Author's note: Ever wondered what was the backstory of Dudley's tortoise and what happened to him...?
Not Made to Fly
One day a tortoise will learn how to fly.
- Terry Pratchett, "Small Gods"
Chapter 1
Earthbound
Tortoises led an earthbound existence and he was no exception. He might had never seen his species' homeland, and he hardly remembered seeing other creatures of his kind – well, not counting his own reflection staring at him from the tank's glass – but he knew his own nature well enough to understand that he was a strictly terrestrial creature.
Testudo horsfieldii. The steppe tortoise. There, even his species' name was closely connected to the earth. With their brownish colouring, grainy patterns of their scales and hard shells, tortoises even resembled oddly rounded rocks or clumps of pebbles. Tortoise, the very epitome of earthiness.
He was definitely not made to fly.
He had been observing exotic birds in the pet store long enough to know that he was nothing like them. His sturdy paws with sharp claws were made to walk, to climb and to dig – they did not resemble wings. He had no feathers to speak of, only scales and hard scutes of the shell that protected the most squishy parts of his body. No bright, dazzling colours. No fancy tails, crests and other things like that. Now, there was the beak, but it was a perfectly adequate, tortoise-kind of a beak, useful for munching hard-leafed plants, not for pecking around in search of whatever birds ate.
Nothing like a bird.
And yet, here he was – held by the shell, dangling in the air, confused by the young human's angry voice and violent movements, trying to understand what was happening around him.
He struggled valiantly. Whatever was going on there, he did not like it. He did not like the boy's shouting. He did not like being waved around in the air and, most importantly – he positively hated being held by the shell. For a tortoise, losing contact with the ground meant troubles and he was becoming incredibly stressed every time it was happening.
'Danger,' his instincts whispered in his mind. 'Danger, danger, danger...!' Perhaps somewhere out there, on the dry eastern steppe, there were creatures like Dudley. Creatures that were catching tortoises from above and... and... were they taking them up into the air? And then...?
He cast a worried glance at the greenhouse window, currently lifted open.
How had it come to this?
Unnamed
He had been bought in the local pet shop almost three years ago – and since tortoises have an amazing long-term memory, he remembered every detail of that day. The large, loud boy throwing the tantrum in the pet store, stomping his foot and screaming: "I want a pet! I want a pet NOW!" And the even larger man with red face, hastily fumbling for his wallet and telling the boy to "choose something," as if they were about to buy a new toy.
The tortoise had observed the scene with growing unease. That looked extremely bad. Such humans should not be allowed to have pets, not even stick insects. So when the boy had approached his tank, grabbed him unceremoniously by the shell and taken him out – now with a wide grin plastered to his huge face – he timidly retreated into his shell, pretending not to exist.
'There. Tortoise no more.'
He had secretly hoped that the boy would deem him too boring for a pet. Human children had no patience for quiet animals – from what he had seen so far, they seemed to be liking small, lively, furry creatures best. Surely he would be placed back inside his tank in a moment, and the boy would demand a hamster or a guinea pig.
Any minute now...
But instead of his tank, he had been put inside a white carton box with air holes.
He knew what that meant, but in his mind, not everything was lost yet. They were surely going to return him to the pet store soon. Such things were happening all the time. There was even a rabbit that had been returned twice.
But they had brought him home and, to his dismay, no one had even suggested returning him to the store – even a whole week later.
Soon he had learnt some names. From what he had heard, the large, loud boy was named Dudley. His mother was Petunia Dursley. His father was Vernon Dursley. After some time, the tortoise had discovered that there was yet another person living in the house. The Dursleys' nephew.
He had been barely seeing him because the boy was not allowed to enter Dudley's bedroom. He was small, scrawny and he was wearing glasses. The rest of the family was not fond of him, for some reason. The Dursleys were either ignoring him, ordering him around or scolding him. Despite of that, he also had a proper, albeit rarely used name: Harry.
The tortoise had been given no name.
Perhaps they had decided that he was even less likeable than Harry the nephew? He had no idea. He was just 'the tortoise' to everyone in the house – not counting the times when Mrs Dursley was cleaning his enclosure. Wrinkling her nose, she was usually referring to him then as 'the cumbersome creature,' sniffing in a manner that reminded him of an offended rodent.
Was he really cumbersome?
So many questions.
Forgotten
His tank had been standing at first in the Dudley's room and for some time, it had been a centre of everyone's attention. Then, after a few weeks, it had been moved to another room known as 'the smallest bedroom,' where the large boy was keeping old toys and other things he was bored of. The message was clear. The tortoise was not a pet anymore. He was only yet another toy to be forgotten.
The realization was not pleasant, but it was not terrible, either. Truth to be told, the tortoise had been relieved. There were many toys in the smallest bedroom that were not simply forgotten – but also damaged, sometimes probably beyond repair. Some of them were missing parts, as if ripped apart. Some of them were crushed, as if something or someone heavy had stomped on them.
The tortoise had not ended up damaged... at least not much. For those last few weeks, he had been poked and prodded at, and turned onto his back at least a few dozens of times. He had his shell covered with stickers, he had been used as a war machine in some kind of a game and even tied to a remote control car for an entire afternoon – but somehow, he had endured this torment without so much as a scratch.
Tortoises were made to endure, after all.
He had quickly learnt to be afraid of Dudley – and of his parents. When the boy had invented a new game called 'turn the tortoise upside down and spin,' his mother only smiled and his father mussed up his hair, chuckling: "having fun with your new pet, eh?," as if oblivious to the fact that the fun was extremely one-sided.
In time, the tortoise had came to a conclusion that although it was Dudley who was tormenting him, the parents were even worse than the boy. They were adults, weren't they? It was the adults' duty to explain to their young one how to handle a living creature. The boy had simply not known better. There was something sad about it, but ultimately, the tortoise had decided to save the pity for himself.
As far as he had known, there was no one else around who might take pity on him.
His life in the smallest bedroom had been almost entirely stress-free in comparison to what it looked like before – save for the fact that Mrs Dursley was forgetting to feed him now and then. To his dismay, he was still 'the tortoise' or 'the cumbersome creature' to her, as if even those few minutes a week she needed to spare him were too much of a burden. Dudley and his father had forgotten about him almost entirely, not counting rare occasions such as a visit of a family member or a school friend.
His tank had been standing on the windowsill, so he had a perfect view on the world outside. Laying quietly near the plastic rock or nibbling at wilted lettuce, forgotten and undisturbed, he had been looking wistfully at dandelions growing in abundance on the neighbours' unkempt lawn. There was something incredibly enticing, even mouth-watering about dandelions, although he had no idea what it was. They seemed to be vanishing every summer, but they were back every spring.
The outside world looked like a promise of better life to him. He wished he could get closer to the grass and to the earth. His paws were itching every time he had been observing the Dursleys' neighbour digging in the soil, using some tools. The tortoise had tried to dig in the sand in his tank, but it was too dry and loose to dig in it properly. Such a pity.
Then, after a few more changes of the seasons, he had been relocated once more and, to his surprise, one of his wishes came true.
Disgusting
"Salmonella germs, Vernon!," Mrs Dursley positively shrieked. "This creature cannot be kept anywhere in the house! To think... To think that Dudley might get sick because of it!," she gasped.
One morning, Mrs Dursley had apparently read in the newspaper that reptiles could apparently carry some kind of a sickness. The tortoise had no idea what that meant – he had never been sick, he had never heard of this Salmonella thing and in fact, he had not even seen a salmon in his life – but to humans, it mattered not. Mrs Dursley was not fond of germs of any kind, and Mr Dursley trusted his wife in such matters.
They had been discussing giving the tortoise away at first, but Dudley had thrown a tantrum of epic proportions and ultimately, the reptile had been moved into the greenhouse in the back garden. His enclosure had been arranged in a relatively sunny, warm spot and he had even been given some real soil he could dig in.
He had welcomed that change. He had hoped that maybe he would be allowed to roam the garden now and then... There were no dandelions on the Dursleys' lawn, nothing except grass, but who knew? He might stumble across something interesting one day. He might even had a chance to escape.
But sadly, the enclosure was escape-proof and no one was eager to set him loose in the garden.
Just his luck.
Aside from relocation, almost everything had been like before – except that Mrs Dursley had been wearing thick, yellow rubber gloves every time she was approaching the tortoise now, and she had been very careful not to touch him. She was also calling him 'that disgusting reptile' instead of the usual 'cumbersome creature,' wrinkling her nose even more.
He had been wondering sometimes, why Dudley had not allowed to give him away? He was not even visiting him in the greenhouse. What was the point in keeping the 'pet' only to forget about his existence? In fact, the tortoise did not even considered himself a pet. He felt more like a weird kind of greenhouse decoration.
But his questions remained unanswered and soon enough, he had simply resigned himself to his fate.
While living in the greenhouse, he was catching glimpses of Harry the nephew more often than inside the house. The boy was working in the garden rather frequently. He was not allowed to approach the tortoise – Mrs Dursley was adamant about that, saying that she did not want to risk him 'transmitting the germs' – but when no one was looking and when Mrs Dursley was occasionally leaving the greenhouse door open, the boy was sneaking inside. He was usually tossing a few fresh plants into the enclosure and checking on the tortoise before hastily going away.
It was nice to see someone who was not wrinkling his nose at him, if only from time to time.
Harry was nothing like Dursleys. The tortoise wished he could talk to him. They would probably understand each other. He had a feeling that the boy was also treated here like a weird kind of decoration, the one you don't really need or even like.
Airborne
Dudley's angry yelling reverberated against the greenhouse glass, creating a pandemonium of sounds and vibrations. The tortoise curled tighter into his shell, confused and terrified, hoping that whatever was happening, was going to end soon enough. The noise was awful, almost as awful as being suspended in the air like that, so please, make it stop, make it stop...
Then, without a warning, the boy screamed in frustration and sent the tortoise flying straightly towards the lifted greenhouse window – and towards a shred of cold blue sky visible behind it.
With his head retracted into the safety of his shell, the tortoise caught a glimpse of a world whizzing past him with an unknown and utterly terrifying speed. For a split of a second, he felt himself moving through the air almost weightlessly. For a split of a second, he almost believed that maybe, just maybe, he could fly... even without wings and feathers, and all these others bird-like things.
But he was wrong, of course. Suddenly, the earth called him back and he was not weightless anymore. Barely able to register what was happening, he closed his beady eyes, speeding towards the ground like a piece of dry, brownish rock he resembled. He compressed himself into his shell as much as it was physically possible, instinctively tucking his limbs tightly against his body and hastily preparing for the worst.
When he hit the concrete, he felt his shell cracking – but he was too numb from fear and shock to really feel anything, or maybe it was not even painful? He bounced off of the hard surface of the path, acquiring a few additional scratches and bruises, and then tumbled onto the lawn.
In his head, there was only one coherent thought left.
'Not made to fly.'
Enduring
For a few long moments, he was only laying there, still hidden in his shell and too afraid to breath. When everything inside his head stopped moving, he tentatively opened his eyes and was met with the strangest view – grass blades growing out from the blue sky all around him, neatly trimmed and so green that they seemed to be glowing in the bright sun.
Only then he noticed that he was laying on its back.
He was too confused to realize that at first, convinced that the whole world around him had turned upside down. And it had, in some way. The boy, his owner, had thrown him out of a window.
There was something incredibly wrong with the concept of throwing a living thing away in such a manner. The tortoise felt... strange, as if he was sick and disappointed at the same time. It was worse than being tied to a remote control car, worse than being fed only wilting lettuce for the rest of his life – even worse than being forgotten...!
But now he had many other things to worry about. He tried to look around. Was he even still in the Dursleys' garden? Would anyone find him here? Would anyone search for him, in the first place...? He was not sure if he wanted to go back to the greenhouse, but he was not feeling strong enough to turn himself over – and laying the wrong way up for too long probably won't end well for him.
Trying not to exhaust himself too soon, he began to weakly beat his legs in a soundless cry for help. The movement was a bit painful, but it should make him easier to spot in the grass. The help should be on the way already. The humans could not just leave him here...
...right?
He ignored the gloomy flash of doubt that appeared in his thoughts and continued beating his short, sturdy legs with the stubborn patience of his kind.
Tortoises were not made to fly, but there were certainly made to endure.
He was going to endure...
...somehow.
Author's note: I meant to write only a one-shot, but since I cannot bring myself to leave this little guy laying there like that, I will probably write something more one day.
0 Links