Well. This ride home was… a bit awkward. Max and Fang sat on one side of the cabin, Dylan, Jeb, Dr. Martinez, and Ella on the other. The pilots? Up front.
The rest of us were on Max's side of the cabin. I was dozing, as nothing interesting was happening. Max and the rest were talking in low voices.
Darn, these people were uninteresting. Angel, who was sitting beside me, whispered, "I agree."
I shot her a half-hearted glare. "I thought I told you not to read my mind."
She shrugged. "I was bored. And you weren't guarding your mind."
I sighed in response to this. There was nothing to do! I lashed my tail in frustration.
Angel tugged my arm slightly. "You could tell another story."
Glancing at her, I shrugged. "You actually liked the last one?"
"Everyone did. It was just a lot to take it," she replied, blue eyes wide.
I sighed again. I turned my attention towards the talking people. Max was saying, "What will we do when we return?"
"The CSM has given you a house in Colorado. You can live there," Jeb replied.
This caught everyone's attention. "A house?" asked Nudge, disbelieving what she was hearing. "An entire house? For us?"
"No, Nudge, just half a house," Iggy responded sarcastically.
"It's an entire house for you." Dr. Martinez joined the conversation.
We were all thunderstruck. Dylan the lovesick idiot then piped up, "But I can't join you."
"What a shame…" Max muttered.
Gazzy asked, "How old are you anyway, Dylan?"
"Eight months old."
"WHHAAAAAAAAAAAAATTTTTT?!?!?!!!" we all exclaimed simultaneously.
How the-?! What the-!? He looked fifteen. Not 8 months.
"His growth was sped up," Jed explained.
"No duh."
We were all silent for a moment, then Angel tugged my arm again. "You said you would tell me a story," she insisted. I had forgotten about that.
"Oh yeah, that." Nudge and Gazzy looked up at me, interested.
"You're going to tell another story?"
"What's it going to be about?"
Now everyone was listening. Ella asked me to not do another creation story like the one I did last time. I assured her I wouldn't.
"Okay," I started, taking a deep breath, "Any suggestions for what the story will be?"
"We don't know your legends," Fang pointed out dryly. I ignored that.
"Do you have one about baby animals?" asked Nudge.
I thought for a moment, then smiled. I had the perfect one. "How about how the baby deer got its spots?"
Well, Nudge and Angel squealed yes. I turned, took a drink of water from the glass of it they had provided, and faced my expectant audience.
"How about I shape-shift for this?" I asked first.
Angel stared at me. "Won't you get tired?"
I shrugged. I seem to be doing a lot of that lately. "Yeah, but it'll be interesting. Give me some jelly beans after I do."
We had gotten sports jelly beans as well as other food. The jelly beans were energy in bean form. I like 'em.
Nudge leaped towards them, nearing landing on Iggy in the process, and tore open a packet. Then stared at me with Bambi eyes, waiting for me to start.
I took another deep breath, got the glow, and transformed into a deer. I was quite lovely, with light reddish brown fur that was smooth and silky.
Then I began.
In the time before the Pinkskins came, (Dylan asked, "What's a Pinkskin?" Max answered him with, "Shut up, it's a human.") Anima, which are what animals were called before Pinkskins, flourished. Squirrels ruled the trees, wolves the hunt, and birds the sky.
They all lived in harmony. Wolves, bears, mountain lions, and wolverines did eat the birds, squirrels, and deer, but they never took more than they needed. This allowed them to live in peace.
However, baby deer were small and helpless. They still are now, but then they had no spots.
Predators would always take what they could get, what was easiest to obtain. It was their way. Therefore, fawns, being small and helpless, served as easy meals.
They tried to hide in the shade often, which worked sometimes, other times, sunlight would dapple them and expose them.
Freespirit (Dylan, idiot, asked, "Who's that? Max said, "Their god, basically, now shut up and listen!") didn't like this. However, he knew that he could change the way of the hunter, as they were doing all the could to survive themselves. So, he helped the deer.
He started with a baby deer known as Taiko. He asked Taiko if he wished to be different, to be part of an experiment if you will. Taiko agreed.
Freespirit then sent Taiko to a forest where sunlight dappled the floor. Sure enough, Taiko wasn't killed. Delighted, Freespirit called together all of the deer. He told them that their young would have spots from then on.
So more deer survived, and all the animals enjoyed a happy life until the time of the Pinkskins.
I finished, transformed back, and downed the rest of my water. Then I proceeded to eat all of the jelly beans in the pack in one gulp. I nearly choked myself. Very smooth, Spark, very smooth.
While I was gagging, Max said, "Nice job. Just as good as last time."
I recovered and straightened up. Angel leaned over to me and hissed, "I told you they like it." I whacked her lightly.
Dylan asked, "She did a story before?" Well, now we know why he acts so dumb. You can accelerate the growth of the body, but there is absolutely nothing you can do to make the mind mature faster. The person just gets confused. Thank Freespirit I grew at a normal human rate.
Max growled, Iggy looked up and counted to ten, I simply did a facepalm.
We ignored him after that.
He complained for a while before shutting up. He learned! Good Dylan!
The helicopter flew throughout the night. I fell asleep, and when I woke up, it was still dark out. I thought I was the only one awake, though as I watched, Jeb stirred and awoke.
"What's the house in Colorado like?" I asked quietly.
He smiled at me. I had heard that he had acted as the flock's father before he disappeared a few years ago. Most of them apparently didn't trust him anymore. I think I could.
"It's big, big enough for all of you," he began, "It's near the mountains, and there's plenty of wildlife nearby. There's strong wind, and it's near a town. You'll love it there."
It did sound ideal. I had never lived in a house before. Dr. Martinez's was only for a bit, and I lived in a cage before that. The rest of the time, I was in the wild.
I grinned back at him. He then looked like he had just remembered something. After rummaging in the briefcase beside him, he came up with a book. "Brigid told me you could transform into dinosaurs," he said, holding the book out to me, "and I thought you might want to read this."
Well, dinosaurs were kinda cool, but they were no different than animals today.
But anyway, I now had my own book. It was Jurassic Park. Okay, so Brigid had told him about us watching it for me to transform. Now I needed to read the book, apparently. I didn't even know there was a book…
"Thanks," I murmured back to him. Jeb smiled at me. Why did he choose this? Because I could simply turn into extinct creatures. But at least I wouldn't be bored anymore. I peeked inside and saw that the font was small, and the book long. Yep, not for a while.
Oh well. This was one of the few times when I was given something of my own. The house, the book… I was grateful to the flock and all the good fortune they had brought me.
Well, that's chapter nineteen! We're getting very close to chapter 20. Yay! And Spark has a book. She doesn't have many possessions, so that is very valuable.
The legends are becoming kinda regular… Anyone want them to continue during a lull in the plotline?