In the backyard, Jelly checked that her tablet was recording and cleared her throat.
“Day three of my experiment,” she said, squeezing past Dad’s weeds and into the junk-packed shed. She focused the camera on the shelf and moved aside the curtain rings to see the padlocked box with the kitten sticker on it. “Still nothing to see, but it’s in the early stages.” She stopped, wondering what to say next. “But although there’s not much science to report at the moment”—she turned the camera back on to herself, very much aware that this must be the most boring video ever—“I’d like to add that the world is going absolutely raving mad over chocolate!”
She switched off the tablet and ran back into the house, shouted a “see ya later” and opened the front door just as Dodgy Dave almost fell in.
“Yer dad ready?” he grunted, his phone to his ear and his jaw chomping on bubble gum at the same time.
Jelly stepped outside and closed the door quickly behind her. “No, sorry, Dave,” she said quietly. “He’s gone out. Gone…er…shopping. He’ll be ages…probably.”
“What?” grumbled Dave. “Well, he’s missing a good deal.”
Jelly tried her best to usher him down the path before Dad saw or heard him.
“He’ll regret it.” Dave shrugged, opening the van door and jumping in. “Jobs like this don’t come along often, you know. He’s missing a big payday. Tell him from me—he’s a fool!”
Crowds had taken over the High Street. Cars were being diverted by people in Day-Glo jackets. Jelly couldn’t be sure if they were police officers or just people who owned Day-Glo jackets and liked to interfere.
Everyone seemed to be gathering around the town’s Chocolate Pole—a stone post decorated with purple flags and ribbons, which, it was said, marked the exact center of the chocolate world. The sun was shining, and everyone was wearing brightly colored summer clothes. But that was where the carnival atmosphere ended. It was more like everyone was waiting for a long-delayed train, elbowing and muttering to each other, Jelly thought.
“Hey there, Jelly-no-mates,” sniped Summer Harris-Tweedy as she and her goons roughly squeezed past. “One hundred and seventeen ‘likes’ now, and rising.” She smirked, waving her phone in Jelly’s face. Then, as if she’d lost interest, Summer turned on her heel, and with a quick flick of her wrist her minions followed.
Someone grabbed Jelly’s arm and she turned, relieved to see her friend, eyes wide.
“It’s exciting, isn’t it!” Maya giggled.
“But what’s happening? Who’s coming?” asked Jelly.
“Dunno,” said Maya. “Maybe the Queen, or someone from Dancing with the Stars?”
They looked around to catch a view of which celebrity might be appearing.
“Look, there’s Mr. Tatterly,” Jelly said, spotting their teacher. “I think he’s with his wife.”
“That can’t be his wife, can it?” said Maya, frowning. “It might be his dad?”
The screech of a microphone being switched on focused everyone’s gaze onto the Chocolate Pole. The girls scrambled up a small wall to get a better view. Jelly’s heart sank when she saw a familiar figure in a butterscotch safari suit adjusting a volume control. Gari!
He was now wearing an old-fashioned safari hat and carrying a wooden cane, like some kind of Victorian explorer, Jelly thought. He dabbed his red face with a large purple handkerchief—it was a warm day to be prancing around in fancy clothes!
“That’s the man from that snobby chocolate shop,” she explained to Maya.
“Oh,” Maya groaned. “I was really hoping it was going to be the Princess of Pop—Carly Meringue.”
“Good people of Chompton,” shrieked Gari in his weird, garbled accent that was even more ridiculous when he was talking loudly. “You are at the center of the chocolate world…”
“Who’s the sweaty guy in the stupid hat?” whispered someone in front of Jelly.
“That’s old fancy-pants from Chox, don’t you know,” replied someone else with a la-di-da tone.
“Looks like a Muppet to me,” came another comment, followed by general chuckled agreement.
“…and yet your shops are empty of chocolate,” continued Gari.
Jelly looked around: some people were starting to nod.
“Your children ask you: Please, Mummy.” He spoke in a baby voice that made Jelly squirm. “Please, Mummy, why do you not give me chocolate? Do you not love me anymore?”
The crowd grumbled their agreement, and there was no longer any chuckling.
“This great town of ours has the biggest chocolate warehouse in the world—the Big Choc Lot. Inside is Chompton’s chocolate—your chocolate! Yet you go without.”
Angry shouts rang out.
“Today, my friends, you shall claim what you deserve. So together”—he held his cane high, and his voice got louder with every word—“toward the Big Choc Lot…WE MARCH!”
With a great roar, the crowd moved as one, along the High Street and past Waffle’s statue on the corner of Cookie Way and Bittersweet Street. The chocolate block received desperate licks from lots of people, despite the fencing and signs that had been put up around it. Slowly but steadily they moved downhill to the port and on toward the Big Choc Lot itself.
At first, everyone was so tightly packed together, Jelly and Maya had no choice but to be taken along.
“Ah well,” said Maya nervously, “I didn’t really need new shoes anyway.”
Jelly tried to smile reassuringly, but worries flooded her brain. Would they be crushed by a ton of sweaty people? Should they be doing this? Would the police stop them? What would Gran say? And why was Gari suddenly so keen on ordinary chocolate?
Then thoughts of chocolate, lots of chocolate, took over. The chocolate does belong to the people of Chompton, doesn’t it? she thought. It was only fair, then, to share it.
It wasn’t long before they arrived at the huge iron gates of the Big Choc Lot. The security guard, eating a hot dog in his tiny security cabin, froze at the sight of all the angry people heading in his direction. By now the crowd was punching the air, chanting:
“What do we want?”
“We want chocolate!”
“When do we want it?”
“All the time!”
With his hot dog in one hand and a newspaper in the other, the security guard jumped up and ran for his life.
Gari grabbed a huge set of jangling keys from the cabin and pressed a button to open the gates. The mob flooded through the gap like a herd of wildebeest, and Jelly and Maya squeezed through too, holding on to each other desperately.
At the huge warehouse doors, Gari scrambled onto a stack of crates and held up the keys. “I take great pleasure,” he shouted, “in opening these doors for you fine people of Chompton. Inside is everything you deserve.”
Loud and angry cheers rang out. Jelly and Maya hugged each other tightly with a mixture of excitement and jitters as the doors to the world’s largest chocolate warehouse were slowly opened.
As the crowd pushed in, they quieted, as if they were entering some kind of temple. There was a faint but familiar whiff of chocolate, but there were so many people, Jelly couldn’t see anything—just the large domed roof when she looked up. She was shocked at the size of it. She had seen it from outside, of course, but it looked even bigger from the inside. A bit like the time-traveling TARDIS from Doctor Who, she thought.
The crowd gradually spread out into the warehouse. Every moment, they became quieter and quieter. It was eerie. Something was wrong.
And then Jelly finally realized the problem.
The warehouse was empty.
Not only were there no workers, but there was no chocolate in the Big Choc Lot. None at all!
Jelly raced around, running her hands along the empty shelves and tipping over the few remaining boxes—all empty. Standing on a pile of unused pallets, she craned her neck to see as far as possible. But there was nothing: no chocolate and no workers. Had everyone lost
their jobs here? Dad…She stopped in shock.
Had Dad lost his job all those months ago because of what was happening to the Big Choc Lot? Was there no more chocolate arriving here in Chompton? How long had this been going on? Maybe she should ask Dad when she got home if he had any idea this had been happening.
“B-but…,” Jelly stuttered at Maya, who was following her, openmouthed and silent. “There must be something here. I can smell it.” She took another breath. Either she’d got used to it or the chocolate smell was disappearing. She looked over to the doors. She could almost see the chocolate smell drifting out of them. “No!” she yelled. “Shut the doors! Please!”
Her protests were ignored. Jelly sniffed desperately, again and again and again, sure she could smell the last remaining particles of chocolate being whooshed out into the world.
And then there was nothing left but a dusty emptiness.
Jelly watched as the people of Chompton left the Big Choc Lot. Some were in tears and had to be hugged and comforted. All the protests and anger had dissipated, replaced now with glassy-eyed bewilderment.
“Not even a single low-fat mini muffin!” wailed one lady.
Jelly noticed a few more of those white insects crawling around the floor. It must be the warm weather bringing them out, she thought, flicking one off her jeans in disgust. She spotted Gari at the doors of the warehouse, surveying the crowd and trying, unsuccessfully, to hide an unpleasant and very smug smile.
After he spoke to someone on his phone, he took a large wad of leaflets from an inside pocket of his safari suit and forced them upon the sorrowful crowd.
Maya took one and showed it to Jelly: it was an ad for Chox.
A white van came hurtling through the large open gates to the Big Choc Lot. It squealed to a stop by the warehouse, and out jumped Dodgy Dave, who immediately opened up the rear doors. I bet he had the zip code of the Big Choc Lot already in his GPS and was waiting for the call, thought Jelly. Inside the van were boxes and boxes of Chox chocolate.
Gari and Dave seemed to dance among the townsfolk as they waved them all toward the van. Everyone reached for wallets and purses and parted with bundles of cash for tiny boxes of chocolate. Maya unraveled a few bills from her pocket.
“That’s for your shoes,” warned Jelly. “Your mum will go crazy if you spend it on chocolate. And it’s not even nice chocolate, believe me.”
“At least there’s still some chocolate left somewhere,” Maya said, sounding sadder than Jelly had ever heard her before.
—
At seven o’clock that evening, Jelly’s family sat in the living room, ready to watch The Seven Show.
Dad came in with a huge grin. “I’ve got some cans of great new fizzy drinks!” he announced.
Fizzy drinks? thought Jelly in delight. It had been ages since they’d had fizzy stuff. Maybe it would make up for the lack of chocolate….
“I got twenty-four cans for the price of a Chunky Choc-Chip Crispie,” Dad said, handing them out, “and they’re only a little out of date.”
“Fizzy coconut water?” groaned Gran, looking at the label.
“It’s got to be better than melon-and-watercress cordial,” said Jelly.
Mum read aloud the label as they cracked the cans open. “Full of electrolytes, it says, and is naturally antibacterial.”
Gran took a swig, and suddenly her whole face wrinkled up. “Are you supposed to drink this or clean the floor with it?”
Jelly wasn’t too sure either, but it was fizzy—and that’s what mattered. Thankfully, Gran had been to the ramen shop, so they all hungrily tucked into a magnificent dinner of noodles and ravioli.
“And now we have a special broadcast from Number 10 Downing Street,” said the announcer, “where the prime minister has a message for the nation.”
“What?” moaned Dad with a mouthful of noodles. “What’s that clown want?”
“Shhhh,” mumbled Mum, through a bite of toasted noodle sandwich. “It might be serious.”
“Good evening, Great Britain,” said the prime minister at a podium outside Number 10. Her downturned mouth and stern black suit made her look like she had just come from her own dog’s funeral.
“What does it say on that brass plaque on her front door again?” asked Mum. She had helped Jelly with some homework during the politics section last year and had learned quite a lot—but had obviously forgotten some!
“It says, ‘First Lord of the Treasury,’ ” reminded Jelly.
“That’s right, I remember now.” Mum nodded. “Because it’s weird, isn’t it? It should say ‘Prime Minister’ or something like that.”
“It should say ‘Snooty-Faced-Buffoon’!” grunted Dad, who didn’t like the prime minister.
Jelly smiled in agreement. She had sent tons of letters to Downing Street asking for her and her class to be able to visit during that semester. They had not received a single reply.
“This proud nation of ours,” continued the snooty-faced buffoon, “has seen times of strife: the Blitz; penalty shoot-outs; that very hot day last year when even I had to wear a pair of shorts; and now ‘the Chocopocalypse,’ as The Seven Show has called it.” She looked awkward for a moment before quickly adding, “I don’t watch it myself, but that’s what I am reliably informed.
“In response, I demanded a thorough and immediate report. A report written by the greatest brains that were available at very short notice.”
She waved a thick and boring-looking document. The cameras flashed wildly.
“A report which says, and I quote, ‘There is probably nothing to worry about.’ ” She triumphantly slammed down the wad of paper and produced her finest politician’s smile. “There, you see. What more evidence do you need? Now, let us please, as a nation, return to our normal—and in most cases—very dull little lives. I repeat: there is probably nothing to worry about.”
While the prime minister was talking, Jelly noticed a truck pull up in the background, and a man began unloading boxes of “Premier Chocolate.” Security guards tried to get the man out of the way of the TV cameras. The prime minister, oblivious to this, continued:
“But just to show you what a nice gal I can be—and this has nothing to do with the election that is coming up—I have ordered a nationwide operation. Tomorrow, every single person in this fine land will receive a governmental disaster chocolate ration bar in the mail.”
“Is this for real?” Gran said.
“Brilliant!” squealed Mum.
“I wish they’d give us a packet of cheese-and-onion chips too,” sighed Dad.
“These bars of chocolate,” continued the prime minister, “are coming direct from the nation’s ECS—the Emergency Chocolate Stash. Our post office workers, assisted by our mighty military, will be issuing the bars tomorrow in an operation code-named ‘Easter Bunny.’ ” A smug grin spread across her face. “There, you see. I am a nice gal after all, regardless of what they say online.”
A gaggle of reporters tried furiously to ask questions, which the prime minister dismissed with a stern shake of the head. She quickly retreated into Number 10.
“Nice gal, my bum,” said Dad. “She’s still not getting my vote.”
The next morning Gran slurped her coffee in the kitchen while Jelly watched Dad do the dishes and waited to dry them.
“Will the government disaster chocolate be the fancy stuff, do you think?” asked Jelly, remembering the horrible chocolate at Chox.
“No way!” answered Dad. “It’ll be bargain-basement cheapo chocolate.”
Gran nodded. “The fancy stuff will go to the rich and famous. They’ll be digging into it right now, I tell you. And I bet they get more than a bar each.”
“How big do you think the bars will be?” asked Jelly.
“Oh, Jennifer dear, you’re driving us mad!” pleaded Gran. “We’ll see this afternoon what we get. I’m sure it’ll be lovely.”
“Yeah, there’s nothing we can do until the mail arrives,” said D
ad, looking at the kitchen clock.
“Are you all right, Gran?” Jelly asked. “You sound a bit grumpy.”
Dad snorted but was ignored.
“Oh, I didn’t sleep that well last night,” Gran said, resting her head on her hand. “Did you not hear all that noise?”
Jelly shook her head. She’d got so used to the sounds from the highway and Mrs. Bunstable that nothing seemed to wake her up.
“Police sirens and banging and crashing,” Gran went on. “I thought for a while they’d finally come to arrest old nosy-bags next door. But it must have been some riots and looting in town. I saw it on the news this morning. It happened everywhere—the world’s going mad. I had to turn my headphones up to ‘eleven’ to block it all out. I’ve got a stinking headache.”
Jelly’s mind turned back to chocolate. Now that the panic-buying had turned into looting, there would definitely be no more chocolate in the shops. Could it really be true that the chocolate she was going to get today was the last bar she would ever have in her life? It didn’t make any sense, but it really seemed to be happening. The world had run out of chocolate. No more Blocka Choca bars. Ever! Jelly felt her stomach shrivel in sadness.
—
Saturday morning went on. Even though it was a bright day outside, no one wanted to go out or do anything in case they missed the chocolate delivery.
Then, just before midday, Jelly’s phone tinkled with a text message. It was from Mum.
I’m coming down. Pls put kettle on.
Jelly got a mug ready. As she put some coffee in it, the mailbox clattered. Dad and Gran froze like statues, and Jelly ran out of the kitchen but returned quickly, shaking her head and waving a pizza menu, which she slid into the garbage.
Dad finished some washing up while Gran went back to her magazine.
“What do you think the bars will look like?” asked Jelly.
Gran shot her one of her “serious looks,” and Jelly held her hands up. “I was only asking!”
Mum came into the kitchen in her dressing gown, her eyes barely open, her face creased.
The Chocopocalypse Page 6
