#24 carrot island | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

poorboypictures · 2 years

Text

Frank Pellegrino on 24 Carrot Island

Frank Pellegrino woke up to a seagull screeching above his head. Not understanding what was going on, Frank shooed the bird away before standing up and stretching; he was a bit stiff from sleeping in a ball. Looking around after stretching, he immediately noticed his predicament; he was in a basket, attached to a balloon, in the middle of a vast ocean scattered with islands, with nothing but his clothes and a backpack in the corner; Frank knew his name, and where he was, but he didn’t know how he got there or how long he had been there, but he had the oddest feeling that he had some problems to solve.

***

Frank looks at his map, focused on trying to figure out where he needs to go next; he had helped a few island residents already and is looking for a new island to explore.

“Steamworks sounds interesting; Super Villain sounds a bit dangerous, Nabooti sounds… odd. Hmm… 24 Carrot seems like a good choice, sounds fun.”

As if the balloon can understand him, it immediately flies towards a small island consisting of a small town, a few farms, and a factory. Soon Frank finds himself climbing down his Balloons rope onto the main street of the small town that looked more run down than it did in the air.

“Oh, man… what happened here…?” He asks himself quietly.

He looks around to see signs on all the businesses and buildings; “closed” “going out of business” “out of stock”. Frank sees a man in a ragged suit sitting on a bench next to the Carrot King Diner and heads over.

“’Scuse me!” He calls. “What happened here?”

The Man sighs. “Son, our town runs on one thing and one thing only: carrots. For months now, our carrots have been disappearing, taking away our livelihood; our stores have closed, banks have foreclosed on our farms, and our residents have moved away. Our town is done for unless someone can stop the carrots from disappearing.”

“I take it no one has yet?” Frank asks.

“There are some local kids who’ve tried, but they’ve gone missing.”

Frank thinks for a moment. “I could try.” He says, unsure of the decision.

The Man’s face lights up.

“Could you?”

“Yeah, I’ve solved some other issues like this, I probably could find out what’s going on.”

The Man stands up and vigorously shakes Frank’s hand, overjoyed at the prospect.

“As Mayor of 24 Carrot Island, I cannot thank you enough, son, I wish you well on this mystery.”

He lets go of Frank’s hand and Frank rubs his now sore wrist.

“Um…, any idea where to start?” Frank asks.

“Not really, but I can suggest asking around town for some leads, maybe the farmers?”

“Thanks, I’ll do that.”

Frank heads down the main street, passing the Carrot King Diner and the movie theatre, finding a homeless man wrapped in a thick blanket next to a small fire.

“Life ain’t treating you too well, huh?” Frank remarks.

“Nope. Not since the carrot cake factory closed down and I lost my job.” The homeless man answers gruffly.

“What happened?”

“Fire happened, we barely got out with our lives.”

“Sounds scary.”

“What’s scary is that you can still hear stuff moving in the factory at night; I swear the place is haunted.”

“Sounds like something might be going down in there.” Frank remarks inquisitively.

“You can try and figure that out yourself, I’m not going anywhere near that place.”

Frank cocks an eyebrow at the remark before heading back down the street, finding a hardware store and a woman out front calling out.

“Whiskers! Whiskers, where are you!?”

Frank walks over. “Lost your cat?” he asks.

“Yes, I can’t find him anywhere and I’m getting worried.”

“Why can’t you go look for him?”

“I can’t, I have to stay with at the store.”

“Store?” Frank asks, confused.

“Charlie’s Carrot Surplus.” She says as she motions towards the hardware store. “I’m Charlie.”

“Frank. I can try and look around for Whiskers for you.”

“That would be fantastic! He’s probably hungry by now; if you could find a way to feed him that would get him to trust you.”

She hands Frank a food bowl and he puts it in the hammer space he has dubbed his “Inventory.”

“Any idea where I could find him?” Franks asks.

“He used to hang around the Funny Bunny Carrot farm when it wasn’t foreclosed on.”

“Where would that be?”

“Down that way.” Charlie points past the Diner.

“I’ll get right to it.”

Frank heads towards the farm.

***

After a few minutes of jogging, Frank finds himself at the rundown Funny Bunny Carrot Farm, seeing a farmer at the edge of the property looking over the land.

“Was this your farm?” Frank asks as he gets closer.

“Yep.” The farmer replies, forlorn. “Bank foreclosed on it a while ago. Just can’t grow enough carrots to get the money to pay the mortgage.”

“Mind if I look around?”

“Go ahead, it’s all dead land anyhow.”

Frank thanks the man and starts exploring the area, soon coming across a small patch of freshly grown carrots.

“Odd. I thought all the carrots where gone?”

He walks over to the carrots only for them to disappear as he gets close.

“Hey!”

He jumps to try and grab a carrot, but misses, getting a face full of dirt; Frank gets up, more perplexed than ever.

“This is getting weird…”

In the distance, he hears a cat yowling; following the noise, he finds himself in front of a rundown barn, the meowing coming from the second floor. He tries the barn door to find it locked; Frank looks up and sees the opening to the hay loft and leaps into the barn, coming to terms with the fact that he is somehow able to leap fifteen feet into the air a long time ago.

“Still gut wrenching.” He remarks, a little queasy.

He looks around the loft to find an orange cat in a raccoon cage.

“Whiskers! What are you doing in there, little guy?”

He opens the cage and the cat dashes out of the barn, followed by a thrown together wooden cage slamming down over Frank.

“Hey!”

A raggedy man with sticks and grass in his hair pops out from behind a pile of bags of grain.

“HAH! The shoe is on the other rabbit’s foot!” The man triumphantly shouts.

“Let me out of here!”

The man looks at Frank, a bit confused.

“Hey… You aren’t Dr. Hare.”

“No, I’m not! I’m Frank! Who are you!?” Frank asks, angered.

“Maynard.”

“’Maynard?’” Frank whispers to himself, refusing to believe that is a name

Maynard pulls a rope and the cage rises off of Frank.

“Thanks.” Frank says.

“Sorry about that, I’m hiding from Dr. Hare.” Maynard explains.

“Who the heck is Dr. Hare?” Frank asks, both confused and angry.

“He’s a maniac who kidnapped the citizens of 24 Carrot Island!”

“… Why?” Frank asks skeptically.

“He’s making them work in his factory. It’s something to do with the missing carrots.”

“How do you even know all this?”

Maynard leans closer to Frank, who gets a bit uncomfortable.

“I’m the only one who escaped.” Maynard whispers triumphantly.

Frank pushes Maynard away and stands closer to the loft opening.

“That’s crazy! You’re crazy!”

“I’ll prove to you I’m not crazy! I can give you a blueprint of the factory; but first you need to find a replacement part for my trap.”

Frank sighs in defeat. “Fine, what do you need?”

“A spring, preferably tightly wound.”

“Alright, I’ll be on the lookout for a spring. Now, I need to find that cat you had trapped.”

He drops out of the hay loft and looks around in time to see Whiskers find isr way into the chimney of the farmhouse.

“Dag-nabbit…”

Frank leaps onto the top of the house and looks down the chimney, sighing.

“Well…, let’s see if I can find some milk or something.”

He hops off of the house and heads back towards town.

***

Frank enters the Carrot King Diner, finding the inside is just about as run down as the outside.

“Yeesh; Health inspector will have a fit if he comes to town.”

Frank sees a waitress cleaning a table and walks over.

“’Scuse me? Do you work here?”

“I don’t just hang out here for fun, kid.” She remarks, uninterested.

Frank pulls the cat bowl from his ‘inventory.

“Can you fill this bowl with milk?”

“Honey, I only work for tips these days.”

Frank pulls a couple PoptropiCoins from his “wallet.”

“Will this do?”

The waitress stares at the coins for a few seconds before shrugging.

“Well, it’s money.”

The waitress takes the bowl into the kitchen and comes back with the bowl filled with milk.

“Here you go, Hun.”

She hands Frank the bowl and he puts it in his inventory.

“Thanks.” Frank says as he exits the diner to head back to the farmhouse.

***

Frank is on the roof of the Funny Bunny Farmhouse looking down the chimney.

“Well, if Santa can do it, so can I.”

He jumps down the chimney, landing in a soot filled fireplace; coughing as he climbs out of the cloud of ash, Frank takes off his sunglasses to see better in the darkened house.

“Whiskers! Here kitty-kitty-kitty!”

He makes his way through the house; finding nothing downstairs, he heads up to the second floor to hear a cat meowing. Frank follows the cats call into the master bathroom, finding the tabby in the bathtub.

“Hey, Whiskers.”

The cat meows and hops out of the tub, walking into the master bedroom, stopping to clean itself; Frank pulls the bowl of milk from his inventory and sets it near the cat.

“Here you go, bud.”

Whiskers sniffs the milk before drinking some of it, meowing in content as he rubs up against Frank in thanks.

“Come on, Whiskers, Charlie’s been worried about you.”

He picks up Whiskers and the cat snuggles into his arm.

***

After finding a way to carry Whiskers up the chimney, Frank heads to Charlie’s store and enters the building; Charlie sees them enter and rushes over, taking Whiskers from Frank’s arm.

“Whiskers! There you are!”

“Found him in the farm house.” Frank says, trying not to out Maynard.

“Thank you. I don’t have a lot, but I can give you a crowbar; it might come in handy.” Charlie offers.

“Sounds like something I might need, yeah.”

“They’re over by the entrance; you can grab one on your way out.”

“Thanks.”

Frank exits the store, taking a crowbar as he passes.

“Now I just need to find that stupid spring. It hasn’t been anywhere else I’ve been, might as well check near the factory.”

***

Finding the spring near the factory, Frank sprints back to Maynard, gets the factory blueprints, and sprints back to the factory; finding a sewer drain, Frank uses the crowbar to pry the grate off and head inside, passing a massive rat as he makes his way up into the factory. Using the crowbar to shove the grate open, Frank enters the factory and turns on the power, lighting up the immediate area; Frank looks around to see crates of carrots stacked around the room.

“Okay, tons of carrots in crates with a weird robot rabbit head on the side.”

He pulls the blueprints out of his inventory and opens them up.

“Let’s see where I need to go…”

He looks at the map of the air duct system.

“I’m in the surface warehouse right now; I should probably head to the processing area to see what’s going down.”

He puts the plans back in his inventory and looks around the warehouse, finding an air vent above him.

“Bingo.”

Frank parkours his way up to the vent and enters the ventilation system; as Frank moves through the vents he picks up a pair of pliers, not knowing why they’re in the vents but he gets the feeling he might need them.

***

Eventually, Frank exits the vent in the Processing Room, makes his way down from the top of the room and looks around to see carrots being loaded into crates, carrots being blended in giant juicers, and someone across the room in a metal helmet with rabbit ears.

Frank sprints across the room towards the individual.

“Hey!” He calls out. “Are you okay!?”

A rabbit shaped security drone flies above Frank as he gets to the woman; Frank turns her around to see her eyes are blank, electricity arcing between the ears on the helmet. Shocked at the girl, Frank lets go of her and takes a step back.

“Holy…”

He notices the drone above him just as it hits him with a beam; Frank disappears in a flash of light.

***

Frank appears in the buildings’ walk-in freezer; after taking a moment to regain his senses Frank hears someone talking outside the door; Frank moves over to the door and listens closely.

“Minions! We have an intruder in the factory! The security system is set at maximum. I expect you all to keep an eye out. When we catch our guest, I’d like to give them a… hands on look at our giant juicer.”

The unknown person chuckles slyly at the thought and Frank looks a bit worried at the prospect.

“Yikes.” Frank says to himself. “I need to do something about that security system.”

He looks around and spots an electrical panel marked “Security Access” a little ways away from the freezer door.

“I knew these would come in handy.”

Frank pulls out the pliers he found earlier, opens the panel, and snips the wires.

“Now to get out.”

He looks around and spots another vent near the ceiling; Frank leaps up to the vent and makes his escape.

***

Frank makes his way up through the vents and comes out in the Printer Room.

“Well, it was on the way, may as well check it out.”

Frank leaps from the vent and lands next to another woman in a rabbit helmet.

“Excuse me? Are you okay?

The woman turns around, eyes blank, and stares at Frank.

“Can’t talk. Processing carrots.” She replies in a droned voice before turning back to her work.

Frank spots a power switch on the top of the helmet and turns off the device; the woman shutters before collapsing on the ground, surprising Frank. Frank kneels down next to the woman about to check her pulse when she groans; Frank jerks his hand back as the woman sits up, rubbing her head.

“Uugh…” She moans. “What happened…?”

She nearly collapses again but Frank keeps her sitting up.

“Hold on, miss.” Frank comforts. “You should just sit for a bit.”

“I’m free…” The woman realizes.

Frank is about to say something but the woman cuts him off as she quickly gets to her feet.

“Quick! There’s something you need to see!”

The woman goes to a giant computer and begins working the machine; Frank follows her and watches as she prints something from the computer.

“This is the password for the main system; it should give you full access.” She explains as she rips the paper from the printer.

“Kind of a cruddy system if it only needs one password to work the whole thing.”

“Thanks for freeing me, by the way.” She says as she hands Frank the paper. “And be careful, if you’re seen without the rabbot ears you’ll be captured.”

“I’ll try to find a pair. Try to find your way out of this place.”

Frank makes his way up to the vents.

***

After making his way back to the Processing Room, Frank comes up behind the first woman he came across and turns off the rabbot ears; the woman collapses, but Frank catches her before she hits the floor and props her against a stack of boxes. Frank looks around to see another person across the room by the juicers and quickly makes his way over and shuts off the rabbot ears; Frank catches the collapsing man and sets him against a juicer.

“They’ll be fine.” He mumbles to himself.

Frank makes his way over to the entrance to Dr. Hares’ lair and tries to enter the room; a camera focuses on Frank as the woman in the room wakes up and sees Frank by the door.

“NO!” She calls out frantically. “You don’t have rabbot ears!”

Frank looks over to the woman just as a trap door opens beneath him, sending him into the depths of the factory.

***

Frank falls into the underground Smelting Room, landing near the end of the line; Frank looks around, a tad confused, at the room.

“Why would a carrot cake factory need a smelting room?”

Frank makes his way through the area, looking for another exit.

“I mean, pie tins maybe, but those can be shipped…”

Frank finds a high platform with a large ventilation shaft and makes his way up to it.

“Unless this place is fully independent from the other islands.”

Frank makes it to the platform to find a busted set of rabbot ears.

“What are the odds?”

Frank places the ears in his inventory and begins his climb up the shaft.

***

The woman and man in the Processing Room are pacing, worried about Frank.

“What are we going to do?” The woman asks frantically.

“This guy made it farther than any of us!” The man exclaims. “And he failed right at the end!”

The two are interrupted by loud noises in the ventilation system above them.

“Is it the sewer rat?” The man worries.

Frank falls from the vent with a shout, landing on and breaking several crates; the man and woman rush over to see Frank sitting up in the mess.

“Oowww…” Frank wheezes.

“Are you okay? The man asks, helping Frank to his feet.

“I’m fine, just need to…”

Frank twists to the right and his back cracks loudly.

“There we go…” Frank says in relief. “Now on to the big bad.”

Frank makes his way over to the lair entrance, taking the rabbot ears from his inventory and putting them on.

“Find a way out of here while I handle Dr. Hare.”

He enters the lair without trouble.

***

As Frank enters the lair, he sees Dr. Hare, a grown man in a pink rabbit costume, standing on a floating platform.

“Hurry, you fool!” Dr. Hare shouts. “I’ve finally harvested enough carrots to fuel the giant rabbot! There’s not a moment to waste; once I reach outer space, everyone in Poptropica will become my minions!”

Dr. Hare laughs maniacally as he floats up to the rabbots head; Frank parkours his way up the rabbot to the control pad on the second floor of the room. Frank finds another man in rabbot ears and quickly frees him, placing the unconscious man on the floor.

“Now to shut this place down…”

Frank uses the system password and begins looking through the command files; the roof of the lair opens up as the rabbots’ thrusters warm up, causing Frank to speed up his search.

“Come on, come on… where’s the shut off command?”

Before Frank can find the command, the Rabbot launches into the sky.

“NO!” Frank exclaims.

“The defenses…”

Frank looks over to see the man getting up.

“We still have the defenses.” The man explains. “We can use them to stop Dr. Hare.”

“Where are they?” Frank asks.

The man points behind Frank.

“There’s one behind you, I’ll get the other one.”

Frank agrees and the two get into defense towers, booting up the manual controls and targeting system as Dr. Hare begins releasing the mind control drones.

“Ready?” Frank calls.

“I’m ready!” The man returns.

The two begin firing on and destroying the drones as they break through the stratosphere, heading for the four corners of Poptropica.

“Nearly done!” Frank calls. “Four more!”

“What are we going to do about Dr. Hare?” The man asks.

“What’s the range on these things?”

The man realizes Franks’ plan.

“Pretty far.” The man says, smiling.

The two destroy the final drone and aim at the rabbot in the sky, firing on and destroying the beast, seeing a pink escape pod being sent into space through the targeting system.

***

After climbing up through the ceiling, coming out on Main Street, Frank realizes the whole town is investigating the hole in the street; The Mayor walks up to Frank and shakes his hand once more.

“Young man, this island and her citizens are in your debt.” The Mayor proudly states. “We don’t have a whole lot right now, but we can offer you this.”

The Mayor presents a gold medal to Frank, who gladly takes the reward.

“Thank you, I’m happy I could do something.”

Frank waves to the crowd as he heads to his balloon, proud that he solved another problem, but excited to see where else he can go.

The End.

#poptropica #24 carrot island #fan fiction #art #original character #post number 50!#my art #digital art #digital artist #my oc #character illustration #oc #character design #fanfic writing #writing #dr. hare

7 notes · View notes