1: Cupcakes
Chaps was making cupcakes in an underwater submarine. Inside the submarine with him were Joe Willis, Princess Catricia, and a new friend they met along the way called Squid Ted—a squid that randomly says emotional and deep things at the most inconvenient times.
“Who’s ready for delicious mango peach strawberry blueberry blackberry raspberry lemon lime apple banana blue raspberry cupcakes?!” Chaps exclaimed, putting on checkered oven mitts and taking the multicolored cupcakes out of the oven.
“I am!” said Catricia, leaping out of her seat.
Joe nodded. “While cupcakes tend to get somewhat messy, I do admit I cannot resist a good raspberry blue raspberry peach lime mango lemon strawberry blueberry blackberry banana apple cupcake.”
“Life is but a wheel of love, life, and death,” said Squid Ted.
Catricia took a bite out of one of the cupcakes. “So true!”
Chaps slapped his knee. “Classic Squid Ted! Now, as we eat, we must discuss the plan. That locked dimension is persistent, but I believe our key should work.”
“Excellent.” Joe bit into his cupcake. He turned to Catricia, wiping stray crumbs from his mustache. “Were you successful in tracking down the ‘door’ to this dimension?”
Catricia nodded, her pink-blonde hair bouncing. “Normally, my area of expertise is more around tracking people, but all my sources confirm our suspicions were correct — the door we’re looking for is right down the Bottomless Chasm. I have it here.” She reached behind her to grab a laptop off the control panel. Its screen displayed a map colored blue, a red dot blinking in the middle of it. “Unfortunately, the map doesn’t display depth, but so long as we travel along this part of the wall, we should find it. I’d imagine it’s hidden in some sort of sea cave.”
“Brilliant, Catricia!” Chaps celebrated this discovery by lifting his cupcake into the air before taking a triumphant bite. “Into the Bottomless Chasm we go!”
“DANGER!” said a robotic voice from the speakers on the wall. “DANGER! HIGH AMOUNT OF DIMENSIONAL PULLING!”
“Oh, no, dimensional pulling?!” Chaps yelled. “There's only one being in this reality region that can do this!” He pulled his emergency stress-relieving harmonica out from beneath his top hat, using it to play the instrumental of ‘Footloose’.
“We are in the sky!“ Joe shouted.
Chaps shook his head and looked down at a bag of potatoes on the floor of the submarine. “Hmm.” He abruptly threw the bag of potatoes out of the window. Looking outside, he noticed that they were no longer falling. They were suspended in the sky.
“The potatoes were us in a different timeline,” Squid Ted remarked.
Chaps noticed a green aura around the submarine. He looked down and watched as a figure flew up to face him.
“Do you have any idea how much you've shaken up?!” the Peacekeeper screamed. “Chaps, Joe Willis, Princess Catricia! You all are in a world of trouble! You must repair the damages you've done across the dimensions you've crossed before you can enter any more!” She ripped the submarine in half, levitating all of the inhabitants in the air and staring at them angrily.
“Oh, no!” said Joe, sneezing. “My pollen allergies!”
Catricia tried to squirm out of the levitation magic to no avail. “Um,” she said, “we’re really sorry. Right? Now please let us go.”
Chaps sighed. “Unfortunately, the Peacekeeper is right. We broke several dimensional laws in our journey so far. And we didn’t even meet a single new guardian!”
The Peacekeeper huffed. “Well, good news for you. The first thing you have to do is fix the Teleporting Gate you broke earlier, and there’s only one person that can do that. A guardian of this dimension.”
Chaps straightened his bowtie. “This is a ‘pog’ moment!” he exclaimed. “Who is this guardian?”
“The music guardian,” said The Peacekeeper. “Known for her tendency to plague everyday people’s lives with incidental violin music. Her name is Viola.”
“But she plays the violin?” asked Joe. “And not the viola?”
“Correct.”
Joe shook his head. “What a shame.”
“Violins are just wood and string,” said Squid Ted.
Catricia smiled. “Well, I can’t wait to meet the new guardian! And she’s a girl! Maybe she’ll be my first girlfriend!”
The Peacekeeper just stared at Catricia with a look that said “I don’t get paid enough for this.”
Chaps made a throat clearing noise. “Well, Miss Peacekeeper, we’re more than willing to fix the Teleporting Gate. But can you tell us where to find Viola?”
“I could also simply throw you there,” said the Peacekeeper, and she launched the three guardians through the sky.
