Chapter 3 Morning chores

The next morning, Knuckles crawled out of his sleeping bag but when he looked over to the bed, he saw that Cloud wasn't there. Knuckles looked around, thinking she had left. He walked over to the other side of the bed and there she was, lying on the floor, curled up in a ball, fast asleep with the blanket over her.

What in the world is she doing there? Knuckles thought. He knelt down beside her, and shook her shoulder gently.

"Uh… Wha?" She said, still half asleep. Knuckles stepped back and smiled.

"I thought you might wanna help me with my morning chores," he said.

"Mmmph. Five more minutes," muttered Cloud, pulling the blanket over her head. Knuckles chuckled to him self.

Doesn't look like she's fully awake yet. He thought. He sat in the chair and eventually began tapping his foot impatiently. Cloud sat up and looked at Knuckles.

"Okay okay, I'm up," She grumbled. Then she looked around. "What time is it?"

"7:15" Said Knuckles.

"WHAT!!!??" Cloud said, now fully away. She lay back down. "Aw, man! I didn't mean to oversleep!" After realizing how hard her head hit the floor she added, "Owwww…" Knuckles couldn't help but laugh. Cloud sat back up, rubbing the back of her head. "You didn't happen to find a bag in the spaceship, did you?"

"No. I didn't even go in," said Knuckles. "Why?"

"I have a few things to pick up in there," said Cloud. "Would you mind taking me?"

"I still have to do my morning chores," said Knuckles.

"I'll help you," said Cloud. "What do you need to do?"

"Well, first off, I have to polish the Master Emerald," started Knuckles. "Then I need to get the weeds out of the garden."

"Okay. But what's the Master Emerald?"

"Look out the window," Cloud got to her feet and looked out the window to see the biggest Emerald that she had ever seen.

"Whoa, where'd you get that?" she asked, staring at the beautiful gem.

"Actually, I don't know how long I've had it. It's been here as long as I remember, and it's my job to guard it," said Knuckles.

"Oh," said Cloud, still not fully understanding it. "So, when do we start?"

"What about right now?" asked Knuckles.

"Okay," They both went outside to the Master Emerald shrine.

When Cloud and Knuckles got to the Master Emerald Cloud looked at the Emerald.

"Why would you need to polish it?" she asked. "It looks fine the way it is."

"That's why it looks like this, I polish it every day," said Knuckles with a smile.

While they were polishing the Emerald Knuckles kept looking at Cloud, then when she noticed, he shook his head and paid attention to what he was doing again. Cloud was a little distracted by this. At last, she looked at him and said, "What?"

"Well, I was wondering…" started Knuckles. He paused for a minute, trying to find the right words. "Did you fall out of bed last night?" Cloud laughed.

"No!" she giggled. "I used to sleep on hard surfaces a lot, so I had gotten so used to it the bed wasn't that comfortable for me, so I slept on the floor. Why?"

"Well, most people don't sleep on the floor," stated Knuckles. They both laughed.

Cloud looked at Knuckles occasionally and noticed that he was really putting effort into the polishing the Emerald. There was even sweat coming off his forehead. Just so she wouldn't look lazy Cloud began polishing as hard as she could, though it was making her hands quite sore. After a few minutes Knuckles looked over at her.

"Uh, you may wanna take it easy, Cloud," he said. "At least until you do it a few more times, otherwise your hands will go raw, even with the rag if you keep going like that on a first time," Cloud looked down at her hands, which were now really sore, and saw they were bright red. Knuckles stepped back, wiped his forehead and said, "Aright, I think that's good enough. You did a nice job Cloud," Cloud stepped back next to Knuckles.

It doesn't look any different than when we started, she thought. Still, she was proud of herself for getting a complement on something she did for the first time, even if it didn't seem to do anything.

"C'mon, let's get the garden done real quick," Knuckles said as he walked away from the shrine. Rubbing her hands, Cloud followed.

When they got to the garden, Cloud saw that it was much bigger than she expected.

It's as big as a block! She thought. Apparently, her expression told what she was thinking, because Knuckles gave her a pat on the back and said,

"Don't worry, it actually doesn't take that long to get it done,"

"Okay then, what do we need to do?" asked Cloud.

"We need to get all the weeds out," He said. "Can you tell the difference between a vegetable and a weed?" Cloud cocked her head to the side with a confused look on her face. "I'll take that as a no," Knuckles muttered.

"Sorry, I'm not that familiar with plants," said Cloud, straitening her head back up.

"It's okay. See how the plants are in neat rows?" Knuckles asked, and pointed down the garden. Cloud looked and saw they were indeed in rows.

"Yeah, but there are some plants between them," she said, "Are they weeds?" Knuckles nodded.

"You learn fast," he said, surprised at how quickly she figured this out. "They usually look like this," He pulled out a nearby weed for Cloud to see.

"Okay, I can do that," She said.

"I'll start here you start on the other side," Said Knuckles. "We should meet in the middle," Cloud ran over to the other side of the garden.

Cloud started to pull the weeds. It was much easier than she expected. At the end of the first row, she pulled out what she thought was a weed, but there was a radish at the end.

"Ah, shoot!" she said. Knuckles looked over.

"Hey, that's not a weed!" he called.

"Sorry!" she called back. She buried the radish back where it was and continued.

Yuck, I hate radishes! She thought.

When Cloud and Knuckles finally met, it wasn't exactly the middle. He had done at least twice as much as she had.

"Okay, we're done," said Knuckles. He looked at Cloud and chuckled. Cloud looked at herself and saw that she was dirty from head to toe. Then she looked at Knuckles. He didn't have any dirt on him, not even on his hands.

"Hey, how come you're not dirty?" she asked in surprise.

"How'd you get that dirty?" asked Knuckles.

"I have no clue," said Cloud.

"How about you get cleaned up and then we'll go to the spaceship?" suggested Knuckles.

"Okay, but I don't have any clothes to change into," said Cloud.

"Well, you could barrow some of my clothes," said Knuckles.

Oh, this could get interesting, Cloud thought as she looked at what Knuckles had on.

They walked up back up to the house and Knuckles tossed Cloud a light tan button-up shirt and stonewash jeans. She knew the jeans were going to be a little big, but she decided not to say anything Cloud gave him a funny look.

"Uh, my friend Amy made me pick that," He said.

"Who?" asked Cloud.

"Oh, right. You haven't met my friends yet," Knuckles said, rubbing the back of his head. "Would you like to meet them after we finish up in the spaceship?"

"Uh…" Cloud said nervously.

"C'mon, they're harmless enough," Knuckles said with a grin.

"Oh, okay," said Cloud with a nod.

While Cloud went to take a shower while Knuckles took her dirty clothes and put them in the washer. About a half an hour later, Cloud came out with her barrowed clothes on.

They look better on her than they do on me, Knuckles thought as he looked at her for a moment. Cloud looked at him.

"What?" she said. Knuckles snapped out of his thoughts.

"Uh, nothing. Let's go," he said.