A Wandering Heart
Part 11: Monstrosity
by Kim McFarland

There was a soft creak as the door opened, letting a shaft of light into the dark storeroom. A hand reached in and flipped on the light. Janken, startled awake, glanced around in confusion. Before he remembered where he was the door slammed shut again and the doorknob clicked.

Then he remembered. He had crawled through a tunnel and found himself in Outer Space. A rather cavelike section despite all the unnaturally flat surfaces, he thought as he looked around. He put his sweater back on, then went to the door, reached up, and tried to turn the knob. It was locked. He put his ear to the door. He heard voices, raised and speaking urgently, on the other side. He could not make out what they were saying, but the general impression he got was that they were afraid of what they had found in the storage room. Afraid of him? How silly could these Silly Creatures be? He tapped on the door.

The voices cut off abruptly. Hearing footsteps approach, Janken waited calmly. The lock clicked again, and the door swung open abruptly. Janken had an impression of a wall of shaggy blue fur, and then something closed around his neck and upper body and lifted him off his feet.

Janken panicked for a moment, then he began screaming and kicking at the thing holding him. When you're alone and something has you cornered, fight back, show it you're not going to be an easy meal! It was huge and hairy and had too many teeth and horns, and Janken didn't have claws or any other weapons, so he did his best to ruin its eardrums and bruise the arm that was holding him.

The beast glanced around the storeroom, then turned and said to someone behind itself, "There's only one of them. It doesn't look dangerous. Just noisy."

Janken stopped struggling and shrieking. He could just make out other faces beyond the big blue thing. He said, "Um. I'm a person, not an animal. Would you put me down?"

The beast looked at him, startled. He waved one hand and tried to smile. "Hi."

"How did you get in?" it wanted to know.

"I came in through the hole in the wall over there. I was exploring the caves, and wound up here. I didn't mean to upset anyone."

Another, smaller creature squeezed past the blue monster and peered at him. This one was covered in short, neat pink fur, and although it had ears and a beak it looked much more like a person. It—she, he was pretty sure—put her fists on her hips and said, "You broke in through the wall?"

"I didn't break anything! The tunnel was already there."

"A tunnel to a cave," she replied, clearly not believing him. She picked up his backpack, opened it, and dumped it out. A map, writing utensils, a small knife, a box that was now empty of food, a dry canteen, a pickaxe. She looked at the pickaxe, then at him.

"Just go look. It's right behind that box there." He pointed. "I promise I won't go anywhere."

The woman looked behind the box. She stared, then knelt to take a better look. After a minute her head rose again and she said to the blue beast, "There's a cave back here. There are offices on the other side of the wall, but I see a cave!"

"What should we do with him?" the blue monster asked.

Janken said, "That's where I came from. Um, could you put me down now? This is really uncomfortable."

The pink woman said, "He's been breaking and entering, but I don't see any damage except that hole in the wall, and it doesn't look like he was trying to steal anything. I think we've found the most inept thief in the world. Put him down, Cheryl. Even he has to be too smart to try something while you're here."

Janken understood the implied threat. His feet touched the floor and the hand released him. He rubbed his throat. He felt as if he'd been picked up by a baby Gorg. He said, "I'm not a thief. I just found this place by mistake."

The pink creature said, "I'm going to call the police. Watch him," and left.

Janken didn't know what a police was, but from her tone of voice he wouldn't like it. When Cheryl glanced away from him he grabbed his pickaxe, darted around the box, and dove into the tunnel. He scrambled on elbows and knees, hearing shouts in the room behind himself, half expecting a huge hand to grab his tail and drag him back. When he was confident he was out of reach he paused long enough to sniff the air. He did not smell yesterday's predator, just dust. Lots of dust, making it smell musty. He continued forward, and soon emerged into the safety of the cave.

As he got to his feet and brushed the dust off himself he thought, that had been a narrow escape. He had heard that not all Silly Creatures were as friendly as Doc, but he had never expected them to attack him just for coming out of the caves! He would mark a warning on this part of the cave. Oh—he had left his map and mapping tools behind. Well, no matter, he'd make another map.

He turned to go back to the colony. After the first twist in the passage he found it blocked by fallen rocks and debris.

He frowned. So this was the source of the dust. He looked around the edges, and could not see through to the other side. Rock and gravel filled the tunnel completely. It was a good thing he'd had the presence of mind to grab his pickaxe. Using the flat end, he dug into the pile. Debris slid away, raising more clouds of dust and making him cough. Underneath the gravel was more rock. Large rocks, so big he could not get the edge of his pickaxe around them for leverage.

With rising desperation he tried digging on the other side. That was no good either. Frantically he scraped away the loose material, revealing a core of big boulders that firmly blocked the small passage. There was no way he would be able to pull them out of the way, there was debris on the other side so he couldn't push, and the stones were too hard for him to break. And there were no other passages leading out of this area. He was trapped.

Trapped between a rockfall and Outer Space, blocked off from the Fraggle colony by a pile of cold, unfeeling boulders. Alone and helpless. He put down his pickaxe, sat on one of the boulders, and did the only thing he could think to do. He lowered his face into his hands and began to cry.

It was too much for him. Why had he left home? He had been safe there! If he'd been trapped, they would have come to rescue him! He should never have left to follow Cantus because of a vague invitation and a foolish crush. He shouldn't have left the Minstrels because he was losing his nerve. He shouldn't have gone exploring alone. Why did these rocks have to fall now? It was like he was cursed!

Janken did not notice when a small, pink-furred Monster emerged from the tunnel, a can of pepper spray held out before herself. She looked all around, amazed. She still could not believe that this cave was here. Clearly it was possible; she was seeing the evidence with her own eyes—but how?

There was only one exit to the room, and she heard soft gasping sounds from it. Cautiously she followed it, ready to spray at the first sign of danger. She found the intruder who had broken into their office sitting on a pile of rubble and crying.

She stared, trying to understand what she was seeing. She had expected either to find that he had fled, or to pepper spray him into submission. The last thing she had anticipated was to see him crying like a child.

He glanced up, then startled and yelped when he saw her. She was holding something like a weapon. It didn't look dangerous, but Silly Creatures had all sorts of magical things. His pickaxe was on the ground, and she could use that thing on him before he reached it. Eyes wide, he begged, "Please don't hurt me!"

His cheeks, covered in rock dust, were streaked by muddy tears. He was staring fearfully at her pepper spray. She lowered it and asked, "What happened here?"

He told her, "I was trying to go home. But this rockslide had blocked the way back. I can't dig through it, and there's no other way out of here!" He wiped below his eyes with his sleeve and sniffled, trying to regain his composure.

"Your home is down here?" she asked.

He nodded, then looked at the blocked tunnel. "Down there."

Part of her mind was telling her that this was ridiculous; magical caves didn't just appear. She pushed that thought aside, because obviously it had happened, and now this...being...was in distress. She said, "My name's Lana Bea. What's yours?"

"Janken," he answered.

Softly, trying to avoid scaring him, she asked, "Janken, why did you come into our office last night?"

"I was exploring. I wanted to see what was beyond that tunnel. I didn't know it led to Outer Space."

"Outer space?"

"The surface world. We call it Outer Space because it's outside of our caves, and it's nothing but space."

"And now you're trapped," she said, looking at the rockslide.

"Nobody could move those rocks by himself," he said, trying to keep his voice from trembling.

She said, "Come back with me. Maybe we can help you."

"Someone can help me break those rocks?"

"I don't know. But you don't want to stay in here, do you?"

Mutely he nodded. She beckoned toward the hole, and nerved herself to go through. Janken considered retrieving his pickaxe, but decided not to; they might mistake it for a weapon, and what he needed right now was their goodwill. He started to kneel to go through the tunnel, but she said, "No, I should go first so I can explain what happened."

"Oh, right."

The pink woman hesitated a little longer—she was afraid, Janken realized with surprise, even though it was a stable tunnel, and not all that long—then got on her hands and knees and started crawling.

The rest of the office staff were waiting anxiously around the hole in the wall when Lana reemerged. She told them, "It's all right. There really is a cave back there." She looked at the hole again. Only the end of Janken's purple nose was visible. He was staring apprehensively at the collection of Silly Creatures. She beckoned to him and said, "Come on out, we won't bite."

Janken did not want to leave the safety of the tunnel, but what choice did he have? Reluctantly he crawled out, wishing he'd kept his pickaxe after all.

Lana put a hand on his shoulder and said, "This is Janken. A rockslide trapped him in a little cave on the other side of that tunnel. I know that's impossible, but I saw it myself. Anyway, he doesn't have anywhere to go now. I think we should in-process him."

The others looked at each other. This was the strangest situation they'd dealt with here, and they'd handled some strange cases in their time. It sounded ridiculous, a tunnel to a cave appearing in the wall of an office building, but they had all looked into the hole, and Lana was not gullible... Cheryl said in a low voice, "The Lord works in mysterious ways."

Nodding, Lana replied, "That's the way I see it."

The blue monster showed Janken a washroom where he could clean the dirt and mud off his face. It had taken him a minute to puzzle out how faucets worked. Then she led him to a desk in a larger cave—no, room, he reminded himself—with windows on one side. Janken stared at them. Streets, cars, buildings, Silly Creatures by the dozen, sky! This was Outer Space for real!

The monster said to Janken, "Did Lana tell you who we are?"

"She told me her name, and I heard her call you Cheryl." Which was, he thought, an intimidating name, perfectly appropriate for someone so huge and spiky, he thought. She was being nice to him now, but he remembered the terror he had felt when she had held him off the ground.

Cheryl folded her hands on the desk. "We call ourselves the TMI. In a nutshell, our purpose is to aid Monsters who have fallen on hard times, and who are willing to do their part to get back on their feet."

Janken said, "Monsters only?"

"Monsters, broadly defined. However, we link with other organizations to get help for other people, and they refer Monsters to us."

"Oh. Um, I'm not a Monster," Janken told her.

She tilted her head. "May I ask what you are?"

He couldn't help being a little amused at the sight of the huge, fanged beast now speaking to him so politely. "I'm a Fraggle."

Now she looked startled. "Fraggles are mythical cave fairies."

Janken patted himself as if to make sure he was all there. "I don't feel mythical."

The door opened. Janken glanced around. A pair of Silly Creatures wearing identical dark blue clothing came in. One said, "Someone reported a B and E?"

Lana intercepted them. "I'm sorry, Officer Faluci. We thought someone had broken in again, but it was a misunderstanding. I apologize for wasting your time."

"Are you sure, Lana?" the other one asked.

Lana smiled. "Yes. We're all right, I promise."

"Okay. Glad it was a false alarm this time."

"So am I."

The two Silly Creatures left. Lana, who had been listening to the interview, told Janken, "'Monster' isn't a specific kind of person. Those who people don't know the species of are often treated as Monsters, and as they suffer the same disadvantages, we aid them too."

He thought about that. "I guess it's relative. There's a creature we call a Hairy Monster. He visits us sometimes. We didn't find out for a long time that he was a dog, and by the time we found out we were used to calling him a Hairy Monster, so we still do. We like him."

"Do you object to being called a monster?"

Janken shrugged. "I guess not. If you've never seen a Fraggle before, I might as well be a monster to you, huh?"

She nodded and smiled. "Most of us here are Monsters."

He looked around. The other people came in all shapes, sizes, and colors. Maybe Monsters are just people who seem scary when you first see them, he thought. He said, "You can help me until I can go back home?"

"I don't know about digging through rockslides in magical caves. I don't know how we'd even get tools in there. But we can help you learn to live out here."

He paused, thoughtfully. He hated the thought of being cut off from everyone and everything he'd ever known. He wanted to go home! But he couldn't. And... a Fraggle could live on the surface world; Great-Uncle Traveling Matt had wandered Outer Space for years. He had found many bizarre, incomprehensible places and creatures, but he had survived. In fact, he had enjoyed himself. If he couldn't go home, he might as well make the best of it up here, he decided. He said, "Thanks. I'd like that very much."

Fraggle Rock and all characters except Janken, Lana, Cheryl, and Officer Faluci are copyright © The Jim Henson Company. All copyrighted properties are used without permission but with much respect and affection. Janken, Lana, Cheryl, and Officer Faluci, and the overall story are copyright © Kim McFarland (negaduck9 at aol dot com). Permission is given by the author to copy it for personal use only.