Arc 3: Are You Oakie?

Chapter 15: A Human

Here he was...wherever he was. Oakie pulled a device from his bag, ready to have a mental breakdown of legends.

They were irreversibly lost, he just knew it. He wanted to drag his face across the pavement and then smash his AI assistant Allie with an anvil.

Yes, he was an idiot who often got lost in his own house, but Allie was supposed to cover for him! That was the whole point of Artificial Intelligence, to fill in that empty space every human being had inside of them. Oakie's empty space just so happened to be located in his skull.

Then again, Allie did only help him when she felt like it. Her default mode was more 'snark from circumstance' than 'benevolent, unbiased guide'.

"Allie, what happened?" Oakie cried to his device. "How'd we get this lost?"

"We?" Allie replied, words also scrolling across her screen. "You say that as if I were the bus driver, or had half a brain and a map."

Oakie had at least considered he possessed two-thirds of a brain, but that was beside the point. "I was looking at it!"

"Through your eyelids?"

"All you had to do was alert me when we were going off-track," he mumbled. How could he help being such a heavy sleeper?

"…I forgot where we were going," Allie's tone shifted to one of subtle puzzlement. "You must not have updated the desired location in my GPS."

Oakie considered two things; one, that she was lying, because he knew he'd done that before he'd even gotten on the bus. And two, that something else weird had happened because Allie wouldn't lie over a technical issue.

In fact, now that he thought…he couldn't remember where they'd been going, either.

He had his bag, had his lunch packed…nothing else to indicate anything more than a casual trip to the town over. So how'd they get so lost? Why'd he have to fall asleep on public transport again?

"You were born with common sense. I had to learn it." Allie told him in consult. "However, I am still unable to reach a reasonable conclusion as to what could have happened. Your turn."

"I got nothing," Oakie answered weirdly. The area they were in had a natural feeling to it and didn't look like any town or city he was familiar with. He also didn't see any other pedestrians walking around the neighborhood. But, it was quiet and peaceful-looking.

He always had a more outdoorsy spirit—in reverence only. He loved the idea of being surrounded by nature and absolutely adored animals, but would be the kind of person to die within ten seconds of starting his own campfire.

Oakie squinted in discomfort. He'd made ten different ugly faces within the past five seconds. The colors of his surroundings had a lot of pop to them, so bright and cheery that it hurt!

"When you're finished making faces for your future mating ritual, it'd be best if you went to inquire information from the locals," Allie told him.

And, it wasn't until he started moving that Oakie finally noticed how small everything seemed to be. Well, the trees, bushes, and other natural objects were normal. Everything else tailored by hand definitely was not.

He took up the entire sidewalk. Traffic signs were only a little shorter than his chin. He looked back at the bus stop. He would've only been able to sit in it if he squatted all the way down first. A closer look at the buildings and houses made him feel as though he'd finally gotten that second fabled growth spurt his grandmother always squawked about.

Then again, Grandma always said weird stuff. Dementia's a bastard, Oakie thought. This is weird. I didn't end up in some weird government-testing district for midgets, did I? Even if I did, they have it good…it's nice here.

He passed a brightly colored object on the sidewalk. He'd initially mistaken it for a wet-floor sign until it moved slightly in his peripherals. Oakie stopped and adjusted his glasses, focusing on the object.

"Oh!" he exclaimed. He was looking at a little yellow bunny rabbit with a pink nose and slippers. "Oh, how cute! You think you can tell me how to get on the road back to Albuquerque?"

Cuddles ran off screaming.

Allie gave her opinion. "Your ninety-second mistake before noon was asking a lagomorph for directions back to Albuquerque. Referring to your ninety-first—did you not notice that you spoke to a neon-colored animal that stood upright like a human?!"

"So?"

"Even you should realize that was unusual. I'm beginning to become worried about this situation. What if we were led astray on purpose? What if this is all a conspiracy and we're unknowing experiments? What if this is all a lie and we're living in a purported simulation, destined to be trapped by the laws of this reality?!"

Oakie rolled his eyes. What a drama queen.

He had enough of Allie being unhelpful, and now, needlessly paranoid; he was invested in learning more about this nice peaceful patch on the map and didn't want her ruining his mood, so he went into her settings and muted her for the next one thousand years.

After that he continued on, relaxing as he took in the scenery. Something eventually grabbed his attention: a trailer, the only one in an avenue of houses and duplexes. He figured someone whimsical and intelligent lived there.

Maybe they're better with directions at least, Oakie thought, heading towards the trailer. He didn't watch where he was going and his two left feet tangled over each other. He slipped off the curb, right into a mud puddle that'd been waiting its whole existence for him.

"Oooooughh," he struggled to pull himself out of the muck. He was completely covered, couldn't see, and mud kept dripping into his mouth. He crawled blindly on the lawn towards his soon-to-be savior.

Lumpy leaned forward, sticking his tongue out slightly as he balanced dangerously on the ladder. His macaroni sculpture of a whale was almost done. All he had to do was set the 1,000,000 piece in place…

Bangbangbang!

Someone assaulted his door. Startled, he lost his balance, crashed to the ground, and then had his ladder clobber him on the head.

Rubbing his head, Lumpy glanced up in caution to see if his sculpture was fine. It was, but he'd dropped the last piece of macaroni. He had the instinct to look below his couch at the hellscape of dropped and forgotten items. He dug a hand underneath, only to immediately pull it back with a howl of pain. Something had bitten him. A wild ferret slipped out from under the couch, hissing as it fled into the depths of his trailer.

Something banged at his door again. Lumpy bumped his head underneath the couch and tore a chunk out with his antlers. Grumbling, he got up to see who was pestering him.

Or what was pestering him, really. Lumpy had no clue what he was looking at. At first glance it looked as though someone had taken a huge dump on his porch again, but he began noticing limbs and other features; there was a pair of glasses where this Thing's face may've been.

"Heelmmmp," it groaned, reaching out to him. Lumpy hesitated before taking the Thing by the hand and pulling it in. Something went clunk.

The Thing screamed. Quickly, Lumpy reset its arm back into place. He left the Thing sobbing in his living room and went to his back yard to grab the hose. He ran in, remembered that he'd forgotten to turn on the water, and ran back outside again. While this was happening The Thing began wandering around the living room, bumping into things, eventually tripping over the hose and tumbling out the back door into the yard.

Lumpy accidently sprayed himself in the muzzle before turning the nozzle around. He put his focus-face on and hit The Thing with a high-pressure jet of water, blasting its glasses off. It began flailing on the ground as Lumpy cleaned it off.

"S-pfah! Stop!" it screamed, seconds later. "STOOOOP! I'm clean! I'm clean!"

"Ohhps!" Lumpy tossed the hose aside. He pulled a face, still puzzled about the creature groaning and coughing at his feet. It wore a lot of clothes and didn't look like any animal he was familiar with. It was around his size, so maybe it was a moose that'd lost its fur and antlers?

Lumpy gasped. Poor thing! He hoisted his new friend over his shoulder and carried it inside. If he could take care of an elephant, he could take care of one of his kinfolk that'd lost the genetic lottery.