Chapter 2: The New Normal part 1

Dear Ivy,

I'm trapped. TRAPPED! O what cruel fate to befall this precious little frog boy!

…nah, just kidding, it's actually not that bad here. Pretty comfy, really. I'm just not allowed to leave.

But let me start at the beginning. When I left off in my last letter, we had just gone through the portal We had no idea what awaited us on the other side.

The first thing I noticed was how loud it was.

We were on what could only be some kind of road, crawling with metal beasts, braying their shrill, piercing cries. Around us were sights I'd never imagined seeing. A huge metal bird soaring through the sky. Strange, colorful, gyrating worm monsters. And humans, humans everywhere.

I wanted to look around more, but Anne said it was dangerous to stay on the Freeway, whatever that was, and hurried off the side of the road.

Once we were away from the metal monsters, I finally had a chance to look around. We were in this huge city, so big it makes Newtopia look like Wartwood. Towers of stone and glass as far as the eye could see… so tall they seemed to… what's a good metaphor… scratch the air? Something like that.

Anne seemed really excited because she finally had bars (I always thought she was to young to drink, but I guess I could understand the need after all she'd been through). But more important, she said her phone was now connected to some sort of spell called FiveJee that unlocked its special powers, including one that could draw a map to her home.

So now the question is, what were we going to do next? We can't exactly stay here forever knowing what's going back home, but we needed some kind of short-term plan, especially since we don't really know anything about this place. At least we had step one… get to Anne's house. Anne was pretty sure she could convince her parents to help, but she wanted to ease them into it.

So we followed her home, passing all sorts of incredible stuff. There were these tall metal trees, short metal mushrooms, and even some regular old trees, though they don't look anything like the ones back home. We saw some regular animals too. You wouldn't believe ow small and harmless-looking the birds here are. And the bugs? They're tiny. No wonder humans don't eat them. A dozen would barely even be a snack.

After a long walk, we made it back to Anne's house. I don't know exactly what I was expecting, but it looks so normal from the outside. A little more geometric than houses back home (I've noticed there are a lot more straight lines here), but when you take into account that humans are proportionately bigger than frogs, it looked about the size you'd expect.

Anyway, Anne wanted to ease her parents into the whole revelation that she brought talking frogs home (since I guess they don't really exist here), so she hid us in a garbage can (one think that I definitely recognize from back home; I guess garbage is universal) and told us not to come out until she made a bird noise. Which didn't take too long, but it turns out it wasn't Anne, just a regular bird, because they definitely weren't ready for us. Seeing as Anne's dad fainted.

Once he woke up, Anne gave a brief recap of her time with us, although she left out a lot of stuff… pretty much anything having to do with Andrias. I guess she wanted to ease them into the whole ticking off a tyrant who wants to conquer their world situation too. I honestly thought she should tell them everything, but I figured I should probably defer to Anne for now. After some guilting (I swear, Anne guilts like she's a native-born Plantar!) her mom and dad agreed to let us stay for the time being. Unfortunately, that means that we're confined to the house until further notice. I can't even look out the window… and the whole world is out the window!

At least we've had some time to get to know Anne's family. Anne's mom is a very nice lady who basically looks like a bigger version of Anne. She can sometimes be pretty intense, especially if you've done something wrong, like, oh, hypothetically, flooded the bathroom. Anne's dad is a bit more laid back and is very eager to share the culture of his native world. I've been eagerly immersing myself in human literature, such as the saga of Monday Cat, a philosopher with much wisdom to impart.

Oh, that reminds me: Anne's family also includes a cat which is kinda like a kill-a-piller with less legs, though at least she doesn't have much interest in eating us. She and Polly have really bonded over their love of creating chaos. Her favorite activities are knocking stuff over, trying to get into boxes, and napping.

What else have I learned about life in the human real? Well, they've got a whole lot of magic boxes that do all sorts of things. They've got one that makes things cold, one that makes things hot, one that cleans clothes, one that dries clothes, and one that's supposed to clean dishes that I kinda broke when I went inside it. There's even one Anne showed me that can create whole worlds… strange worlds where a plumber, a princess, a dragon and a turtle can race at blinding speeds. Polly's been trying to learn how it all works. She thinks we might be able to use it to bring Frobo back to life. We brought his head with us, but she hasn't managed to get him to wake up yet.

So, that's what's been going on. We've been cooped up in the Boonchuys' house for days now, with no progress on finding a way back. It's a comfy cage, but it's still a cage, and I'm really itching to get out. Also itching because the air on Anne's world is dryer than back home. That's kinda what led to me flooding the bathroom and trying to get inside the dishwasher.

I can tell being cooped up has been taking its toll on Anne too, along with, well, everything else. She's been acting really positive, but I can see the smile fade when she thinks no one is looking. I don't want to be a burden, though. If she needs to talk to me, she knows she can anytime.

Anyway, not much more to talk about. Hopefully soon we'll be actually able to to leave and explore, but who knows when that will be.

Captively Yours

Sprig

A.N.: Breaking "The New Normal" into two parts since the market trip is thematically really its own chapter. Remember, comments are welcome! Writers need comments to LIVE!

Jose: Glad to have you aboard! I wanted to change things up for season 3, since it's now Spring who finds himself in a strange new world, I figured his POV would be more interesting (especially since we got Anne's already in Marcy's Journal).

Next: Part 2!