A Wandering Heart
Part 12: Phone Home
by Kim McFarland

It was early evening, and the staff of the TMI office were preparing to close up the office. For most, that involved getting as much of their case work as they could to a resting point. It was never possible to clear the boards before going home; social work was never that simple. They simply brought things to a point at which they could pick up the following morning.

The workload had been lightened a bit these last few months by the new addition to their staff. They sometimes hired the Monsters they were helping to work around the office until they got better jobs. This time they had put Janken on staff to give him a little income and keep him out of trouble. Not that he was inclined to mischief but, as they had quickly found out, he had no idea how to live outside of a cave.

They had had to teach him everything from the basics up: where it was safe to walk and when, why you had to exchange money for the things you need, how to tell time, and so on. He was smart, but some concepts were so alien to him—private property, money, any kind of hierarchy—that he often made mistakes. However, when he finally understood things, he did not forget them. It was a stroke of luck that he had come to the surface here, in this office; otherwise he would likely have been injured on the road or arrested for shoplifting on his first day.

His current task was learning how telephones and computers worked. He could not begin to fathom the how of it; machinery and electronics, to him, were as magical as portals to Outer Space. You had no idea how they worked, but they did, and you just had to learn how to use them. He was starting to get the hang of writing on a computer, but he didn't like it much. He understood why it was good; it let you write a whole lot and kept it in one place and you could change things later and it would even check your spelling. However, printed text looked so rigid and impersonal, and in the time it took him to hunt-and-peck a sentence out on the letter buttons he could have written a whole page by hand.

Telephones, on the other hand, were a miracle. They let people who were far away talk as if they were right next to each other! After learning phone etiquette they had him take care of incoming calls, which he did cheerfully. If there were phones in Fraggle Rock, he thought, he could have told his family where he was. They wouldn't yet be worrying about him because he was trapped out here; it would be some time before the Minstrels returned to Fraggle Rock without him. He'd like to tell them about his adventures himself, before they had a chance to get upset. Maybe they could send someone to clear the rockslide away from the other side. But... he didn't feel like he needed rescuing just yet.

Outer Space was fascinating. Great-Uncle Traveling Matt's postcards had made it seem like a weird, baffling place. Now Janken was beginning to understand how things worked out here. Matt had misinterpreted so much because he had thought of everything in terms of Fraggle Rock. Silly Creatures built things, but they were not edible like Doozer constructions, nor were the creatures that built them Doozers. They built things to live and work in because they did not have caves. And many of the 'creatures' that Matt had described in his postcards were actually machines of incredible size and complexity.

Janken could not laugh at Matt's mistakes. Rather, he admired him all the more for exploring this world, voluntarily braving its strangeness and cheerfully sending messages back home. He had blazed a new trail. Janken had accidentally followed that trail, and now he wanted to take it further by understanding the world of the Silly Creatures. He could be the first Fraggle to do this. It would be an impressive thing to talk about back home, but, he thought, what was more important was that someone should do it. They needed to understand Outer Space, because they were all part of the same world. Janken remembered the story of how Fraggle Rock had once been poisoned when industrial waste had been pumped into the caves. If Boober had not managed to communicate to Doc that there were people living there, everyone would have died. But if there were Fraggles who knew how to talk to the Silly Creatures, they would not be helpless any longer. Gobo always said that the better you understood the caves around you, the safer you were because you knew how to handle the dangers. Well, the better Fraggles understood the world, the safer they would be in it.

Janken felt a little silly when he found himself thinking like this. He wasn't going to perform great deeds out here, certainly not on the same par as Cantus and the Minstrels bringing the many people who lived in the Rock together with music, or even Wembley making friends with Junior and showing him that Fraggles were just as much people as Gorgs were. They were the true pioneers. Janken was here by accident, and he was just muddling through because he had no other choice. But since he was already here, he'd learn as much as he could, then bring that knowledge back to the Rock.

Lana said, "Janken."

He startled. He had been so spaced out, he hadn't noticed when she had approached. He said, "Yes?"

"Would you come with me?"

"Sure."

He followed her into the interview room in the back. He'd sat in here often enough during their weekly progress meetings that he was no longer intimidated by the stark, pale, cubical walls. However, she usually spoke to him on Fridays, and this was a Wednesday.

As usual, she sat at the desk, and he took the chair on the other side. She put a folder on the table in front of herself and said, "How are you getting along?"

"Fine. I've out of trouble, at least," he said.

"You're doing very well. Frankly, we're all impressed with how quickly you've picked up on just about everything we've shown you."

"Thanks."

"Tell me, if the cave-in was cleared away and you could go home right now, would you?"

His eyes widened. "Is it?"

"No. But if it was, what would you do?"

Disappointed, he leaned back in the chair and dropped his gaze to the floor. She waited while he thought about it. When he looked up again he said, "I'd want to move back into the colony so I could swim and live with other Fraggles, of course. But I'd want to be up here too. Spend the nights in the colony and work up here so I could keep learning."

It was not quite the answer she anticipated, but it was certainly an honest one. She could not expect him to renounce his heritage. She said, "Sorry if I got your hopes up for a moment. What I'm leading up to is, I see an opportunity for you, if you're willing to commit to staying here for a long time, whether that passage remains closed or not."

"What is it?" he asked.

"We have helped many people enroll in the local university to complete their educations. With a bit more work, I think that you would be a good candidate for that."

"Oh," Janken said, surprised. Lana watched as he thought about that for a minute, then asked, "Um, what kind of things could I learn there?"

"They teach vocational and performing arts." Janken looked at her blankly. "I have some information that you can read. Going there would require several years' commitment. We have worked with them many times before; they're Monster-friendly, and their counselors are very good with the special cases we bring them."

She handed him a booklet across the desk. He took it and flipped a few pages. Lots of tiny print. Writing in Outer Space was always so little, it hurt his eyes to read it without a bright light. There was so much of it, this would take hours. He asked her, "Would this help me? Would I be able to do it?"

"Yes, it would, and I think you could. You're smart enough, and you have the drive."

"Can I read this and think about it?"

"Yes. Tell me what you want to do by Monday so, if you decide to go, we can begin to bring you up to speed, beginning with earning a GED."

"I will. Thank you." He looked at it, wishing he knew more about this. He had never heard of a university before; how was he to decide if he should spend years in one? He wished there was someone else he could talk to about this. He started to get off the chair, then, having a sudden thought, asked, "Would you help me write a postcard?"

Surprised, she repeated, "A postcard?"

"Yes. I want to send it to someone I know. He's a friend of my family. I'd like to ask him about this."

She thought he didn't know anybody outside the caves. "You just need the card, his address, and the postage. If the card is pre-posted, then you just need his address."

"That's the problem. I don't have his address. All I know is that he lives in 'the desert'."

"That's not very specific."

"Is 'the desert' big?"

Patiently she told him, "There are many deserts all over the world, and some are very large. Do you know which desert?"

He shook his head. "No. It's very hot there in the summer during the day, and it gets very cold at night."

"That's what deserts do. What's his name?"

"Doc. Um, some letters to him call him Jerome Crystal."

She wrote that down. "What else do you know about him?"

"He's an inventor, and he has a dog named Sprocket, and his best friend, Ned Shimmelfinney, lives downstairs. And he thinks we're magic, but I think he's magic." He smiled. He knew that sounded silly, but it was true.

"I don't know if I can find out anything without knowing which state he lives in, but I'll see," she told him.

"Thanks," he said sincerely.

They left the office. Janken went back to the reception desk so he could cover the phones and read the booklet.

Lana went to a workroom in the back which was used for confidential work. Janken thought he could talk it over with someone by postcard and have an answer by Monday? He must believe that mail travels instantaneously, she realized. She sat at a computer, opened up a web browser, and after a few clicks typed in a name.

Several minutes later she picked up the telephone.

"Janken."

The Fraggle looked up. Lana was beckoning to him from the hallway. "Coming," he said.

He followed her into a conference room. She held out a telephone to him. He took it and said, "Hello?"

"Janken Fraggle?"

"Doc! Is that you?" Janken exclaimed excitedly.

"Of course it's me! Where are you, Janken? Gobo told me that you're traveling through the caves with a band of minstrels." The line clicked, and Sprocket barked into the other extension.

"A rockslide trapped me in a cave with only a Fraggle hole as an exit-"

"Oh! Were you hurt?"

"No, I'm fine! I'm in Outer Space now. I found some Human friends and they're helping me. Doc, have you ever heard of the university?"

"Of course! I remember those years well, when I was a young man studying marine biology. It was a fine time. Why do you ask?"

"They're talking to me about helping me go to a university to learn about things. Should I go?"

"You want to enroll in a university?" Doc sounded startled. "Well, they are institutions of higher education. If you want to learn about the world, that's where you'd go."

Earnestly Janken said, "I can't go back home. And... I'm interested in living out here, not just peeking out of a hole every so often. My friends have been showing me all sorts of things. I want to learn more. Maybe it's time a Fraggle did. Do you think it's a good idea, Doc?"

"Well, now... I don't really know. But you should decide for yourself. If you really want to, then I say do it!" Sprocket arfed emphatic agreement.

"Thanks, Doc. I haven't decided yet. I just wanted to ask you about it. I was going to write you a postcard. Uh, could I send you postcards for my family?"

"Sure! It'd be like old times. Do you need my address?"

"Yes. What is it?"

Janken wrote down an address in California. He said, "Thanks, Doc. Could you tell my family where I am, and that I'm all right?"

"Of course, Janken. These people who've been helping you—is the lady who called me one of them?"

"Yeah. She's been really nice to me."

"Could I speak to her again?"

"Sure. Bye, Doc, Sprocket." He gave the phone back to Lana, saying, "Thanks!" Then he left with the booklet.

Lana said, "Mr. Crystal?"

"Please, call me Doc. Tell me—what do you know about Fraggles?"

Janken read through the booklet. Parts were difficult to figure out because he had no frame of reference, but what he could understand was that it offered two- and four-year training programs for various jobs. Plumbing, building, art, writing, acting, and other things he did not understand very well. There was a map on the back of the booklet, and it showed the university's location. It wasn't far from here. The booklet even explained how to get there by bus.

When Lana came back to the front she said, "You've got a good friend in 'Doc' Crystal. He wanted to make sure we were treating you well."

"Yeah, Doc's great. He's the first Human friend we ever made. He didn't believe in us for years, but when we finally met... well, we've been friends since."

"Does his dog usually bark on the phone?"

Janken grinned. "Yeah."

Lana shook her head, amused. "No wonder you call us Silly Creatures."

"Um, it says here that the bus goes to the university. I'd like to visit it this weekend. What do you think?"

Janken had a monthly bus pass, and it was his favorite toy. On weekends he used it to explore the city, and somehow he never got lost. "Go ahead."

"I will. Thanks. Thanks for everything!" he said with a wide smile.

"You're welcome," she replied with equal warmth, and patted his shoulder.

He opened the booklet again. His mind was not on the print, however. He was thinking about what he would write his family. He would buy a postcard after work, and write Doc's address in the same spot where Great-Uncle Matt used to do that, and he would tell them about what he was doing now. He'd tell them not to worry, that he was happy—and safe, he added, thinking of Boober.

He mulled it over, then realized that he was composing a postcard telling them that he would be going to the university. He really did want to go. It would take years to finish, but he could do it, and then he'd know what Fraggles needed to know, and could bring it back to the Rock. For the first time in his life, he thought, he had found something that really felt right, like it was what he should be doing.

He wished he could talk to Cantus about it. Heh, if he did, Cantus would only turn the question back on him. Can you? You tell me.

Yes, I can, Janken thought, smiling to himself.

Fraggle Rock and all characters except Janken and Lana are copyright © The Jim Henson Company. All copyrighted properties are used without permission but with much respect and affection. Janken, Lana, 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.