The title is a reference to the movie Holes. It seemed appropriate. lol
Evan shifts through crumbled rock, hoping to catch a sign of petrified bone. A glance flicked at Cassie assures an equal lack of progress before fingers grab and sort more rubble.
A single chaperone stands off to the side of the new cavern, idly leaning against a pickaxe. Starla watches the two pairs of pupils she is in charge of, alternating between the children and the darkness at both ends of the chamber. The female's geologist cohorts had chosen the day's excavation site for containing "everything necessary for a proper dig". Which, apparently, didn't include a suitable child-to-wall-space ratio.
"Wait! I think!" Evan tenses, worried that someone is having better luck. "Aww…just a different kind of rock." The taunt posture loosens as Cole finishes the sentence.
"Looks like you found some chert, kiddo," the adult informs from across the room. "Chert is a lot like limestone and is often found inside it. Sometimes, when you crack the little nodules open, they contain bigger fossils. Here, let me show you." Pushing off the handle of the large pickaxe, Starla strolls over. A final check is made over a powerful shoulder in reassurance of the empty passageways.
"Geode, keep an eye out, please." The borrowed Pokémon nods, its stony expression serious. The ball tucks in pewter-hued arms and rolls to a better vantage point for both tunnels.
Sam stops shuffling chunks of earth to watch the fiery woman crouch in front of his safety buddy. Starla holds a hand out expectantly and Cole's cantaloupe-sized rock is surrendered by straining arms. The adult sets down the pickaxe, using both palms to receive the prize. Shifting its weight to a short boulder on their left, the woman steadies it with one hand. Holding up the other, now empty hand, the instructor looks pointedly at the pick still clutched by the green-haired youth.
"You two better come over as well!" The demonstrator calls out. "It'd be good to teach you all how to do this at the same time." Evan and Cassie make their way across the small room and plop onto the ground nearby, the ginger's legs sliding into crisscross.
"The thing you want to keep in mind while cracking into one of these babies is that you don't know where the fossil is, if there is one at all." Starla uses the newly acquired tool as a visual aid, pointing in a circle around the chert while speaking. "You have to proceed with caution or you might break what you don't mean to. It's best to try and get a single crack lengthwise on the stone, then work your way around the edges." The verbal directions match the presentation as the Cinnabarian turns the rock on its side, taking a first smack at the skinny center of the oblong rock. "Second, you want to make sure you don't hit it too hard. Start with a firm, but easy hit. You can always hit it harder, but you can't take back a swing." At a second hit, the first chunk breaks off, leaving two clean-edge semi-ovals.
"The nice thing about a lot of sea fossils is that a single shell is a lot easier to spot than a bunch of bones. I don't see anything in this guy, but that just means he's a great teaching tool." At this, each pair of kids is handed half.
"Use your picks to practice taking chunks off as if there is a fossil inside. It should give you a feel for the swing and the amount of force you have to use. Plus, you may find an animal fossil. We can't revive 'em, but they make cool paperweights." She smiles at the four. "If there is a skeleton in there and you don't put direct force on it, it should cleave cleanly away from the surrounding rock. Petrified shell is stronger than chert."
Evan makes his way back to his and Cassie's spot, holding the rock tenderly.
"Can I try first?" the lanky boy directs at his outspoken friend.
"Sure?"
Tilting the stone on its side in mimicry of the teacher's earlier movements, the lad smacks the rock lightly. Chink. Nothing happens under the gentle pressure. Eyebrows draw together in anxiety as the rock is hit a tiny bit harder. Chank. Still nothing happens.
Green globes roll in their sockets and the pickaxe gets snatched, drawing a small cry of protest. Thwack. Evan launches back from the mineral as it falls to the side, a second portion concurrently falling away in the opposite direction.
"Cassie! Are you crazy?!" The girl's shoulders sag in belated understanding of the impulse's risk. "You might as well be a danger buddy; you could have taken off one of my fingers!"
"Sorry, I just. I mean. Sorry," the impatient kid looks away dejectedly.
"Just think next time you use objects capable of breaking stone near my hands." A heavy exhale whooshes out, the near-amputee's attempt to settle nerves and temper.
Cassie demurely places the tool on the ground, positions the offending appendages behind a slumped back, and retreats a few knee hobbles. An uneasy sidelong look later, and the young male grasps the pick again. Repositioning the rock, he knocks it once more. After a few failures, a fragment cleaves off. Four more successes verify and refine the technique. A weighted stare is directed to his partner before the largest piece and instrument are passed back.
Handling the rock like she would an angry Seviper, the girl carefully places it back on the floor. Peering through the clear, hard plastic of safety glasses, the distance is judged between her and her friend. Legs fretfully back up several more knee-lengths. Another visual check; the distance appears sufficient. Set to practicing, Cassie's technique cracks off a solid chunk with every swing. The workmanship slowly reduces the learning aid to a pile of rubble.
Feeling more up to the task, the two revisit the loose rocks scattered at the base of the crumbling wall. Retrieving an acceptable victim each, they get to work. Nearly a half hour passes of vigorous sorting, sifting, crumbling, and cleaving.
"Oi! I found some'mn." All the kids scramble in Sam's direction, eager to have a distraction from the monotony. Crushing the audience's hope, the kid is happily cracking a small bivalve free of its primordial prison. Removing a sufficient amount of the outer layer, the boy stops. "I think I'ma leave it in here. So it don't look like no regular clam on my bookshelf."
"Man, I thought you found something good. Not some stupid clam," Cole complains.
"I reckon you best shut your gob afore I tell everyone what's got your knickers inna twist today," Sam replies derisively, accent thickening with agitation. The snippy boy flushes pink but pinches fingers over tightly-pressed lips, pulling across them to mime a zipper.
The worker Combee disperse, their Vespiquen leaning back in a bone popping stretch. Several more minutes pass in boredom.
Evan grabs a hefty chunk of sandstone from the wreckage of Starla's latest conquest. The newest aggregate of empty lies is turned on its side, before iron punctures it with practiced ease. The compressed grit crumbles a little, but doesn't immediately come apart in the same fashion as the chert. Without a second thought, the flat backside of the pickaxe replaces the sharp point in the hole and the brittle stone is braced under a knee. With a half hour's repetition as his guide, the male uses the rounded center of the tool as a fulcrum and pries up slowly with leverage. A quick crack, and the sandstone fractures nicely.
Evan grabs at the jumbled mess, picking up the four pieces one at a time. A quick examination sends each to the trash pile. Except. Anxiety swamps the boy as he dives back to the graveyard, picking up the last piece that was so carelessly chucked. Is this…? Could it be? Within the pressurized sand sits three long triangles, nothing more. The panicked lad takes a breath to speak, releasing compressed lungs from their fixed exhale.
"Cassie. Cassie! Look!" Evan's hand reaches out, tugging on the girl's green shirt.
"What'd you find?" The disinterested child turns to look at the treasure, not particularly excited after too many false alarms. Still, the ginger peers closer in deference to her friend's zeal. "Looks like more rock chunks to me," is admitted apologetically.
"Uhm, Starla. Ma'am?" The chaperone jolts back to the present, grabs the ever present pickaxe and walks over. Noticing debris still strewn across the floor next to the wall, the excavator's grip loosens, no longer expecting to use the tool. Wait.
"Ma'am?! I'm not that old! What crap is that?"
"Sorry. But we aren't sure if this is a fossil or a rock. It looks nothing like the Dome or Helix ones I was expecting." Hanging forward, the woman looks at the supposed remains.
"Ehhhh, I don't know. It is kind of rounded at the edges, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's bone. Triangles also aren't super uncommon in nature, so it's anyone's guess. I'd definitely keep it separate if I were you, and keep digging until time's up. If you find anything else, great. We can take any potentials back with us to test for DNA at the lab later."
Resigned, the kids nod, continuing to excavate for the next allotted hour.
Chapter Notes:
-Yes, Geode is a Geodude. XD What were you expecting with Plant as your introduction to Eugene's naming theme.
-Yes I watched a video for how to crack geodes for fossils. The method is "similar" to trying to open a crystalized center, except you don't want to crack it perfectly in half in most cases, because you could damage the fossil inside.
-Seviper is a snake, she's handling the rock like a snake.
-For those who didn't catch the completely irrelevant info, Cole has a crush on Peony.
-Vespiqueen and Combee are just a queen bee and worker bees.
-Aggregate of empty lies is a vague reference to Danny Phantom. Tucker chases after a PDA on a string held by Sam, only to finally catch it and have it be fake. Later in the episode he says "Or chinnin' up to a killer bird's nest on a tree branch of empty lies!"