kids? Why do they need all of us? I wondered. I heard Kristy mention Jackie Rodowsky and grinned. She was about to launch into a story about her latest Walking Disaster experience, but she was interrupted by a scream and a thud.
We all jumped a mile. Kristy quickly regrouped us, but we were one babysitter short.
"Dawn?" Mary Anne called. "Where... ow." She pointed. We looked.
Dawn lay sprawled across the ground, next to a squat gravestone. As if on cue, she followed Mary Anne's "ow" with one of her own.
"Dawn, are you okay?!" we chorused, crowding around her.
"Owwwww," she responded. But she got up, rubbing her head. "I don't know where that" she pointed at the gravestone "came from."
We all laughed then. We figured that pretty much covered our black cat bad luck. Were we ever wrong.
Stacey
That's for sure! Who would have thought we could get lost in the Stoneybrook Cemetary, especially in broad daylight?! It must have been more black cat bad luck... right?
We walked for what seemed like an eternity (although according to Mal's new digital watch it was actually only fifteen minutes). We were all getting tired. And hot. And anxious. And don't forget tired.
"I don't remember Stoneybrook Cemetary being so big!" Jessi exclaimed. "Shouldn't we be out by now?"
Mallory grinned. "Are we there yet?"
Kristy's reaction was somewhat less cheerful. "We're going to be late!" she wailed.
Mary Anne pried Dawn, who was clinging to her step-sister's shoulder nervously, away before commenting, "Didn't we see that headstone twenty minutes ago... when Dawn tripped over it?" (Dawn yelped and clutched Mary Anne's arm more tightly.)
"Imagine. We've lived here our entire lives, and now we're getting lost in this little cemetary!" Claud complained.
"Some of us," Abby corrected absently, as she glared at the tombstone Mary Anne had pointed out. "Hey, you're right. There's the dent... just kidding, Dawn." Dawn yelped again. Then she stopped and unclutched Mary Anne.
"Where'd Kristy go?" she asked, with surprising calmness.
Kristy
Well, this is where the story gets extremely strange.....
"Guys? Where are you?" I called looking around. They were right behind me a second ago....
"Kristy? Kristy, where are you?" a voice called.
"Mary Anne? I'm over here!!!!"
"Kristy?" This came from right behind me.
I turned around.
"Peace man," said the thing behind me. (Actually, it sounded more like, "Peas mon.")
I screamed and fell backwards into a tree.
"Do not be afraid, young lady." the thing, that can only be described as a man, said. "I will not harm you. But I would like to ask a favor of you."
"Wh... what kind of favor." I asked, suspiciously.
"Well, you see dear, I need a wife. I was hoping you would let me put this ring on your finger, therefore being bound by magic to marry me."
"What?! You've got to be kidding! I don't even know who you are! And I don't even know why I'm still here talking to you when I should be running!" I ran off in the direction away from the thing. I ran for what seemed like forever. Finally I looked behind me. I kept at a light jog. Then I ran into something.
Jessi
I was terrified. Completely terrified. That's all there is to it.
"AAHHHHH!!!!" I screamed as the person bumped into me from behind. The person screamed too.
"Jessi?"
"Kristy?" I turned around.
"Oh my lord! You'll never believe what just happened to me!"
Kristy relayed her story to me. When she finished she asked, "Where is everyone, anyway?"
"I actually don't know. We got split up when we went to look for you."
Just then, a scream pierced the air. Kristy and I looked at each other for a moment, then ran towards the scream. A flash ran behind a nearby monument.
"Hello?" Kristy called.
A blonde head bobbed up. "Help!"
"Dawn!"
"Old Hickory..ring....marry....run....help!" Dawn rasped out, trying to catch her breath.
"No way! That was Old Hickory? But he's dead!" Kristy cried incredulously.
"Well, not as much as we thought he was, apparently."
"I think we better find the others and get out of here as fast as we can." I said, glancing around nervously.
"Yeah-" Kristy was cut off by the appearence of another ghostly specter.
"Old Hickory needs a wife!" it said.
"Run!" Dawn shrieked.
Abby
That ghost had no sense of humor. None at all!!!! None, nil, nada, zip, the big zero... well, you get the point. But here's what happened.......
"Hey, Hicky, baby, sweetheart, dollface. Has anyone ever told you we're too young to get hitched?"
"Ohhhmmmmm... no?"
"Oh, well, in that case. I guess I should be going. Toodles!" I raced off.
"Come back my beautiful bride!!!!!"
Jeez, doesn't he ever give up? Time to bring out Plan B. And I would bring it out - when I actually had a Plan B. For now I just kept running. Run, run, run, leap, run, run, run, leap, run, run, run, leap, run, run, thud. Where'd that last headstone come from? Oh well, no time to think about that now. I stood and started to run again, but then I realized I was all turned around. And the Hick-man was no where in sight. Was this a good thing or a bad thing? I had no intention of finding out. So I raced off.
Mary Anne
Running. I never want to run again. Ever. I mean it, you guys. If I never have to run again, it will be too soon.....
I ran through the dense woods, dodging stray tombstones. I didn't know if that THING, or Old Hickory, was still behind me. I stumbled along, hoping to run into one of my friends. I lost Dawn a few miles back when she ran in the opposite direction. Suddenly, the ground was no longer under my feet. I was falling. Uh-oh! Thud! I landed on the ground.
"Owww..." I slowly got to my feet. I was in a small hole. It actually reminded me of the tiger traps I saw in Swiss Family Robinson and read about in Rudyard Kipling books.
"Haha, I got you," a monotone voice intoned. I recognized it at once. Old Hickory.
"Hee hee, now I will shrink you until someone agrees to be my wife."
Uh-oh, this didn't sound so good.
"Drooble Dribble, Shrunk and Shrink, make small the one who sunkity sinked!"
Did the hole suddenly look a lot bigger?
Mallory
Searching for the president of the Baby-Sitters Club in a graveyard. A haunted graveyard. A scary, spooky, haunted graveyard. My brothers would be so jealous. As for me, I wasn't having the time of my life...
"AAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!" No, Stacey did not see a ghost and she did not fall into or over anything. But she may have been having a heart attack because she discovered her new boots were covered in graveyard muck.
"Ew ew ew ew!!!!!!" I was not impressed. We had lost the others about an hour before.
"Where do you think the other girls are?" Stacey asked when she finally calmed down.
"I wish I knew. I wonder if they found Kristy yet." I said looking around.
A sudden scream sliced through the air.
"What the..?" We turned around.
There was our fearless leader running towards us with Jessi and Dawn right behind her. They looked very fearful.
"What's going on?" Stacey asked.
"Run! We're being chased!" Kristy yelled.
"By what?" I asked, about to run.
Something crashed through the woods.
"Old Hickory needs a wife!!!!" it yelled
"It's a ghost friend of Old Hickory!!!!!!!" Dawn wimpered, stumbling a little.
We ran and ran. Finally we lost him.
"Can someone please tell me what's going on?" I managed to say while catching my breath.
After hearing the story, we tried to figure out how to get out of the graveyard and where to find Claudia, Mary Anne and Abby.
Crunch
The noise was heard by all of us.
"What are we going to do?!" Stacey looked terrified.
"Guys?" a voice questioned.
"Abby!" Jessi exclaimed.
Sure enough, there was Abby walking towards us.
Claudia
Veery werd. A gost who shrincs poeple. I just dont get it.
"Help!!!" I could hear a faint voice yell.
"Little girl stay with me." a male voice sounded.
"Let me go! Someone help me!" the first voice yelled again.
I cautiously approached the area the voices came from. There was Old Hickory! I had ran into him a half-hour before and was still reeling from the experience. Currently, he didn't see me. But he was holding something. Or someone.....
"Help!!! Somebody!!!!" the voice cried.
I knew where I heard that voice before! It was Mary Anne! But how did she get so small? All knew was that I had to save her. I gathered up my courage and charged at Old Hickory. He didn't see me until I had gotten close enough to snatch Mary Anne from him and push him into a pit that he stood next to. Then I ran as far as I could. When I was sure we weren't being followed I looked down at my friend.
"Mary Anne! What happened to you?" I asked.
"He shrunk me! He said he wouldn't turn me back until SOMEONE married him!"
"Oh no!"
A twig snapped somewhere close by.
"We better go find the other girls. Ya know, safety in numbers."
"Where are you, my shruken bride?" a ghostly voice called.
In my palm, Mary Anne choked back a scream.
"We gotta get outta here!" she exclaimed. I put her in the front pocket on my windbreaker, making sure to leave the zipper part open. Then I began to run again.
Stacey
Ghosts who want to marry poor and defenseless teenaged girls, goo that gets all over new shoes, big pits randomly lying around, short tombstones that trip you. The Stoneybrook Cemetary has it all. So why did we decide to go in there?
We wandered around, looking for Mary Anne and Claudia.
"I hope they're alright." Abby said.
Dawn suddenly looked even more terrified than she already was (If that was possible).
"What if Old Hickory got them? What if he got them to marry him? What if they sitting in the middle of some ghost bridal room with ghost bridesmaids about to be married by a ghost reverend-guy with ghost guests and ghost ushers and a ghost bestman and-"
"Dawn! Snap out of it!" Kristy commanded, snapping her fingers in front of the girl's face. Dawn shook her head.
"Sorry."
"Guys!" a voice whispered.
"Claud?" I asked cautiously.
Claudia stepped into view.
"Claudia, are you alright?" Mal asked.
"Yeah, but Mary Anne-"
"What happened to her? Is she alright?" Kristy asked frantically.
"Well, see for yourself." Claudia pulled something from her front pocket.
"Hi guys." It was Mary Anne!
"Mary Anne, what happened?" Abby asked.
"Old Hickory. He shrunk me! He said I'll stay like this until someone agrees to be his bride."
"That's terrible!" I exclaimed.
"It's not as bad as being stuck in a bridal room about to be married by a ghost reverend-guy, though." Jessi said with a side-long glance at Dawn.
Dawn was looking at Mary Anne in horrified amazement.
"Does this mean you're my little sister now?"
I don't know what it was, probably all the tension was built up so much it had to be broken, but that innocent comment made us all crack up. Even poor Mary Anne, who still stood on Claudia's palm. When we calmed down again, we tried to determine how to get Mary Anne back to normal and make it out of the cemetary.
"I'm guessing that we really didn't have a sitting job at Town Hall today." Kristy spoke up.
"How could we have been so stupid! Eight sitters for four kids?!" I chimed in.
"We were just so excited about sitting for the mayor's family." Mary Anne put in.
"Now we have to get out of this mess." Claudia brought us back to the problem at hand.
Jessi asked the question that I knew was puzzling everyone.
"But how?"