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Buy One Get One Free! Crew
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 Posted: Tue Feb 10, 2009 8:22 pm
“Daaad... I'm t-tired....” whined Carl as he uprooted another weed from the back garden.
“I don't care,” replied the father. “You still have work to do. And lots of it. So get to it!”
“But-but... can't you... at least order food?” he said, wiping newly-forming sweat off of his brow.
Vilmos sighed. Couldn't he handle any work? “Alright, Kid. You can stop to go pick up the cabbage I ordered from the store. Then you can boil it and eat it in some soup.”
“...again?” The shy man pushed up his glasses, a nervous habit he'd developed. “Plus... the guys are supposed to come over a-and...”
“They come over every night. Tell them to cancel. Go work on some robots or whatever you do in the basement after dinner.”
Carl sighed. “Oh-ohkay...” Not bothering to wash himself or take off his work apron, he headed out the front door along the path to the grocery store.
It was the same old story at the grocery store. A bunch of people there, with their cars, spaceships, horses and rickshaws all parked outside. It reminded him of the store he used to go to as a child... with his mother... except there were only cars back on Earth. Not many people owned a one-man UFO or a giant robot's head back in the country. As he walked out, cabbage in hand, a strange woman clad in a muddy old poncho appeared before him, holding a significantly larger cabbage.
“I can't do this...” she said, over and over to Carl. “I can't do this... I can't do this... I thought I could but I can't, I can't...”
Carl eyed the girl in front of him. Middle-aged, hobo-esque, covered in dirt... smelled like mushrooms? He couldn't tell if the woman was a gardener, or just plain homeless. Either way, who was she, and more importantly, why in the world was she talking to him?! “U-um, w-w-what are you t-talking about?” He asked her, shivering.
At seeing the cabbage in his arms, the woman's eyes opened wide. “Y... you have one too?” she asked. She then thrust her vegetable upon Carl, who haphazardly managed to get a grip on it without dropping both of them. “Take mine, take mine! Please!!”
Carl looked at the new veggie in his arms. Sure, it was strange, but he couldn't complain about free food – much less such gigantic free food. “A-alright... but um... why?”
“They're going to call you about this. They're going to find out,” she told him. “I thought I could handle the responsibility, they said I was stable enough, but I'm not, I'm not, I'm not...” She fell to the ground on her knees, weeping into her hands.
Carl blinked. What was so hard about a cabbage? “Um, don't worry ma'am, I'll take it... just um... go on and live life... free?”
The woman smiled at him and kissed at his feet. “Thank you, thank you, thank you thankyou!!” At that, she sprang up on her dirty old feet and skipped away. “Oh, it feels good to be free... No one will rely on me... it feels so good to be free...”
Hm. Well that was odd, Carl thought to himself, now awkwardly carrying two cabbages. Wonder who's gonna call me... hopefully that lady didn't steal this from anyone... Oh well, Dad will hopefully be happy that I got more food...
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Posted: Sun Mar 01, 2009 10:49 pm
Vilmos overheard the door opening as he sat in the back room, reading his newspaper. The shop was always closed on Sundays – it was his wife's favorite day – thus he had time to himself. “Hello, Kid,” he said to Carl, not even bothering to look up. He only did so as he heard the audible thump from his son slamming two cabbages on the kitchen counter. “What in the world...”
Carl saw his dad's dumbfounded expression and started to sweat. “U-uhm, some lady, s-she gave me a free cabbage and...”
“No wonder she gave it to you free,” Vilmos said, standing up and inspecting the vegetable. “Look at it. Half of it is yellowing and wilted. It's basically trash.”
“Wha? B-but it wasn't...” After taking a second look at the cabbage, Carl saw that his dad was right. It indeed had yellowing leaves. It didn't have that before, though...
“Oh well. Go throw it out back for some animals or whatever to eat. I'll start the soup.”
His dad actually start the soup? Well, that was nice of him. As he carried the wilting cabbage outside, the phone began to ring. Not normally one to answer phones, he almost decided that this would be no exception – however, seeing as he wanted his dad to make the soup for him, he decided to suck it up and answer. “H-Hello?”
A woman's voice greeted him on the other end of the phone. “This is The Cabbage Patch calling. We understand that you have acquired a cabbage from a woman earlier today. Don't worry about how we got this number – we placed a harmless tracking device on the cabbage in the event something like this would happen.”
Carl was dumbfounded. Cabbage patch... tracking device... woah, this must be some really high-end cabbage store. “Um.. y-yes, that is what happened. Uhh... why?”
“You've not heard of us, have you?” asked the woman.
“Well... no, not at all.”
The woman sighed. “Alright then. Someone will be there to pick up the cabbage tomorrow. Don't water it or expose it to sunlight any more, okay?”
“Umm, alright...”
“Alright. Take care.” At that, she hung up the phone. How bizarre, thought Carl as he hung up his phone, cabbage still in arms. Well, better just keep this in the basement... As he walked down into his room, he set the cabbage on a small end table and stared at it momentarily. No water? But it's dying... I wouldn't want this store to pick up a dead cabbage, then I'd have to pay... Deciding that he had better judgment than the woman, he spritzed the cabbage with a spare water bottle he kept in his apron to water droopy flowers with. Afterwards, he reluctantly feasted on cabbage soup, then worked on modding his computer until the crack of dawn. Remembering that the store was open today, he decided to sleep until awoken by his father.
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Buy One Get One Free! Crew
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Buy One Get One Free! Crew
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Posted: Thu Mar 19, 2009 8:58 pm
Vilmos didn't have to wake up Carl – the sunlight shining in through the narrow basement window did the job for him. Instead of meeting his dad's face this morning, he instead met the large watery grey-blue eyes of some hideous monster creature, staring dead into his face.
“Ahhh... ahhh... AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!”
At Carl's shriek of terror, the child squeaked and hid underneath Carl's bed. As soon as he did, Vilmos came running down the stairs. “What? What's going on?!” he said, almost sounding as terrified as his son.
“A m-m-m... m-mon... MONSTER is under my BED!!” Carl cried, now standing in the dismal corner of his room, shivering and pointing to his bed.
“...You've got to be kidding me.” Vilmos put his hands on his hips. “You did this when you were six.”
“No no, th-th-this time it's FOR REAL!”
“And you said that when you were seven.”
“D-d-daaad, look under my bed! Please!”
Vilmos sighed, and with a strenuous moan, bent down to look underneath his son's bed. Sure enough, he was greeted with a pair of almost luminous eyes, peering out from under the darkness. “Umm... wow, you sure do have something there. Well then. Guess I shouldn't doubt you.” Standing back up (which took as much effort as kneeling down did), he dusted off his pants and looked to Carl. “Where did this thing come from, anyway?”
“Ahhh I don't kn-kn-know, he was just there when I woke up...” He then walked out from his corner of solitude, looking around his room for any sort of way the strange boy could have gotten in. Not spotting any holes, he almost said there was no way it could have gotten it at all... until he noted the ratty-looking cabbage on his table, it's middle burst open as if something had crawled out of it during the night. “Umm... it came f-f-from... that...” he said, pointing to the messy vegetable.
“Wha... weren't you supposed to throw that moldy thing out in the back?!”
“Sorry... s-someone called and... they said they were gonna pick it up today, and...”
“Well, they very well can't now that a child burst out of it!!”
“I'ma child?”
At the sound of a little squeaking voice, the two men turned their heads downward at the child. He didn't look very monstrous at all at second glance... just very, very bizarre. The first thing they noticed was that he had no nose. The second thing was that he had a gigantic overshadowing mushroom cap on top of his head in place of hair. After staring at the nearly-naked fungus child for a while (somehow he came out wearing shorts), they pretty much figured that he was part mushroom, what with his rubbery-looking yellow skin.
“Well. You're a mushroom,” Vilmos said, rather matter-of-factly.
“I'ma mushoom?” the child responded.
“Ahhuhh, d-dad, he's not really a mushroom...”
“Oh?” Vilmos was confused at his son's comment. “Then what is he?”
“Well, based upon his bright coloring and spots, he seems like more of a toadstool to me.” Ah yes, when he was able to talk about nerdy things like discerning types of fungus, Carl did not stutter at all.
“Haha. Toadstool. You're a Toadstool, little guy,” Vilmos said, trying to poke the toddler's stomach. Unfortunately, the child squeaked and ran over to Carl's leg, hugging it for safety.
“Uhh, D-d-dad...” Carl said, confused at the sudden display of affection. “What is he...”
“It looks like he thinks you're mom, after seeing you right after, erm, hatching.”
“Well then, ummm, t-t-t-toadstool...” Carl said, his stutter beginning to show his newfound fear. “Well uhh, we better a-ahh-umm, take c-c-care of you, u-u-until they come to ahh, pick you up...”
The child didn't register the comment – instead, he just clung blissfully onto his leg.
Vilmos laughed. “Looks like you've made yourself a friend.” At that, he turned around and walked up the stairs to attend to his job.
“Haha... y-y-yeah... ummm... don't leave... ahhh...” Looking down at his new mushroom comrad, he tried to strike up a conversation. “So um... y-y-you seem advanced... able to converse at such a young age...”
“Conversawhatta?”
“...nevermind.” Carl sighed. What in the world had he gotten himself into? “So u-um, wh-what do you call yourself?”
The child thought for a moment, staring blankly up at Carl until his eye lit up with an idea. “I'm a mushoom!” he said cheerfully.
“...No. Too cliché. Such an obvious statement will not work, even if you are blatantly a mushroom.” Well, this is one plus to finding yourself with a mutant child, Carl thought. You don't have to worry about them judging you based on your nerdiness.. “What about toadstool?”
“I'ma todeestool? What's a todeestool?”
“Todee? That's not a word... although it does bring about an alternate spelling of the word that would be nice, what with you throwing an E in there... ahh, Tode... unique enough to bring out confusion in others, since you are a mushroom and not a toad, thus they'd already be confused... but T-O-D-E? An exclusively peculiar spelling like that only furthers the intriguing nature of yourself. I like it.”
“...I'ma mushoom?”
“No. Well, yes. You're Tode, but you're a mushroom.”
“...I'm Tode... I'm... a mushoom?”
Carl smiled. “Now you've got it!”
“I'm Tode – I'ma mushoom!”
“Haha! Excellent!” Prying the little child off of his leg, he then sat him and himself upon the bed.
So uhh.... now what?
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