The normally deserted entryway to the Gorg's garden was not quite so empty today.
A lone blueish-green fraggle was at the that moment pacing back and forth before the hole, a trench formed in the earth, falling just short of his knees.
"If I just…" He said, lifting his head up high as he paced one way. "But if I don't.." He snapped in rebuttal, retracing his steps the other direction.
Another voice, much louder and more bouncy than his own, interrupted his nearly silent battle with himself.
"Ewewewe, ewewew..ACK!" The voices' owner concluded, falling muzzle first as she tripped over Boober's pacing rut.
Red groaned as she sat up. "Boober, I think my brain needs a bath, got any soap?"
"Anti-bacterial or heavy-duty?" Boober remarked, and then a moment later threw up his arms.
"Argh, what am I saying? This is no time for jokes! Mokey is missing!.."
He fell to his knees with a disheartening thump.
"I woke up this morning and she wasn't there!"
Red let out a bottled up breath.
"Oh, so she was sleeping with you last night, that is a relief, I thought she had…"
Boober's normally lighter green face slowly began to get flushed patches that resembled the dark green of his body fur.
"W... she wasn't sleeping with me, that is, I was sort of sleeping beside..Anyway, it's all quite platonic."
Red giggled as she got up, towering many inches over Boober in his hole.
"Aw, Boober, I'm a big girl, it's none of my business who Mokey plays moonlight snuggle with..I'm just glad…"
"We weren't moonlight snuggling!" Boober yelled, his face now completely dark green with a mixture of embarrassment and rage.
"Don't you know Mokey went swimming last night? She might have triple pneumonia by now…"
"Oo, so you two went swimming, how roman…" Red's teasing was stopped abruptly by a hand over her lips as Boober used the leverage of her added height to pull himself up on level ground again.
"I think she went to see the Trash Heap." He whispered with a serious glare.
"Oah Ash rep?" Red exclaimed in muffled horror as Boober finally took his hand away from her mouth.
"Oh no, did you tell her about?.."
"No…" Boober replied sadly. "You know Red, I think I liked it better when the grogs use to thump us…What are you doing?"
Red took a deep breath as she settled down on her mark like a champion runner.
"I have to go see the Trash Heap to. Could you cover for me, Boober? Please?" Red looked back, batting her eyes in a second silent plea.
"I'm not sure…Is this all only to rescue Mokey and cure her gripping depression?"
"Um…yes?"
Boober sighed, lifting up the copper ladle he now always wore on a length of string around his waist like a sword.
"Why do I get the feeling that is the most honest sounding answer I could plan on getting from you?.."
He took in his own deep breath, raising the ladle high like a knight's jousting lance.
"Aw well, you only live and die horribly once…"
With a scream of "For Mokey!" he dashed boldly into the garden, the sicking ring of a glass jar meeting earth resounding though the rock as Red nimbly ran into the sunlight in his wake, hugging the side of the pathway with a well practiced light hopping gallop.
The giant glass jar rocketed into the air and flipped over on its own accord by means of a pulley and wire, sending Boober crashing onto what was now its' 'floor' as a strong piece of metal screen slid over the top to form a lid.
Red scampered away scott free around the side pathway to one side of the well, as the sound of huge footsteps drew closer.
"Well, well, well. If this isn't a pleasant surprise. If it isn't the well spoken Ornithorhynchus Fragglius specimen 397." A high mild mannered voice remarked.
The figure that loomed near had light purple skin and a mop of tan hair the texture of yard worn back in a single ponytail. A pair of glasses framed her wide nose, making her magnified blue eyes appear to be twice their normal size as she reached to get a pencil and notebook from behind her ear.
All and all, she was a very typical looking gorg, the white sundress she was wearing adorned here and there with far too many pearls to mark her as anything short of a future overseer of The Universe.
"Let's see…my my my, your last check up was over six months ago 397, that just won't be satisfactory. I will have to start a compete a compete analyze again from the top."
Boober groaned from where he was now sitting cross legged on the jar floor.
"Can't we just not do it and say that we did?" He shouted up hopefully.
"No no no, I won't have my research paper based on anything but the most accurate first hand documentation."
The gorg slid away the wire topping, reaching in to grab a very unhappy looking Boober, tucking him security against her body with an arm as she used both hands to write.
"Let me see now, male of early maturity…My my my, do you creatures have limited life-spans! Honestly, what respectable creature lives to be less than three hundred years old?... Of the long haired sub-genus of fragglius, originating in the cooler climate of the northern Fraggle Rock…"
"This is so demeaning…" Boober remarked as he was placed in a small cage upon a table filled with charts and beakers and a gigantic microscope.
"Not at all! Why, this is civilized!" The gorg said, waving her pencil at him. "This is science!"
"Ow!" Boober yelped as the grog plucked a sample of his body fur with tweezers the size of a small tree.
"Honestly, would you rather I was chasing after you with a club like some dim witted barbarian?"
"Honesty, yes!" The fraggle shouted back, but his answer was drown out by another voice twenty times louder.
"Missy! Missy, I can't find my shoe!" Came the childlike whimper.
Missy Gorg rolled her eyes with a sigh and yelled back in a well practiced harsher tone that bought to mind an Outer Space big-rig truck driver.
"Did you check under your bed?"
"Aw, there it is! Golly Missy, you're so smart. No wonder we're get'n married when our mommies and daddies get back from that grog gathering."
The furry form of Jr. Gorg, taller than his female companion by at least a foot, stood in the doorway of the castle dreamily, wearing a princely shirt of blue and green velvet with puffed sleeves and pair of shiny black shoes.
"How do I look?" He asked in playful tone.
"Like a well dressed monkey." She replied.
"Why, thank you! You look nice to..Could you help me put on my sash?"
The smaller gorg took off her glasses, rubbing the bridge of her nose in exhaustion before going up to start tying the many decorations onto Jr's outfit.
"Let me make one thing perfectly clear..." She said between her cliched jaw.
"The only reason I'm marring you is because you're the only male within a lifetimes' travel of my own family in the universe..." She added, tying the knot a bit too tight.
"If I wasn't a true lady of breeding I would be telling you to take your wedding and…"
"Aw, Missy." Jr cut her off turning to kiss her on the nose. "I love you to!"
The young gorg turned back to her examination of Boober, her right eye twitching ever so slightly.
"Now little fragglius, it's time to take your temperature…"
"Nooo! Anything but that!" Boober wailed. "Red, Mokey, heeeelp!"