Part 2

            “Well, Mr. Filishimer,” I said, grasping the twenty-year-old kougara’s hand, “Pleased to meet you.  I’m Mayella Chester.  May for short.”

            He nodded quietly, “You look rather familiar.  But I don’t believe that I have ever met someone named Mayella before.  Nor someone with the last name Chester.  Though there was… ah never mind.  I suspect you shall be going on the expedition, am I correct?”

            “I’d have to be dead not to,” I said, grinning hugely for a second.  For some reason or another, he gave me a weird look, “You do look so familiar.  But it’s okay; there are plenty of yellow wockys in this world,” he said.  He still looked pretty confused.

            The currently unnamed mysterious zafara came out of the house, and looked at us, asking, “Are you going as well?”

            “Well why not!  I have nothing to lose anyways!” I exclaimed, wondering why anyone would have second thoughts.  “I’m May, by the way.”

            He smiled, a small smile, so very different from my large grin that took up the entire width of my face. “I’m Moht.  I have plenty to loose, but this isn’t exactly an opportunity to pass up, now is it?  I mean, how many chances are there in one’s life to be able to see so many things.  The normal world is so boring, but just imagine,” he paused for dramatic effect, “all of the things that basically no one has ever seen before!  I will be able to take so many pictures.”

            “Oh, wait, right, um,” said Jordie, “You have eyes, but do you have soul?  I think that’s my line.  I’m supposed to see if anyone will back out if I try to scare them, but I forget.  Oh well,” he said, smiling, “I didn’t think anyone would back out.”

            The moehog, who I had determined to be named Kerlie, walked out of the house.  “You have brains, but do you have the braveness?” Jordie asked him.  Moht and I burst out laughing, as Kerlie started to sweat nervously.

            “Uh, uh, well, um, I just,” he stuttered, and we all continued laughing as he fiddled with his glasses.

            “Oh sorry,” said Moht, “He’s just asked all of us a similar question.”

            “Yeah,” I said, “He asked me the exact same one as you, except backwards.” I said, my grin, my laugh, all so big, that I wondered why my life hadn’t been this good before.  I just had to say something.

***

            I heard her shower stop.  I heard her step out of her shower stall, and I heard her leave the bathroom.  It was quiet without her.  And I wondered who she was.

***

            That night, I lay on my cot, my smile as big as it had ever been.  I thought it was the biggest in the world.  It turned out to be second, since my face was smaller. 

            I had never felt so happy in all my life.  Finally, I had three friends, and something to do.  I looked forward to tomorrow.

            As I fell asleep, I heard “Art” again.

            My dreams were filled with strange moments that night. It was how it was the night before, a shaded figure, pacing about.  But I understood the person this time. “She has her mother’s eyes.  But she looks so much like her father,” a pause, “but she certainly skipped his attitude.  Oh, a reminiscence of clear,” and I awoke to a reality consisting of being poked furiously by Veer.

            “You were saying stuff in your sleep.  Something about clear art.  What the slorg does that even mean?”

            I yawned, “I don’t know.  I remember someone saying clear.  But I want to find out what that means.”

            “Yeah, well whatever.  Now that you’re up, I can go back to sleep,” and with that she flopped back down on her cot and began to snore.

            I stood up, and found myself pacing amongst deeply breathing sleepers.  I went to the single window of the girls dormitories, and stared up at the pencil thin moon.

            I saw the red light fly across the sky, and immediately thought neocopter.  But that made no sense, what with the way it seemed to flicker and flutter.  Like it was flapping wings.

            I concluded that it was a faerie, off to give some random pet a quest that would cost all of their savings. 

            I sat back down on my cot, and began to have thoughts of not going.  I pushed them from my head.  Lying down, I realized that if the island didn’t even exist, I now had some friends.  That was good enough for me, along with the opportunity to travel a little bit.

***

After my far too long shower, I went back to my small room in The Orange Weewoo.  It was a small comfortable inn and tavern, though it seemed to be rather rowdy downstairs.  I didn’t care; actually I found it quite awesome to even be on Krawk Island in the first place. 

I threw on my PJs and lay down on the bed.  It was the largest bed I had ever slept in before.  And the comfiest, and the only one that didn’t creak.  Well, I’ve only ever really slept in my cot in the pound.  I would have just lain down, and fallen asleep, but I had an agenda.

It was ten o’clock, but I knew what I had to do.  I whipped out my rarely used hairbrush, and began.  It was a half an hour later when it was entirely brushed.  You might be thinking, “May?  Brushing her hair?  This rarely ever happens!” but I had to.  The last neomail I had received had said to come in disguise.  So, I brushed my hair straight, and had borrowed Veer’s pink sweater.  “Borrowed.”  I needed to get back at her, for all of those humiliating moments, since I might never see her again.

I looked like a different person now, not the quiet little May who stands out too much, but someone who blended in.  Unfortunately, I wasn’t going to get to wear my hat for most of the morning, at least not until I got on the boat. 

There was no meeting the day after I met Moht, Jordie and Kerlie.  We had just gone to the meeting, the real one, since Mr. Fairweather hadn’t specified a time.  I had received many neomails, including reservations at the Orange Weewoo.  And 5,000 np for supplies.  I bought a knot tying guide for my rope, and now could use it almost like a grappling hook.

Beyond that, hiking boots, a vest and some gloves.  Oh, and with 150 np left over, a pair of purple knee socks to protect me from prickers.  I found my attire to be perfect for this specific excursion.  I didn’t know.

The most recent notice I had gotten had said that tomorrow at 6:13 AM I would find a yellow lutari with information on our boat.  It had also said that it did not matter what he looked like, as he was also wearing a disguise, and was also coming on our boat.  We were leaving at 6:36.

***

The next morning, I walked downstairs with a mission on my mind: to eat my very first pastry.  I was going to pretend to be a slightly rich traveler from faerieland who loved all stuff light and airy, as most pets from faerieland did. 

As I stepped onto the ground floor, I surveyed the room.  I saw a green pirate whose species I wasn’t quite sure of, a group who looked like someone’s crew, someone asleep in the corner, and a pink gelert, sitting alone.  I decided to sit down by myself.

After getting my muffin, I looked at the wall clock.  It read 6:11.  I waited for a minute, nibbling.  Bored, I got up and inspected the sleeper, and found that he had his hat over his eyes, a wisp of black hair escaping from underneath it, and a number written on his hand.  24 was all it read.  I shrugged, who knew what had happened to him.

I went back over to my table, and sat down.  I looked at the clock again.  6:14. I glanced around wildly, uncertain and confused.  There was no yellow lutari, anywhere in this room at all!  I looked at everyone else, no lutari with the pirates, and not a pink gelert, and not the other green pirate, which I realized was Moht, as he seemed to have the same reaction as I.  The gelert looked mildly concerned, and thus I concluded that she must be Gaviella, or her replacement.

Then, someone burst through the door, but he was still no yellow lutari.  The purple meerca thrust himself through the door, holding a pair of glasses, and glanced wildly around the room.  “Has anyone here seen a yellow lutari?” he said, and we all shook our heads.

“Kerlie!!  We are so very late for our appointment at the lab ray, Kerlie!”  I heard someone shout, and saw a darigan ixi run by, screaming at the top of her lungs.  I realized that the purple meerca must be Kerlie, as the psycho ixi burst in, shouting, “Oh there you are Kerlie!  We must leave this wretched place at once!” and proceeded to grab onto poor Kerlie’s small meerca’s paw.  I saw him mouth, “help me” in my direction, as he was dragged away.  I quickly followed the two of them.

I knew that we were probably not going to continue without Kerlie, for whatever reason, and ran up behind the ixi.  “Excuse me, ma’m,” I said, in my sweetest voice possible, “This is my little brother, Murphs, not your friend Kerlie.  I think this must be a mistake.”

She glared at me, “Well, this is my brother, not yours; you can get your own.  Isn’t that right, now little Kerlie?” Kerlie grimaced as what I believed to be his crazy older sister patted him on the head.  He grimaced, and ripped away from her grasp, and took off running.

“Kerlie!  You come back here this very instant!  Father will be so very angry!” shouted Kerlie’s sister, but we were already dodging our way through the busy streets of Krawk Island.

24 I thought to myself, where is dock number 24?

We passed the Orange Weewoo again, and spotted Gaviella and Moht inside, beginning to follow us.  Moht seemed to realize something, and quickly turned around.  Most likely he had forgotten something of his, but I had everything that I was going to need in my backpack. 

We kept running, and when we got to dock number 24, I got a glimpse of our boat’s name, the S.S Primmella II.  But we both sprinted up the gangplank onto the actual boat, almost knocking over a white gnorbu lifting what looked like to be an exceedingly heavy crate. 

“Wait,” said a green ogrin with a scar across his eye, his hat darkly shading his eyes.  “Ticket.” He said, holding out his hoof/hand.  I glanced sideways over at Kerlie, but as his reaction was similar, we both realized that neither of us had tickets. 

“I have never seen them before,” said an oddly familiar kougara, coming up behind him, “In fact, I think they aren’t even on the right boat.  What are your names?” he asked us.

“Well, um, I’m, uh, Kerlie Brown sir, but, I, uh, keep getting zapped with the lab ray.” stuttered Kerlie.  Jordie smiled, a bit relieved, and shooed him away towards the cabins.  The ogrin glared at him, and turned to me.

“And you are?” he asked gruffly.

“April Walnut,” I said, trying to be calm as I could.

Jordie eyed me, and said, “You are most certainly on the wrong boat.  We have no April Walnut on the list…” he trailed off a bit, and a look of comprehension came over him, “But, ah, it seems that we could give you some extra space, unless our other passenger shows up, eh Captain Rourke?”  He elbowed the ogrin, who simply glared at him

“Gee, thanks mister!” I said, quickly running below deck to get out of the view of the creepy ogrin who was the captain.

I dumped my stuff below in a room that was labeled 3.  I had been told that it was going to be my room.  I was slightly surprised that there were four hammocks inside.  I guessed Lillian, Gaviella, and I, but I did not know who else.

I came up above, and saw Moht dragging the sleeping yellow lutari up the gangplank.  I ran down to help him, along with the white gnorbu I had seen lifting the crate earlier.  Together, we managed to lift him up onto the deck, where he slumped backwards as we tried to sit him up. 

“Bah, that Colcester.  Who knows what trouble he’s gotten himself into this time,” snorted the captain, “I can’t believe he wants to go back to miserable island.  Took me three months to repair my ship last time.”

Kerlie popped up next to him and asked, all curiosity, “What type of boat is this, Mr. Captain?”

“Ship,” corrected the captain, and stalked off to fill out whatever forms he had to fill out in order to leave the docks with so many passengers and so much cargo. 

Kerlie glanced around at the two of us, and asked, “well, what kind of ship then?” and we just shrugged. He shook his head and went below deck, off to do some research on different kinds of boats.

“Hello,” we heard a strange, calm, smooth voice say, “I am Gaviella.  Who are you?” asked someone.  We both turned around and were face to face with the pink gelert that we had seen in the Orange Weewoo. 

“Well, I’m Moht,” he said, “and she’s May.  Nice to meet you Gaviella.”

“Yes,” she said, her eyes a little distant, “pleased to make your acquaintance May and Moht.” She calmly placed her hand in the air, as if expecting us to shake it.

I grasped her hand and shook it firmly. “Salutations!” I said gleefully. 

  “Yes,” she said, still a little bit distant, “I am going to go below deck now,” and stepped down, rather zombie like, the steep stairs.

Moht and I exchanged glances.  “Well,” he said, “I guess I’m going to have to go set up my camera equipment for now.  See you later.”

I was left on the deck alone with the sleeping lutari.  I decided that probably the best thing to do was to try to awaken him, which was probably going to be rather difficult, since he had continued snoring through the ordeal of being dragged all along the streets.

I started by shaking him.  I poked him repetitively.  Then I shook him harder, and tried yelling at him.  He just mumbled in his sleep.

“Bah,” said the captain, coming up next to me, “That’s not how you wake someone up,” and kicked him in the stomach.

“Ahh!” shouted the lutari, “what happened!” and glanced around at us.  “Oh, right, I meant to fall asleep, Cap,” he said, grinning.

            “Stow it Colchester,” muttered the captain, “you just jeopardized this whole operation by taking a nap.”

            “Sheesh,” he said, “You don’t have to yell at me like I’m a little kid.  Oh,” he looked at me now, “You must be May.  I’m Roxton A. Colchester III.”

***