"Hey! It's stew again, with acorn, squash, some green things, a stick, and some sort of orange thing that's not a carrot, orange, or tangerine." Cubby put his lips tentatively to the gourd he was using as a bowl and took a taste. There was nothing tentative about the return of the taste to the gourd. "That's gross!"
Aw, c'mon Furball, that's the second time this week," Tigger said as he wiped the stew from his face and then flung a gourdful at Cubby. It was more dumb luck than skill that caused him to duck his head causing the clump of stew to fly over his head and make a direct hit on Red's chest.
"What'd I do?" Red demanded right before picking up an orange that was just this side of being totally rotten and throwing it at Tigger. This time luck wasn't nearly as forgiving and Cubby anti-ducked as the orange crossed above him, causing it to explode in a spray of juice and pulp in his hair and covering Stumble, Surefoot and Leo as well. With a roar that was equal parts feigned and joyful, Cubby stood up causing the bench he was sitting on to tumble backwards, carrying Tigger and Red to the ground with it. Before Cubby could reach the pitcher of milk, a concoction he strongly suspected of being water mixed with white clay, Surefoot grabbed it and dashed the contents over Cubby's head. Cubby stepped back and tripped over the bench causing him to hit the floor. At least most of him did. A yell from Tig indicated that part of him hit the tiger-pelted Lost Boy as well.
"See? This always happens. It's fun until someone gets hurt." Roo stood there looking like some sort of half-sized avenging angel, his look severe as his eyes moved from face-to-face. For a moment every other Lost Boy froze along with the noise they'd been creating. That lasted for less than a second before stew, milk and dirty paw-mocs pelted Roo from all sides. He retaliated with a seemingly inexhaustible supply of pinecones and acorns from his pelt pocket. Someone found a bucket of strawberries to throw and Surefoot had gone from combatant to trained seal as he tried to snap up each one thrown with his mouth.
Hostilities came to an abrupt end when Cubby climbed a bookcase, and for reasons not even known by him, made a leap to the wooden circle that held torches about the common room table to light the room. He got the distance but didn't have the grip and succeeded in causing the circle to do a complete flip, extinguishing all the torches. Cubby's fingers slipped and he landed on his stomach on the table. The table creaked and shuddered in protest but held. "What the heck happened?" a voice asked from the darkness.
Roo had flint and tinder in his pocket, along with the acorns and pinecones, and quickly succeeded in getting a torch lit. Each Lost Boy wore stew, milk and fruit that had a distinct used look to it. Cubby's hair was sticking straight up from the orange shampoo he'd received. "My stomach hurts," he said in a slightly slurred voice.
"Well duh. What do you expect? You landed on it from ten feet. That'll bruise even your stomach," Roo said in a particularly unsympathetic voice.
"Ha! I bet that's not the reason it hurts. He ate some of the stew before this whole thing began. I know the real reason it hurts. Roo better get ready to induce hurling."
"Don't blame me," Stumble said with a sour look at Tigger. "You're the one who gathers this stuff. What's this orange stuff anyway?"
"Orange stuff? We didn't bring back any orange stuff," Tigger said grabbing a handful of blackberries from Surefoot's hood and placing them in his mouth. "At least I didn't. Did you?"
"Heck no, I learned my lesson. The last time I brought back something orange it turned out to be toadstools. I thought Roo was going to kill me."
"I would have if the toadstools hadn't almost done it. What were you thinking of? You can't just pick up anything off the ground and figure it's going to be safe to eat."
"It wasn't my fault," Surefoot tried to explain. "Greenie was with me and you know how he could be. He was probably too busy talking to birds when I picked it up and I didn't know any better back then."
Roo sighed. "Yeah, I miss Greenie. We survived a lot of raids because of those birds he could talk to."
"Lost birds," Leo said. "They used to pull the hair out of my pelt mane to build their stupid nests."
"You remember the night the raven tried to snack on Tink?"
"Are you kidding? Who knew that sprinkling pixie dust on a bird would make them sink like a stone," Leo reminded his twin.
"Yeah, and who knew that a raven missing all its feathers could look so ugly?"
"Why was he called Greenie?" Cubby asked, pausing a moment from trying to extricate himself from the table he was glued to with stew. Stumble's stew dried quickly and worked as a patch for rafts in a pinch.
"Because he always got airsick when he used pixie dust. Every time he flew he got a wonderful shade of green and after he landed, he'd toss his cookies."
"Not always," Tigger pointed out to his twin. "Ain't that right?" he asked with a big grin at Stumble.
"Ha, ha, very funny, Stripes. It took me almost a month to get the smell out of my pelt and it still smells like birdseed when it gets wet. Not to mention that when Birdbrain barfed all over me it caused me to crash into a tree. I could have put out an eye or something worse." Roo ignored the badly done imitation.
"You can't really blame him. It was your stew that he'd been eating before he hurled." Stumble stuck his tongue out at Red, but didn't get any more aggressive than that. Today's stew seemed to have taken the fight out of him.
As Red and Stumble discussed their differences concerning stew, Leo, Tigger and Surefoot tried to figure out how to get the table to release its grip on Cubby. They'd tried rocking him back and forth, but they'd only succeeded in moving the table a few inches. "What the heck were you trying to do anyway?" Leo asked, glancing up at the fixture that now had a distinct tilt to it.
"I dunno. It seemed like a really good idea at the time. It'd have been cool if I hadn't fallen."
"Are you kidding? I think it was still cool. They'll be talking about this for ages, just like they did with Moose."
"Moose? Who's Moose?" Cubby asked as he managed to pry his left hand from the table. "Did he wear a moose pelt with antlers? Or are they called horns?" Everyone turned towards Stumble, who put on his fiercest scowl.
"What do you care for, Teddy Bear? It's not like you're going to meet him and need to know what sort of headgear he's got so you can recognize him." Leo gently nudged Stumble who made another face but looked a bit pleased to be the center of attention at the moment. "Whatever. Moose wasn't a moose…"
"Well, duh. He was a Lost Boy, same as the rest of us. Tell us something we don't know."
"You want to step outside Bottle Brush? You'll be wearing that fox tail knotted in your hair if you keep interrupting." Red grinned and motioned for Stumble to continue. "Moose didn't wear a moose pelt, he wore a gopher pelt. He wasn't called moose because he was your size either, Teddy Bear. He got his name because he was always trumpeting like a moose. No matter what, he always trumpeted."
Cubby paused in his endeavor to get free of the table. "What'd he trumpet for? Did he do it all the time?" He tried doing a push-up to see if he could get off the table that way, but he'd never had much luck with doing those even when he wasn't stuck to a table.
"He trumpeted when the rest of us were in danger," Stumble said as if it should be the most obvious thing in the world for anyone to know. The fact that Stumble was having trouble keeping a straight face from watching Cubby's efforts ruined the effect a bit.
"So it was like a pirate warning?" Cubby had given up trying to get free from the table and looked at Stumble, his eyes shining as they always did when he got to hear about prior Lost Boys.
"No, that was what Greenie was for. Aren't you listening?" It was Stumble's lecture tone. "When Moose trumpeted he got a response, usually a very big response. There used to be meeses in these woods…"
"Meeses?' Roo asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Who's telling this?" Stumble asked, moving towards Roo but deciding against that action and instead walking over to Cubby and tweaking his nose.
"Ow."
"As I was saying before someone started questioning me, there used to be a bunch of meeses who roamed these woods. Whenever Moose bellowed, they'd stampede to wherever he was."
"You mean they fighted for us?"
"No, Teddy Bear, they stampeded. You're still not listening. They didn't have to fight. You get six or seven meeses running at you and you sort of turn tail and run away."
"What about pirate raids on The Jolly Roger?"
"Are you asking if the meeses swam out to the ship and climbed abord?"
Cubby thought about that and shook his head as much to indicate he wasn't asking that as to try and keep his sore nose out of reach of Stumble's fingers again. "No, that would be silly, wouldn't it?"
"Almost as silly as a clumsy Lost Boy getting stuck to a table," Leo said, agreeing with a grin. "We didn't need and moose on the ship when Moose was around. All he had to do was spin around and the tail of his beaver pelt could take out a ton of pirates if they got too close. Now, as for you, we gotta get you off the table. You're way too lumpy to have dinner on, even if it is stew. All the gourds would turn over. C'mon, men." The rest of the Lost Boys formed up and split themselves equally between each of Cubby's legs. "On three. One, two, three!"
"Owwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww," Cubby howled as they pulled on his legs. The common room moved a couple of inches and there was a slight ripping sound from the bear pelt, but other than that there was no effect from the tug-of-war.
"You know, it might have helped if we'd been pulling in the same direction," Red noted.
"Ya think?" Cubby indignantly demanded from the table top.
"We could always cut him off the table. He might not be so teddy bearish that way." Stumble moved towards the hapless Lost Boy with a grin and a dagger. "Aw, don't worry, I was only kidding," he said when Tig stepped towards him.
"Wait a second." Roo said, turning and waling to one of the cubbies that led off the common room. He rummaged through one of them before bringing out a jar.
"Pixie dust ain't powerful enough to budge Furball,' Stumble said.
"Nope, but this stuff is," Roo said as he tried to unscrew the top. It took him a couple of times before he managed to get it off. He moved to the table and poured the contents of the jar around Cubby's body.
"What is that stuff?" Red asked, wrinkling his nose at the smell. He was pretty sure that stinkweed mixed with skunk wouldn't come close to smelling as bad as this stuff did.
"Just wait," Roo advised as Cubby started squirming.
"But it's burning," the biggest Lost Boy said, squirming even harder.
"Don't worry, it won't get any worse. I think."
"You think?" Tig asked, looking a tiny bit alarmed at the expression on Cubby's face.
Whatever Roo had been waiting for apparently happened. "Okay, guys, try again. This time try pulling his legs in the same direction too." With a few sheepish expressions, the boys grabbed Cubby's legs once more and pulled. "Heave guys," Roo demanded. There was a slurping sound and everyone went flying as the stew suddenly released its grip on Cubby.
"Get off me you big Furball," Cubby heard from under him. "You're crushing me." As carefully as he could, Cubby rolled off Stumble but not before he tweaked the raccoon-pelted boy's nose for him.
"I owed you that," Cubby announced as everyone slowly got to their feet.
"See if you get any blueberries forever," Stumble said, exaggerating a limp as he stood up and walked around.
"What was that stuff anyway?" Surefoot asked, looking suspiciously at the goop on the common room table.
"Stumble stew from last week. It ate a hole in one of the gourds so I figured it might be a good idea to keep some in case we needed it."
"We ate that stuff?" Red asked, looking slightly nauseous.
Roo shrugged. "It's not like it's different from any other day.
"I guess not, but…"
"Don't say a word or no one will get fed for a week," Stumble snapped. "Unless of course any one of you think you can do better."
"Uh, we should get the table cleaned off," Leo decided before that particular discussion could go any further.
A few moments later, as Cubby was scrapping stew off the table, he turned to Tig. "Ya think they'll ever tell stories about me after I've gone on to the next adventure?"
Tig stopped and wiped one of his hands on Cubby's pelt. "Are you kidding? Just this thing alone will guarantee that," he said, gesturing to the remains of the stew on table, benches, floor and walls.
Cubby sighed and nodded. It wasn't quite the story he'd been thinking of, but he knew it'd probably make a good one.