CHAPTER 3: Beelittled
When Barry and Adam returned to the hive, the atmosphere was quiet across said hive; the machines were off, the honey producing machines were off, and the light was off. The only form of light coming within the hive was the one reflecting off of the uniforms of the guarding bee jocks near the entrance. Luckily for Barry, he wasn't one to go on those night shifts. They stopped flying once they got back to Barry's house, since evidently, their parents were asleep, given the living bee room was empty, and the orange, honey-like television was off. Barry and Adam sat down on the couch after, particularly for Barry, a long day of flying.
"Man, I could hit the sack right now..." Barry said, adjusting one of his wings after they've been buzzing all day.
"You've got that right. I'm gonna head on back in a minute, I need a shuteye myself..." Adam said, with Barry nodding.
"You like watching the television much?"
"I dunno Barry, most of our stuff is boring and...just not engaging, not even the comedy is entertaining...but man, you sure do have some comedic moments yourself, so I guess it evens everything out..."
Barry was surprised by Adam's comment; what exactly was it about himself that made Adam laugh?
"W-What? What do you find funny about me?" Barry asked.
"The occassional time I'll recall you hating your life for only being stuck to ONE job...collecting honey for the hive, and even though you said that, here you are, doing just that, you're a pollen jock. It's just the tiniest things that make me chuckle if I'm honest, Barry..."
"Oh yeah? If you wanna talk about comedic stuff, where's your stinger?"
"That one wasn't a good attempt at all, Barry, I actually survived stinging somebody...what're the chances of that happening? You wouldn't survive it..." Adam said.
"You're right, I wouldn't, because I'll never try it. I'm not dumb enough to rage to the point that I want to kill myself over a human; to them, no matter what our instincts do, stings feel like pinches, like uh, you know, when I pinch myself, that's what that feels like to humans..."
"Okay, big deal, I stung somebody, but again, the significant thing was was that I survived..."
"Adam, why do I get the feeling you're trying to belittle me?" Barry asked.
"W-What? Barry, we've been friends for ages, why would you think I'm trying to belittle you? It's just a joke, man, get a sense of humour..."
Barry nodded. His humour senses were dry because of how long he'd spent out of the hive earlier on as a pollen jock. Adam stood up from the couch and walked towards the orange balcony, giving Barry and his parents a huge overlook of the entire hive. Adam was heading hack home, but not before talking to Barry for a final time.
"Hey, don't stop being fascinating!" Adam said, clicking his tiny fingers and pointing at Barry.
"Y-yeah, whatever, I won't?" Barry replied, confused at Adam's statement.
"Alright, take care brother!" Adam said, flying off of the balcony and into the air, ascending ever so swiftly as the buzz of his flight echoed from the corners of the balcony.
"What is with him?" Barry said, talking to himself as he remained sat on the couch.
Barry stood up from the couch, and once again adjusted his wings to ensure that they had a good, solid resting position for tomorrow. He didn't intend on flying anymore, because he wanted to get a good sleep. Before going to sleep, though, he wanted to note down everything he's done today, from those stubborn wasps during his pollen jock adventure and meeting Vanessa recently, and her greenhouse.
Barry walked slowly, in order to remain quiet for his parents, to his room. He opened the door and sat at his own personal desk, with a mirror directly behind it. Looking at his yellow face as his antennaes had remained upwards from his hair, Barry opened up a small tiny cupboard to take out what was a black and yellow coloured notebook, entitled 'Where my thoughts fly'. He placed it onto his table, and he took out a pen which had honey at its tip, with that honey acting like the ink. He began writing honey to paper after flipping the notebook open.
Dear diary,
Another hard day as a pollen jock. I was collecting some pollen from a couple of daisies when myself and the whole crew were bombarded by wasps; they claimed that they weren't gonna let us get to the pollen, and they then threatened us; if we didn't turn back, they'd sting us. Naturally, as wasps, they've got an advantage over us, because they can sting however many times they want and they'd survive. I guess that's one of the downsides of being a bee, haha.
I caught up with Vanessa, and she's clearly grown into the passion of a flower collector or whatever. She unveiled a new greenhouse that me and Adam took a look at, and everywhere I looked, there were flowers; flowers on the top rows, bottom rows and middle rows. I can't quite remember all of them, but there were roses, poppies, I think daisies? And some others. Either way, it's even better for us, as pollen jocks.
The day wasn't even finished there. Myself, Vanessa and Adam had all went to a supermarket, because Vanessa wanted to show me and Adam what our actions have created. What we saw were a wide range of healthier than usual flowers, and honestly? Seeing those had made me feel flattered. Myself and Vanessa worked hard to solve the crisis, and it paid off for sure.
On our way to Vanessa's, though, I still feel this now, too, I was wondering what Ken was up to. The guy lost Vanessa all because of me, something I didn't intend on doing. Everyone's telling me that it's absurd for me to try and make it up with Ken, and honestly, I know that he's allergic to bees, but we've spoken before, but it was that moment where he lost Vanessa; he lost his temper, and he tried to flush me down the toilet. I'm no sympathiser of bug killers, but that guy shouldn't have lost Vanessa because of me. So if all of this goes 'down the toilet' if you will, at least I can say that I've tried to make amendments with Ken. He's probably just been misunderstood by Vanessa.
That was it, I think. Good night, diary.
Barry took his hand off of the pen and sent it rolling towards the left side of his desk. Sure, it was unorthodox to write in a diary when you're basically writing to yourself, but Barry had a habit of expressing his thoughts out into the paper, and as soon as he did, it made him feel less stressful and more open. Why? Because getting your thoughts out into the open, even if its just on a bit of paper, means you've essentially cleared your mind of them. That gives you the chance to move on.
Barry yawned, and he placed his little notebook back into the cupboard. As he stood up, he moved his stool back under the desk, leaving the pen on said desk. He walked towards his bee bed, which had honey all over it, and simply collapsed himself backfirst onto it. He placed his arms behind his head as he rested on the pillow, as if he was on some sort of holiday in a sunny resort. He looked up at the roof of his room, just thinking about certain things.
One thing he was thinking about mainly was Ken. It might be weird that Barry's got an obsession with thinking about the guy this much, but he genuinely did feel guilty. It's going to take a lot of hard work for a bee to convince a human like Ken. In this circumstance, he was going to convince Ken that he didn't intend on spillting him and Vanessa up. Vanessa is simply a human companion who happened to have helped Barry on his journey, and that was it.
Barry's mind then switched to the greenhouse of Vanessa's. He couldn't help but try to remember what those other flowers were that she had. He recalled her other three flowers in the hallway of her apartment, and they had a fruit-like scent to them. They were also vibrant, too.
Completely giving up with trying to remember, Barry's final thoughts rested on the selling of honey in the supermarket he, Adam and Vanessa were in earlier on. When he thought about the fact that all of that honey was now bee-approved, he couldn't help but want even more of it sold. Barry absolutely loves honey, much like all bees, but he wanted to get it across the entire globe so every single human could enjoy it. They did, after all, save the planet's flowers when the crisis had emerged.
Barry started closing his eyes as he remained vacant in his sleeping self. When he drifted off, the whole room was silent, as if nobody was inside at all. Tomorrow was going to be another day of pollen jocks and collecting pollen itself.
Vanessa parked her car up in front of her apartment, where she had a couple of bags filled with shopping; some with flower seeds, and some with general food. She slowly got out of the car and closed the door. Walking towards the boot of the car, she slowly raised it open to unveil the filled bags. One by one, she grabbed them with her two hands, before placing one on the concrete floor to close the boot again. She started humming to herselfd as she walked towards her front door. When she opened her door, she switched the light on and dropped the shopping bags to the floor.
"Better go and check on my flowers!" she said to herself, genuinely determined to grow the healthiest of all flowers in her greenhouse.
She went straight to her back garden, but her face went from cheerful and smiley to one that looked like she had seen a ghost; the door was not only left open this entire time, but she noticed from her backdoor that all the flowers that were in the greenhouse were...gone? Vanessa rushed towards the greenhouse to investigate the matter; it was true, her flowers were all gone, and she planted her hands over her mouth. The flowers looked like they were pulled out from,the soil, evident from the soil being all over the path in the greenhouse. What scared Vanessa though was the fact that somebody, whoever it was, had climbed into her backgarden whilst she was out; the question was, who'd trespass in somebody's property just to pull out flowers?
"O-oh my goodness..." she said, looking all around her, uncertain as to what to do; somebody out there went into her back garden, and that gave her enough of an excuse to run off towards the phone to call the police, straight away.
Ken got up to his own apartment, where he still had the flowers planted in his pockets. At his front door, he grabbed every single flower he had, from the roses to the dandelions, and tossed them straight to the concrete floor of his front path. He stomped his boots right onto them, and he started laughing. Destroying something that the bees needed had felt satisfying for Ken, because he knew it'd anger Barry and those other bees. After doing this, he noticed that Andy was still inside; Ken opened the front door, wiping all the soil off his clothes, and walked in to talk with Andy.