"Digga tunnah, dig, dig a tunnah, when you're done, you dig another tunnah…"
"I don't see why they have to sing that every single time," said Timon, placing his paws over his ears as that tried and true old digging song reached him and Daren as they wandered closer to the tunnels where Max was holding his lessons. Several meerkats, varying in age from adolescents to young adults, were standing in a semi-circle around Uncle Max, who stood with his paws on his hips. Around them, under them, and through them, went the various digging crews, doing their best to ignore everything except the dirt in front of them. Daren, for his part, didn't find this odd at all.
"They gotta keep the rhythm, Timon," he explained as though this was very important, which Timon of course didn't think at all, "we can't just dig willy-nilly, it's a very complex process…"
"Really?" said Timon, giving Daren a sideways glance. "Do either of us understand any of it yet?"
"I do," replied Daren, which Timon somehow did not find surprising at all. "It's really sorta fascinating. See those guys down this tunnel here, propping the support sticks? The way they put them up, we learned last week, is all in the way your partners add their weight to it when they swing around… Toka said the magic touch was a quarter turn to the left at the wrist, really sticks into place. All this stuff we're missing out on! You should be glad we're getting to learn how to help keep everyone else safe."
Timon sighed. As much as he appreciated having Daren around, it definitely wore thin listening to him go on and on about how essential tunnels were. Sure, they kept them from being eaten, or dying of exposure, and gave them comfort when they slept, and helped solidify the community that made sure they survived, but come on... saying they neededthem every day?... That was just unnecessary.
Uncle Max, however, had a very different view on the importance of tunnels and the way they were dug. When the two youngsters came into view, he put on his customized scowl and placed his paws on his hips.
"Tunnel digging waits for nobody, Timon! Especially a pup as unpunctual as you. What took so long, Daren?"
"But I am punctual!" said Timon. "I didn't get that hole from sitting down a stick two days back by being thick-skinned, you know."
Everyone pretty much ignored his little comment, rather used to his ways by now. Daren nudged him with his elbow and turned to Max.
"Sorry sir, he was a little busy in the nur-ow!" He jumped as Timon returned his nudge with considerably more force. Max raised his eyebrow, rather interested in hearing exactly where Timon had been that had kept the two so long in getting here.
"This isn't something important, is it Timon?" he asked slowly. "I certainly wouldn't want to cut in on your private sojourns…"
"What, me? Private?" said Timon with a casual shrug as he and Daren took their place in line. "Don't know the meaning of the word… Nope. Nothing interesting going on in my life."
"Hm. Don't we all know," Max jibed, earning some sniggers and an especially haughty stare from Gamba. Timon noticed him standing a bit on down the line. Daren, to Timon's gratitude, winced and sighed slightly at the snide remark. Max turned to the rest of the class.
"All righty then, you all! It's time we got you synchronized with the main digging teams. You'll be split up into groups and led to your tasks by the team leaders." He pointed to a few adults standing nearby. "Don't wander too far off! Anyone who tries escaping today's lessons will be punished by me personally. This is, as I've told you many times before, is one of the most important things we can learn! You've emulated your parents as kits! It's time to start taking the necessary steps forward to become proper adults! Count off in fives and then move it out!"
Timon raised a cautionary paw.
"What is it, Timon?" said Max, eager to get the kit out of his fur and not have to run through another day of failed lessons.
"I thought you could only dig insi-"
"GET MOVING!"
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Timon, young, naïve, and stubborn as he was, was actually fairly impressed at the buzz of activity that the others were able to orchestrate into a smooth, well-oiled machine. Not that he would necessarily call it that, but this seemed to be the first time he had actually looked at what everyone else had been doing. Of course, after about eight minutes of absolutely nothing more exciting than a misplaced patch of dirt, it lost its luster. The instructor had spread them out over several tail lengths in a hallway that was as close to completion as it would get, so the workers had given it up to the lessons. Timon was stationed at the end of the line, off on his own (placed there to make sure he didn't get in anyone's way, no doubt), and soon it wasn't long until he was doing something wrong.
Feeling a tug on his tail, he looked behind him and saw the instructor, a stoic, soft-faced meerkat named Adono, shake his head sadly.
"Timon, that isn't the way to do it. You're completely forgetting the basics I taught you all! Here, you need to watch."
He bent down next to the kit, and began to paw away slowly so that Timon could follow his movements.
"See how to do this? You're digging in too low. That weakens the wall above. We want to widen this tunnel, not bring it down for renovation. Don't push too far in, you'll tire yourself out ripping away like that. Nice, easy strokes."
"Like paddling?" asked Timon, remembering what his father had told him nigh two months back. Adono paused, then nodded with a smile. Maybe Timon was finally catching on.
"Well, I've never paddled before, but yes, I suppose you could say it's like that."
After a few more minutes of Adono rattling off instructions, and Timon nodding obediently where it looked like he was supposed to agree with something (Adono was a nice 'kat, but his voice had a habit of becoming a horrid drone), the older meerkat stood up and went to assist the rest of the class, rushing off with a shout when he saw he had left some of the younger ones alone too long with the support sticks.
Timon rubbed his paws together, and sighed as he began to lazily claw at the dirt in front of him. He didn't really see what was so synchronized about this. Everyone else got to have digging partners! It was just because he was a tunnel klutz, he was sure of it. In all the savannah, who would want to share a tunnel with him? Nobody, that's who.
He continued griping to himself, completely unaware of the downward turn his path was taking.
If only Daren or Trip were here, and they were off playing like they had been able to do just a few weeks ago. Then they would be frolicking, out under the sun… oh, the sun. It was far too dark in here. They needed light to dig, right? Maybe one day, when he got good enough, he'd find a way to bring the light down here from the sky.
Light… sky…. Light. Sky light! Yes! The next great step forward in digging, the greatest-
"AWRP!" yelled Timon as he fell through the floor, landing hard on his head. He flopped onto his stomach, groaning loudly. Stars wheeled around in front of his eyes, making him unsure whether he was sitting up or standing down when he tried to right himself. Wait… was it the other way around? Ah well. He'd find out once he figured out which way the room was spinning. He found himself in another tunnel below the one he had been digging before. He could still plainly see the hole he had powered through to reach this place… this very crowded place. Somebody knocked into him and sent him sprawling again.
"Hey, kid! What are you doing? Get out of the way, this is the rock moving lane!" Timon stood up, and the sound of meerkats singing in beatific harmony blasted his ears. Oh great. He was right in the middle of the one thing he hated most... after messing up another digging project. What a day.
It got worse when somebody shoved a very pointy, very heavy rock into his paws, which he stumbled about with, trying not to step on anyone's tail. The first somebody who had greeted him so warmly snapped instructions to him.
"Well, get your tail moving, make yourself useful if you aren't going anywhere! We want to get this done before the rainy season kid. Take this and get out of the way!"
"Uh, er, right! Yeah! Right away!" answered Timon trying to hobble off with an aching head and full paws. He didn't even know where he was going, and he had apparently tunneled himself right into the forefront of the colony's construction efforts. It took a while to even figure out that this was indeed the case, so confused was the little kit. Dirt flew into his face at every turn, and meerkats who looked entirely self-assured and happy about their work waltzed right by him without as much as a howdy-do. A few stopped long enough to question or get angry with him.
"Ow! Hey! Watch where you're swinging that thing!"
"Whoa! Wrong lane, pup!"
"Watch where you step! That was my tail!"
"Where the heck are you going? We drop those rocks off over there!"
"What's a kit like you doing down here? Wait, I recognize you… hey! I'm talking to you!"
"This way, pup, go with the flow! The nursery is that way!"
Timon smiled bashfully at all those that corrected him.
"Right, sorry, 'scuse me, gotta get through… move it ya mangy… I mean sorry! Sorry! Terribly sorry!"
Between his placations, he was wondering how on earth he was going to get out of here. Why did they have to build these tunnels so convoluted? The rock in his paws was getting heavier every moment. He knew he should have wrestled more as a little one.
Finally, he stopped off at an intersection that seemed to be less congested. He set the rock down and leaned on it, watching from the sidelines as endless lines of his brethren went to work with gusto, singing and hauling and marching in a manner that seemed ridiculously mindless and repetitive to Timon. What was the point? They didn't seem to be accomplishing much. Just hauling the earth around. Even dung beetles did something more useful than this! Shaking his head, he considered trying to question one of the passers-by for directions back up to his assigned station, somewhere on the third level. He grabbed the first meerkat he found.
"Uh… sir? Excuse me, I was just…" He froze in mid-sentence. It was Paki… one of Gamba's gang. For a moment, they both stared dumbly at one another. Then, the older meerkat simply sniffed disdainfully.
"Don't got time for you… go 'way." He turned to leave, a bundle of support sticks bunched up in his paws. Timon stood staring dumbly after him, and then he turned back. Timon finally noticed the bruise over his eye.
"Gamba's somewhere around here," said Paki. "He… well… he's here. That's all," he added, then moved away again without any other comments. Timon stared dumbly after him. For three months that meerkat had done nothing but torment him, and now he walked off without even a sneer? That was sincerely odd. Deciding to make the most of the non-action and the warning about Gamba, he turned to find his own way once more. It was very hard to get lost in the colony; he just hated asking for directions, especially in his own home. Terribly embarrassing.
Before he could take another thought on the matter, he was conked on the head by something hard and fast. Falling to the ground, he narrowly avoided being trampled by the surge of meerkats that was barreling through the tunnel, support struts in paw, some singing, some humming, some blaring the good old work song. The worker who had smacked Timon upside the skull hadn't quite noticed that something was in the way of his regimented digging duties, and summarily tripped over him quiet suddenly, the rest of the line following. Suddenly the once relatively quiet tunnel became a definite hazard as the once smooth line devolved into a writhing mass of fur and angry faces. The knot of at least half a dozen meerkats yelled and scrambled and pulled their way to freedom, with Timon heaving himself up from the bottom, grasping a support stick like a lifeline. He glanced about in confusion, swinging the stick with both paws as he tried to make sense of a world suddenly blanketed with stars.
"Hey, kid!" said a voice behind him. Timon whipped around, the heavy ends of the support flying.
"What!"
THWACK!
The sound of something being broken resonated through the tunnel as Timon looked down on a very dazed meerkat, clutching his nose and moaning as he writhed on the floor. Timon, deciding now would be a good time to leave, took advantage of the stunned crowd and flung himself about, looking for an exit. He succeeded only in driving the end of his support into the chin of another meerkat, who also fell heavily to the dirt. The crowd around him had gathered its senses and began trying to remove the kit of the support before he did more damage. More out of confusion than anything, Timon tried to avoid their grasping paws and turn to answer for his clumsiness at the same time.
"Hey, pup, hand that thing over!" shouted one, and Timon twisted to face him.
"But I-!"
SMACK!
"You're gonna hurt someone!"
"I didn't-!"
POK!
"Will you just give me that thing!"
"I was only gonna-!"
THUD!
After a few moments of such confusion, Timon found he had managed only to crack another meerkat in the back of the knee, another on the side of his head, and lastly giving another unfortunate a good stab in the abdomen. Finally one of the others managed to get a grip on the stick. He yanked on it. With pain, guilt, and bewilderment flooding his mind, Timon only jerked right back.
"I said give it to me!" said the older meerkat.
"I can handle it! Just give me some space!" said Timon, feeling relieved when he felt the stick return under his power… but as he was pulling back, he found it meeting yet another obstacle, one that wasn't quite as sturdy as the others.
Crunch.
The entire mob, Timon included, turned slowly to the pained image of Gamba, shocked as though he had been hit by lightning, watering eyes wide as June bugs, and grasping himself between his legs. He went down hard, face-first into the tunnel floor. Timon gave out a small squeaking sound, and looked up to see Tupac standing awkwardly over his fallen leader. Still clutching his offending weaponry, Timon turned to face the rest of the digging crew, who were all staring at him with expressions that ranged from shock to anger to pity, and mixes between the three. Mostly they were angry. Very angry. Furious. Timon grinned disarmingly.
"Well... wow... would you look at that... hope that wasn't a... two for one deal... bye!"
Dropping the stick, he scrambled away as fast as his little legs could carry him, a long train of thought that ran on the single track of "I'm going to die" running through his brain. The meerkats he had left only shook their heads and went to work assisting the injured and trying to get the still immobile Gamba to say something other than the agonized gibberish he was grunting out at the moment.
In the midst of his flight, Timon ran smack into another meerkat, sending the two rolling down yet another tunnel before coming to rest via the hard landing of Timon on a well placed rock jutting from the wall.
"Owwwurrgh…" said Timon as the other meerkat got up and dusted himself off. Timon looked up and breathed in sharply. It was Nyack, Gamba's third brother. He was in for it now. The other youngster was not half as surprised. After only a moment's hesitation, he offered Timon a paw to help him up. The red-head took it graciously, after a couple seconds of staring, holding the small of his back as he twisted the kink out of it.
"Well... wasn't exactly the best way to greet somebody, but I'm glad someone's happy to see me," said Nyack with a wry smile. Timon chuckled in return, scratching the back of his neck as he stuttered to get an answer out. He knew all too well this was one of Mosi's sons... but it had struck him dumb that he too was not actively engaged in mocking him.
"Ahh… yeah. Sorry. Got a little caught up. I was in a hurry to, um… get home for dinner." Nyack raised an eyebrow.
"Dad just told me the sun's only halfway through its cycle…" Timon cleared his throat suspiciously.
"Well, you know, it's not like it's ever too early to eat…" he answered with a silly grin. Nyack put his paws on his hips as he glanced at Timon's none too fit (for a meerkat) figure.
"I can see that…" he muttered. They stopped there and stared at each other, until at last Timon, knowing he wasn't about to be ambushed decided getting out of here was a good idea.
"Umm… which way is… east?" he asked carefully. Nyack pointed wordlessly over Timon's shoulder. He nodded and began backing away.
"Right… thanks." Before he got very far, however, he suddenly tripped on something hard. It was that rock jutting out of the wall that he had fallen on, which had now been fully displaced since Timon stepped on it. Water was beginning to spurt out of the wall around it. But wait… water in the walls? That only meant one thing. Timon remembered back, a long, long time ago, during his first few digging lessons. It was then he noticed a very important detail.
There was moss on the wall. Nyack's eyes widened as the rock began to scootch forward, away from its mooring.
"Err… isn't this the wall that holds back the spri-"
FWOOSH!
The rock shot forward and narrowly missed smacking Timon in the legs, dropping to the ground. A jet of water splashed out behind it, powering into the wall and quickly beginning to fill up the small space. When the two were ankle-deep in water, they regained their senses… in a sense. They did what any meerkat kit did when they figured out they had done something sure to get them in trouble: they panicked.
"What do we do! This is terrible! I didn't mean to! What do we do?" yelled Timon over the sound of rushing water. Nyack put his paws up and halted the flow of words.
"Wait! Wait! I think I know! We gotta get it plugged back up! That's all! I think!"
Timon grabbed up the rock and tried to shove it back into place against the steady pressure of the underground spring. It was, of course, to no avail. He could hardly lift the rock, let alone press against the water with it. Even with Nyack jumping in to help, it was useless. The water continued to flow in, only jetting around the sides of the rock when they shoved it into the holeand the breach seemed to be getting bigger. Timon jumped up and began to run. Nyack, still trying to gain leverage against the dirt that was quickly becoming mud, shouted after him.
"Where do you think you're going!"
"I'm going to get help!" replied Timon before disappearing around the corner.
It was some time before he ran across a meerkat he was happy to see indeed: Trip. Timon immediately grabbed his arm and began weaving the two through the digging crews. Trip protested the whole way, but didn't exactly resist Timon's efforts, which he could have easily thrown off.
"Timon! Hey! What are you doing? Leggo! Get off! Where are you going?"
"I'll explain when we get there. Keep your voice down or they'll get suspicious."
Trip caught up to Timon's pace and bent down to speak clearly.
"You didn't find a peeking hole into Misa's den, did you?" he whispered conspiratorially. Timon stopped in mid-stride, turning back to stare at Trip with a very odd look, one eyebrow raised ridiculously high.
"Who's Misa?" he asked innocently. Trip realized that this wasn't really what he had thought Timon had been talking about, and stood up slowly, looking anywhere except at the pup in front of him.
"Ah… right. I thought so. Um… lead on."
Along the way, Daren caught up with them, surprised as well to find Timon so far from his schooling area. Without a word, Timon began leading him as well.
When they had reached the scene of the disaster, Nyack was up to his knees in fresh spring water (he was kneeling, and the break was in the middle of a dip, but it was still becoming worrisome). He looked up at the others, sopping wet, basically trying to shove himself up against the wall and plug the hole with his own behind.
"I lost the stopper! Help me out here!" The other three ran forward, Daren waving his arms frantically.
"What the heck did you guys do!" he asked in a panic. Timon pointed at the hole which water was still spurting out of.
"We did that, obviously!"
"We? Who's we?" said Nyack. "You're the one who fell on the stopper!"
"Forget all that!" said Trip, sloshing forward to observe the damage.
"We gotta get this hole plugged up before someone hears all this!" agreed Daren.
"That's the problem, the rock is missing!" said Timon, frustrated that not even Daren could quite figure out the solution either. Trip smacked Timon in the shoulder.
"Forget the rock, plug the hole!"
"I CAN'T PLUG THE HOLE WITHOUT THE ROCK!" said Timon, shaking Trip by the shoulders. Daren put his paws over his eyes.
"All right, all right, calm down! Trip, find the rock, keep an eye out! Nyack, Timon, try to collapse some of the tunnel from the top! We need to find a way to stop this up before it floods!"
"It's already flooding!" said Timon, who was shushed instantly by the others. Trip looked back up the tunnel as the others frantically tried to tear off dirt from the other walls and stuff it into the break, which of course wasn't working in the slightest. In fact, in their efforts, especially Timon's, the wall holding back the spring was beginning to weaken significantly. If he wasn't panicking, Daren might have told him to stop, but then Trip's voice hailed them again.
"Someone's coming! What do we do?"
"We need to tell them, obviously! We can't get this by ourselves!" said Daren, pressing against the jet of water with his bare paws. The water was quickly reaching up to his thighs.
"What's going on down there? Is there a break in the spring? Who's there?" All of the kits stood bolt upright. Only one voice spoke like that… Shombay himself was coming to investigate! All of the youngsters looked to Daren for guidance, who put his paws to his temples.
"Okay, I think I got an idea! It's dark, and we should be strong enough…"
Shombay stalked down the tunnel with a murderous expression on his face. If some blockhead had been stupid enough to remove the stopper from its anchor, the whole tunnel would have to be collapsed and built around again. More delays. He hated delays. Most of all he hated the stupid people that caused delays. But that was why he was mob leader… he knew how to keep people from making such disastrous errors. As he stepped into the tunnel that held the four pups, he beheld a curious sight.
Waist deep in water, and soaked to the bone, all four of the kits were propped up against the wall, Trip sitting with his back up against it, his bottom sticking into it slightly, and the others pressing or leaning on him at awkward angles. They seemed to be straining to hold all of the dirt in place. Shombay knew instantly what had happened, but instead crossed his arms and stood up straighter. Judging from the structural damage already inflicted, those kits were the only ones who were holding it in place. This seemed like it would take some precise timing.
"What… have you boys… done?" he asked quietly. Daren chuckled quietly and almost stepped forward, but Trip started to be pushed forward, and he returned to leaning on the older male.
"Oh, well, you know… not much. Just kinda taking a break."
"We thought we could try an indoor watering hole for once!" piped up Timon with the best answer he could think up at the moment. Water began to squirt out around his arms. Shombay glanced at the rivulets beginning to break through the wall around them. He pointed in the direction he was facing.
"When I tell you to," he said calmly, "get your furry tails away from the wall… and run."
He took a step forward, keeping a careful eye on the quickly failing wall.
"Now!"
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It took almost three hours, but at last the tunnel was secured. The problem had quickly gotten much larger than previously expected. The two chambers the tunnel was connected to had to be filled inTimon was hiding as far back as he could in the small crowd that was watching the reconstruction efforts. The others were standing apart from each other, all of them looking down and very concerned. After some confused blabbering and explaining to the adults, it was decided that, of course, Timon the tunnel klutz was the main source of the disaster (which he sort of was, even if by total accident). Daren and the rest had done their best to stick up for him, but it was to no avail. Finally, Max's voice floated (or rather bulled) its way up into the chamber.
"There! We got it! All right, where is he! TIMON!"
The aforementioned kit stood up slowly, his legs feeling like jelly. Here came the rainy season. He smiled meekly up at the cloudy, dripping wet face of Uncle Max.
"Ahh… hey, Uncle Max," he said, shuffling his paws in the dirt. "What's the word?"
"It's the end of the world as you know it," was his grim answer. Timon, ever the jokester, grinned, still daring to look his uncle in the eye.
"Oh… well… good thing I had an extra large breakfast."
Nobody laughed.
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A/N: Well. Our hero is in quitea pickle this time! Next... the winds of change begin to blow, and an old rivalry is getting that much closer to being settled...
Review. Now. I command thee. does a Force wave