Part IX (B)

Nat Smurfling woke to a shrill, piercing scream. He was up and out the door so fast, he'd nearly made it to the Village center before he realized he didn't recognize anything…or anyone…around him.

The Village he knew was a small community of individual mushroom houses, most with only one or two rooms. The buildings Nat saw now were tall, multi-story structures, many joined together in long rows with shops at street level and residences above. The roofs and awnings still had a mushroom look, but the streets that branched off from the central square were paved with cobblestones and lined on both sides with broad, brick sidewalks. Nat had never seen anything like it.

Nat was so lost in disoriented wonder he walked straight into a Smurf who was running from the opposite direction.

"Oof!" the middle-aged stranger exclaimed. "Oh, Nat! So you heard that scream too?"

Nat was still lost, but the strange Smurf's question jogged his brain back into something close to working order.

"Uh, yeah… Yeah, I did," he said, and coughed a little. His voice sounded peculiar. "Do you know who it was?"

"It sounded like Sassette," the strange Smurf said worriedly. "Come on, let's smurf if she's all right."

Nat nodded and followed the older Smurf up a long street to one of the taller buildings. A large crowd of concerned Smurfs had gathered there. Nat's companion walked up to the nearest group.

"What happened?" he asked them. "Is Sassette OK?"

"We're not sure yet," one of them answered. "Smurfette, Dreamy, and Vanity are in there with her now."

"Nat! Hey, Nat!"

Nat turned at the unfamiliar voice, scanning the crowd. A blue hand shot up from the far side and Nat started making his way toward it. The hand belonged to yet another unfamiliar Smurf, this one a little younger than the Smurf he'd bumped into but still older than most of the grown-up Smurfs he knew. Nat stopped short, cold panic slowly rising inside him. Who were these Smurfs? How did they know his name? Where was he, anyway?

"Nat, thank Smurfness you're here too! I was so scared I was all alone!"

Nat backed away as the Smurf approached him. The Smurf's relieved smile fell. "Come on, Nat, don't do this to me. You've gotta know who I am. You just gotta!"

"I don't!" Nat exclaimed in his strange-sounding voice. "I don't know anysmurf here!"

"Well, I know you. I'd know you anywhere in that ratty straw hat of yours," the Smurf said. "Even if you are a grown-up."

Nat felt a jolt go through him at that. He looked down at himself, then back at the other Smurf, who was wearing a very familiar scowl. He blinked, then stared in disbelief.

"Snappy?" he asked in a weak voice. "Snappy, is…is that you? What's happened to you? To both of us?"

"What do you think?" Snappy snapped. "We've been smurfed to the future, that's what's happened to us. Gargamel must have done it with that hourglass he stole from Father Time's cave."

Nat stepped back, his muddled mind slowly coming back into focus. "Yeah, I remember that!" he said. "He and Azrael were chasing us…there was this powerful wind and then…then…"

"Then we woke up here," a deep, sluggish voice broke in. Snappy and Nat looked up in surprise to see a tall, slouching Smurf approach them, his hands in the pockets of his baggy trousers. "Bet that's why Sassette screamed. If we three look like this…"

"Right," Snappy nodded. "She'd be grown-up too."

"Oh, poor Sassette," Nat said, his nervous eyes darting from one transformed friend to the other. "She's probably terrified. We should go in there. It might help if she knew we were here too."

"You think they'd let us?" Slouchy asked, looking out at the crowd.

"What reason would they have to stop us?" Snappy asked. "It's not like we're Smurflings."

"Hey, yeah," Slouchy said, a slow grin spreading across his face. "We're equals now. Grown-ups like them!"

"Yeah," Snappy said, returning his grin. "And grown-up Smurfs don't get bossed around and told what to do like Smurflings. They can smurf whatever they like. Come on, let's go inside."

Snappy and Slouchy moved through the crowd with smug confidence, but Nat still felt uncertain. None of this seemed real to him. It was more like a dream, a nightmare that could snap to an end at any moment.

The sound of soft sobs quieted Slouchy and Snappy as they entered the building and climbed the stairs. Sassette's door was open. The three Smurfs peered into the neat little room beyond, feeling much more like spying Smurflings than any of them wanted to admit.

Smurfette and Vanity were in there, looking familiar and strange at the same time. Vanity had aged well, maturing into a dapper, elegant Smurf in a dove-gray suit with a silver-topped walking stick polished to a highly reflective sheen. Smurfette was as lovely as ever, only now her golden hair was streaked with gray and piled into a loose bun. Free wisps of hair fell over the shoulders of her long rose-pink dress. She was the first one to notice the three Smurfs in the doorway.

"Oh Nat, Snappy, Slouchy!" she exclaimed, rushing to welcome them in. "I am glad you're here. You three have always been close to Sassette. Maybe she'll talk to you. She hasn't smurfed more than three words to us."

"Where is she?" Nat asked.

"In her room," Vanity said. "Dreamy's been trying to find out what's wrong, but he hasn't smurfed much luck so far."

He rapped his cane against a half-open white door. "Sassette?" he called. "Three friends have come to see you."

Dreamy stepped out of the room, his large eyes deep with worry. "Oh, thank Smurfness it's you three," he said when he saw them. "I was just thinking of smurfing for you. Come in, come in!"

Nat, Slouchy, and Snappy shared a look, then shuffled after him. Sassette was sitting on her bed with her back to them, her red hair tied back in a single tight braid that fell to her waist. Like most of the Smurfs they'd seen in this future Village, Sassette was dressed strangely, wearing a fitted plaid shirt and denim trousers.

"Sassette?" Nat said gently. "Sassette, it's us. Are you OK?"

Sassette shivered a little and turned to face them. Her eyes widened and she shot to her feet.

"Nat? Snappy? Slouchy? Are—are you…?" she stammered.

"Yeah, it's us, Sassette," Slouchy said. "Really us."

Snappy couldn't seem to stop staring. Sassette flushed and glared at him. "What are you smurfing at?" she said.

Snappy swallowed and straightened. "Uh, nothing."

"It better be nothing! Babbling beavers, what kind of crazy dream am I smurfing?"

"It's not a dream, Sassette," Nat said. "I thought it was too, at first. But…"

He glanced over at Dreamy, Vanity, and Smurfette, who were watching them curiously. "Um, would you mind if we smurfed to Sassette alone for a few minutes?" he asked.

"Can't you four just tell us what's smurfing on without all the silly coded secrecy?" Vanity asked petulantly. "Honestly, I thought your little 'Smurfling club' broke up years ago."

"It's nothing important, really," Snappy said, putting his hand on the door. "Everything's fine, and you can smurf that to the others outside."

The three older Smurfs looked a little annoyed at this obvious dismissal, but they gave in. Snappy closed the bedroom door behind them, then turned a sly smirk to Sassette.

"Well?" he said, holding his arms out and turning full circle. "What do you think?"

"What do I think of what?" she asked grumpily.

"Sassette, don't you get it?" he said. "We're grown-ups! Grown-ups!"

"Yeah? And what's so great about that?" she retorted. "We still don't have the answers we were looking for at Father Time's cave. And just look at me! I feel so…so…" She growled and threw herself onto the bed. "I'm not ready for this," she mumbled into the quilt. "I want to be me again."

"What, an awkward little Smurfling?" Snappy said. "Why? Sassette, you're beautiful!"

"Well, maybe I don't want to be beautiful," she mumbled. "Maybe I like being an awkward little Smurfling. At least then no Smurf looks at me like…like you! Smurf it off, Snappy!"

She threw a pillow at him, which he deflected. He did avert his eyes, though. "Sorry," he said. "I don't mean to, honest. But…but just consider the possibilities! We're free now. No Smurf can tell us what to do!"

"I guess," Sassette said mulishly, pulling herself up into a mopey hunch. "But how did we get here, like this? Last thing I remember, we were running away from Azrael."

"Snappy thinks it was Gargamel," Nat said. "He stole something from Father Time's cave. Some sort of hourglass that sent us all to the future."

"Great," Sassette grunted. "So is he here too, then? And what about Brainy?"

Snappy's expression fell.

"See?" Sassette said. "We're not so free after all. We've got all sorts of problems. And with everyone here thinking we're grown-ups, there's no one we can tell, no one we can smurf to for help! They'll be sure to think we're crazy if we do."

"We don't need their help anyway," Snappy said.

Nat was about to protest when a knock came on the door and Vanity poked his head into the room. "If you four are done chatting," he said in his haughtiest voice, "the rest of us have to smurf to work. And, unless I'm mistaken, all four of you have classes to teach today. Do you need a lift to the University?"

Sassette, Nat, and Slouchy looked completely lost, but Snappy slipped quickly into a mask of cocky confidence. "Sure," he said. "we could smurf a lift."

"Will you be coming too?" Sassette asked.

Vanity gave her a suspicious look. "I wouldn't have offered to drive you if I wasn't," he said. "Are you sure you're all right, Sassette?"

"She's fine," Snappy said, grabbing her hand and hefting her to her feet. She pushed him away with a glare.

"Don't do that," she said, and turned to Vanity. "I'm starting to feel better," she told him. "It was a nightmare, that was all. A bad one. It really shook me up. I'm sorry if I made you worry."

Vanity looked enlightened. "Well, as long as you're feeling better," he said. "I'll wait for you outside. Do you all have your Guises?" He gestured to a colored band on his wrist.

"Uh…" Sassette said, looking around the room.

"We lost them," Snappy broke in.

Vanity wrinkled his nose. "All four of you?"

They shrugged.

"But that's impossible!" the middle-aged Smurf exclaimed. "By all that's Smurfy, you Smurfs are supposed to be adults! How could you possibly-" He cut himself off in mid-tirade and took a deep, calming breath. "Fine. Fine. Getting angry over this will only lead to wrinkles. I'll drop you off at Handy's office and you can explain to him how you managed to misplace four Guises all at once. I'm late enough as it is, thanks to this morning's rigmarole. I just hope you all snap out of whatever strange humor you've smurfed into before we get to the University. This peculiar behavior isn't like you at all. Any of you."

When they didn't reply, he sighed, his expression softening. "Come on," he said. "Let's get smurfing before you make me miss my first class all together."

To Be Continued...

Any opinions on this chapter would be enormously appreciated as I'm having some trouble shaping the next few chapters. Please let me know what you think! :)