A Very Fishy Escape by Hannah Carr

I didn’t plan to be here. I didn’t want to be here. But somehow, I ended up here! I didn’t have a name before now, but just a few days ago, I suddenly ended up with the name, “Sushi”. I don’t know what sushi is, but whenever the prison guard tells someone my name, they either laugh or say, “That’s so mean!”

First of all, my cell is horrible. The whole thing is made of glass, which gives me no privacy. If I need to “go”, I have to do it in front of everyone and not only do they see it, but they laugh! Also, there’s no bed in my cell! I have to sleep sitting up! Did it never occur to anyone to even put some sand or grass on the floor. Right now, the ground is glass, just the same as everything else.

Second, the food in this place is the most horrible thing I’ve ever tasted. They feed me little multi-colored pellets that look and taste like rocks. They tell me that they can’t feed me too much or else it could kill me, but I think they’re just trying to torture me. I think I may be dying of starvation and not being overfed.

Also, I think the prison guard mocks me. She eats cheese cut into the shape of ME! I think she may be trying to tell (or even warn) me of what she’s going to do to me. She also gets up close to my cell and puffs up her cheeks and crosses her eyes, obviously making fun of me. I may be a bit chubby and maybe I don’t have perfect vision, but that’s no excuse to mock me!

But the worst part isn’t the food or the guard, it’s my new roommate (who I think might be here for eating their LAST roommate). Her name is KitKat (but everyone calls her KK), which everyone thinks is hilarious, but I just don’t get it. KK acts cute and cuddly until the prison guard leaves. Then she sits and stares at me. She also makes this strange humming sound. Pdrrrr. Pdrrrr. Sometimes KK struts over to my cell and bangs on the glass or sometimes even scratches it, which makes the most horrible, earsplitting sound. Also, not only is KitKat mean, but she’s extremely ugly to. She’s super fat and is covered with hair from head to toe! She even has whiskers. I can’t even stand to look at her. I would do something about her, but at the moment, I’m too busy trying to escape (besides, she is about twenty times bigger than me and has horribly sharp teeth).

So far, most of my escape plans haven’t really gone as well as I hoped they would. During my first attempt, I managed to escape the cage but by some devilish witchcraft, I was completely unable to breathe! During my second attempt, I was able to get KK to shove the cage off of the cliff but once it reached the ground, it shattered into a million pieces and once again, I was unable to breathe. My fourth attempt was pretty complicated but I will say it involved a stack of books, a piece of cake, and some toenail clippers. My fourth and last attempt (so far) I vowed never to speak of for some very significant reasons.

Even after all these almost-escapes, I will still keep trying until I succeed (even if it turns out to be never but still, I’m no pessimist). Lately, I’ve been planning my latest escape attempt. I only need a few more materials- some duct tape, a slinky, a teddy bear, a screwdriver, a polaroid camera, and two hundred or so bendy straws- before I will be able to leave this horrible place once and for all. *insert evil laugh here* But seriously, where is a prisoner like me gonna get all that stuff? It’s not like somebody’s just going to accidentally drop a hundred straws into my cell. And besides, where would I keep it anyways? I guess I’ll just have to keep waiting…

A few days later…

Well, now I’m never going to get out of here! There’s a new prison guard. He’s not just bad like the other one. He’s INSANE. He drools. He spits. He screams and cries. And worst of all, he smells horrible! Sometimes, he even reaches his hand down into my cell and tries to grab me! Yesterday, he even did! Luckily, my old prison guard put a stop to it and pulled him away from my cell.

He’s so bad that he’s even put into his own cell at night! And to make it worse, his cell is right IN FRONT of mine! Every night the exact same thing happens. When everyone is sleeping, the new prison guard is awake. He starts to cry a little, then a lot, then in the time span of less than a minute even, he’s keeping everyone awake with his blood-curdling screams. And he doesn’t stop until he’s picked up and rocked for an hour or more. Even KitKat hates him.

Well, that’s the bad news, but there is some good news as well. Only this morning, some strange multicolored pebbles were dumped into the bottom of my cell. At first I thought it was all just some sort of trick. Maybe the pebbles were some sort of poison or sleeping pill. Then I realized, whatever those pebbles were, they were perfect for hiding my materials I would use to escape (of course I’d still need another place to hide the bigger items). Which brings me to some more good and bad news. The good news- on their weekly trip to the store, the prison guards purchased a box of approximately two hundred or so bendy straws. The bad news- they are stored downstairs in the kitchen cupboard.

I have another plan though. KitKat isn’t kept in a cell so maybe I could bribe her into helping me obtain the bendy straws. Meanwhile, I will try to find the other supplies I need for my escape.

The next day…

This morning, I attempted to bribe KK into getting me the straws. The problem is, I don’t know what she wants. I tried to give her one of my new pebbles. The answer was no (even after I tried traded each and every different size and color). Then I tried to give her the cake I still was hoarding from my third failed escape. The answer was the same. No. Then, I had an idea. A most likely impossible idea but still, it was a great idea. I told KitKat that if she could help me get out of this darned place, I would help her escape as well. I thought KK wouldn’t actually want to escape since she had been living such a charmed life. But surprisingly, she gave in. I asked her why she wanted to escape, but she just stared off into space. I guess she had a reason, but I wasn’t going to find out what that reason was any time soon.

Later today, my and KK’s plan was put into action. First, KK knocked a vase onto the floor. As the prison guard came running to see what the noise was and clean up the shattered pieces, KK quickly raced to the cupboard and snatched the straws. Then she sprinted back to me and I hid them. I was a genius.

About a week later…

After the successful attempt to steal the straws, I quickly realised that I could use this exact same process to get the other materials I needed for my escape. I have obtained a roll of sparkly purple unicorn duct tape, a green slinky in the shape of a star, a small slightly-broken-but-would-have-to-do screwdriver, and a large pale pink polaroid camera (Luckily, KK agreed to hide the duct tape and camera beneath her bed since they’re too big to fit in my pebbles). The last thing I need is a teddy bear. Luckily, there is already one in the house. Unluckily, it belongs to the new prison guard (which they now call Pete). I can’t get near him without being killed and KitKat can’t get near him without him crying. The only time we could get the bear was when Pete was sleeping.

Last night, we planned our theft. And tonight, we were going to put our plan into action. Pete was sent to his cell promptly at eight o’clock at night. It only took him a few seconds to fall fully asleep. KK grabbed the fishing rod she had snatched from the garage and hid behind Pete’s cell. She climbed up and sat her furry, fat behind down next to my cell. She picked up the fishing pole in her mouth and flung the hook across the room and it carefully and silently landed right in the middle of Pete’s cell. She moved the hook little by little until it was hooked onto the bear. Then she pulled. But as she reeled in the bear, the hook got caught on one of the bars of Pete’s cell. KK pulled and pulled and pulled with all her might until she accidentally pulled herself right onto the floor. The racket caused Pete to wake up and start throwing a fit. KK and I were extremely worried until a prison guard came in to pick Pete up and set the bear right next to my cell. KK mumbled. I couldn’t hear her but I knew exactly what she was thinking. All that for nothing? And she was right. Well, at least we got what we wanted.

This morning, we put my, er, our escape plan into action. While the prison guards were on break, KitKat duct taped the slinky to my cell. Next, she handed me a small plastic bag which I filled with my water by dragging it through the water in my cell. KK carefully pushed my cell off the cliff and the slinky slowly lowered me to the ground where I landed unharmed on the teddy bear. When I was safely on the floor, I picked up the polaroid camera and took a picture of myself and taped it to the inside of my cell. Then I hopped inside the plastic bag and sealed it up. KK jumped down next to me and started stabbing the cell wall with the screwdriver and it burst into hundreds of little pieces. I held my breath then realized that I could still breathe! I started swimming as fast as I could carry myself and the bag rolled along with me. Kit Kat ran along with me. Finally, we reached the window. KK scooped me up and tossed me up. As I sat on the window sill, I motioned for her to come with me. I may have hated her before but now, I wasn’t leaving without her. KK tried to pull herself up with me when suddenly, three prison guards stormed into the room. I was so surprised that I tumbled out of the window. The last thing I saw was KitKat being carried away by some girls. That’s when I realized why she wanted to escape with me. Those little girls were torturing her! “I’ll come back to get you!” I called. “I promise!” I’m not sure she heard me, but I know that I’m going to keep my promise.

You’re probably wondering where I am now. My exact location, of course, is classified, but I can tell you that as of now, I’m planning an escape for KK. All I need now is a spoon, some thumbtacks, a potato chip, and a teddy bear.

***

Hannah Carr, 13, has been writing and illustrating since before she even knew how to write. She likes writing funny stories. She also likes to write and perform comedy sketches with her cousin, Edie. One of her favorite things to write, though, is comics. She has written and drawn four different comic series and displayed them at school for all her friends. Right now, she is working on a story called Dragon Quest. It is probably one of her favorite things she has written so far.