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 Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 8:57 am
Hello again! This is the third chapter of the story. It is not as funny as the other two, but it is still quite important in the story... as it makes things a little more interesting for Jay, Trigger and Chase... not to mention their magical steeds...
Three: Happy Snowflakes
By the time morning broke the next day, the horses were literally dragging their hoofs along the hard dirt through utter exhaustion. They had been walking for almost all the night, and there was still no sign of a town or village on the horizon. Not that they could even see the horizon: the sandstorm they had blundered straight into blew grit into their eyes and limited everyone’s vision to just a few meters ahead.
Meanwhile, the riders were fast asleep in their saddles, much to the horses’ annoyance. Anyone would have thought that they’d done all the walking. Then again, you had to give it to those guys: they were the only humans the horses knew that could sleep whilst sitting upright and holding onto the reins at the same time. It must have taken years of practice, Thunder often mused to himself.
However, this was no time for careless thoughts. The horses didn’t have any idea where they were going, and their energy was slowly ebbing away with each passing step. Bullet whispered words of self-encouragement under his breath, while Shandy had began staggering in an awkward zigzag pattern. Thunder seemed to be coping, but his breaths became deeper and his pace became a little slower as the minutes rolled by. It wasn’t too long until Trigger stirred, though.
He gave a long, drawn out yawn, and immediately swallowed a mouthful of sand. His choking woke Jay, who rubbed his eyes sleepily.
“Are we there yet?” he muttered dozily. Shandy shook her head slightly.
“We don’t even know where ‘there’ is…” Bullet panted wearily, desperately trying to put one hoof in front of the other.
“I don’t care where we’re going,” Trigger grumbled, still wiping sand grains off his tongue. “Just as long as it has food and a decent bed. You keep jogging us about to much when we try to sleep,” he added to Thunder, who simply scowled and started to move with deliberately sudden jerks.
“Well, it would be helpful to know roughly what area we’re in…” Shandy mumbled faintly, coughing on the sand that flew around on the air. Trigger sighed and took out his map.
“Well?” Bullet asked impatiently.
“Errr… I might have the wrong map again…” Trigger muttered sheepishly, before delving back into the saddlebag for the other parchment. However, the look on his face changed from one of embarrassment to confusion.
“Guys?”
“What?” Jay asked sleepily.
“There’s no sign of a desert on either maps…” Trigger announced quietly.
A long silence ensued, broken only by the bitter howl of the wind and a couple of momentous snores from Chase. Jay was still figuring out what Trigger was getting at, so Bullet took control.
“Are you positive?”
“Yep.”
“Try looking for large barren fields.”
“Done that.”
“What about dried lakes?”
“Nope.”
“Craters?”
“No.”
The dapple-grey stamped a foot angrily.
“Well, where the Hell are we then?” he snorted, angry at the idea that they could have wasted all their energy just to get hopelessly lost in a land of nowhere.
“I have no idea…” Trigger said, a faint hint of utter disbelief. It was at this moment that Jay finally clicked at what was happening.
“Wait, does that mean we’re lost?” he asked in panic. The others all shared a glance, all silently agreeing that Jay was, indeed, in a league of stupidity of his own. Then, as one, they nodded slowly. Jay looked positively horrified.
“Nooo! I’m too young to die! We’re all going to starve out here! We’ll rot away! We’re all going to die!”
“Will you calm down, man?! You’re giving me a headache!” Psycho growled, emerging from one of Jay’s pockets. “I’m trying to sleep!”
“Hey,” Trigger suddenly said. “Shouldn’t you have turned back to being a psychopathic human by now?”
“Hmm… that’s a good point,” the hamster agreed. “I can tell that it’s day-break because I can feel a strong heat, and you don’t get that in deserts at night. I guess all this sand is blocking the sun’s rays.”
“Yes, that’s all very nice to know,” Thunder frowned. “But shouldn’t we be sorting out our little problem? You know, the one where we’re completely lost and we may need food at some point? I don’t know about you guys, but I would love to be tucking into some nice hay about now, not starving in some unmarked desert.”
Unfortunately, Thunder had just reminded Jay about what he had been screaming about, and soon he was running around in circles almost as if he was on fire, yelling with all his might.
Trigger spat at the floor and growled, “Oh well done, now you’ve got him worked up again…”
“Wha?” Chase grumbled, woken suddenly from his sleep by Jay’s tantrum.
“Nice of you to join us,” Bullet snorted moodily. “Maybe you can help out with our little problem?”
“Wha?” Chase repeated, still half-asleep. The horses all rolled their eyes.
“We’re lost, Chase,” Trigger explained, his simple statement causing Jay’s mad rant to reach fever pitch. Chase looked at him wearily.
“Is that all?” he asked, much to Trigger’s surprise.
“Err… Yeah… that’s all…”
“You went and woke me up over something like that! How am I supposed to get to sleep if you lot wake me up over some minor setback? Man, I thought we were being attacked or something! Don’t do it again!”
“Minor? But Chase, we’re…”
“Shut it! I don’t want another word from you unless it’s an emergency! I need rest!”
“So do we!” Thunder panted, before halting his progress and shaking his head. “I can’t keep going…” he said breathlessly.
“Stop complaining,” Chase snapped, before turning his attention to Jay. “And you can shut up as well, you moron! Honestly, why we hang out with an idiot like you, I’ll never know! You’re a waste of breath!”
The panicking man came to an abrupt stop and looked positively heart-broken at the remark. Ignoring the pathetic snivelling, Chase suddenly noticed that Trigger was looking at him strangely.
“What?” he snapped spitefully. Trigger shook his head.
“What’s got into you, man? You’re being pretty mean, even by my standards.”
Chase looked quite taken aback.
“Really?” he asked, his tone softening. He rubbed the back of his neck uneasily and shook his head. “I guess I’m not that good in the heat… I get easily wound up…”
“Do you want a break?” Trigger asked, noticing that he was panting deeply. Before Chase had even finished nodding his head, Shandy had lain down and was sighing with relief. Thunder and Bullet followed suit and Trigger almost didn’t have time to get off before his black steed rolled over and immediately went to sleep.
Jay, though pleased that they could finally stop trudging through sand, was still deeply hurt by Chase’s remark, and decided to take his mind of it by starting a conversation with Psycho. While they discussed the complex matter of ‘if-you’re-a-cannibal-then-doesn’t-that-mean-you-eat-other-were-hamsters-as-well-as-humans?’, Trigger seated himself on a patch of sand that sat higher than the rest, studying both of his maps with uncertainty. Chase had sat down by Bullet, clutching his head.
“You okay?” his steed asked with concern. Chase shook his head.
“Is there anything I can do?” Bullet enquired in a rare moment of pity. Chase just rocked backwards and forwards, eyes closed against the flying sand that scratched bitterly against his skin and hands covering his head.
“So… hot…” he panted, almost as if every word was a tremendous effort. Bullet didn’t know what to do. In his opinion, it wasn’t all that hot, it felt like any other day: a vague hint of heat, but not much to sweat over. His body was covered in fur, for crying out loud, and he barely felt even mildly hot, well, apart from all the walking he had been doing. However, Chase was taking in long, deep breaths and sweating steadily. Bullet was about to suggest sucking a cactus (though there was no sign of any around) when his rider suddenly keeled over and lay still in the sand.
“Oh, bloody hell…” Bullet blurted out in surprise, before calling out, “Guys! We have a man down over here! I repeat, a man down!”
As he got up onto his hooves, Trigger came rushing over.
“What happened?” he called to Bullet from a few yards off.
“I just told you: we have a man down…” the horse grunted slowly, in case Trigger was stupid. “Honestly, don’t you lot ever listen?”
Ignoring the stallion’s dark mutterings, Trigger turned Chase’s body over so it was face up, and felt his wrist for a pulse.
“Well, he’s still alive…” he murmured, before removing his hand and pausing for thought. Jay came wandering over curiously.
“Hmm… most strange…” Psycho thought aloud, perched on Jay’s shoulder. “I haven’t a clue what could be-“
“Grit-lock Fever.”
All eyes turned to rest on Jay, who was stood quietly behind Trigger.
“What?” Bullet asked in amazement.
“Grit-lock Fever,” Jay repeated seriously. “Its symptoms are tiredness, short temper and heat-exhaustion. Happens when you inhale poison sand, only found in the Southern Wastelands: a place so foul that no-one has dared mark it on any maps.”
Trigger and Bullet shared a short glance, before staring open-mouthed at Jay. Even Psycho had turned to face him.
“What?” Jay asked uneasily, wandering why everyone was staring.
“I didn’t even know you were capable of saying something seriously…” Trigger stammered. “How the hell did you know that?”
“I must admit, even I’m impressed,” Psycho muttered sheepishly. “I used to be a physician before I turned cannibal, and even I don’t know that much about Grit-lock Fever…”
Bullet gazed in amazement at the rodent.
“What’s that look for?” he growled.
“You used to be a doctor?”
“Yes, why with the surprise?”
“I didn’t think it was legal for a hamster to diagnose humans…”
“Actually, I wasn’t a were-hamster back then: I became one when I got bitten by another were-hamster hiding in my underwear…”
“ENOUGH!” Trigger said loudly, desperately wanting to avoid the subject of what lurked in Psycho’s underwear. “Jay: do you know how to cure it?”
He shook his head.
“I only know what the symptoms are…sorry,” he murmured miserably. Trigger looked at Psycho.
“Do you?”
“Err… yes and no.”
“What the hell is that meant to mean?”
“Well, I do know how to make try and help him live maybe two or three minutes longer, but I can’t cure it. No one ever has…”
Bullet looked horrified, and Trigger turned pale. Even Thunder and Shandy, who had deliberately avoided the commotion, came trotting over.
“What? So, it’s… it’s...”
“Fatal.” Psycho finished quietly. “There’s nothing we can do. Sorry guys.”
Everyone fell silent, and Bullet lowered his head and closed his eyes in despair.
“Is there nothing, not a single thing we can do?” Trigger asked quietly.
“Oh, hang on…”
Everyone immediately looked up at Jay, who had bent over to get a closer look at Chase.
“What? Jay, if you know something, then tell us,” Bullet said desperately.
“Well, I can remember something about being able to stall the disease for roughly a fortnight. But we’d need water and a special type of weed… and I hate to say it, but it’s highly unlikely we’ll find either of them in a place like this.”
“A weed?” Trigger repeated, rummaging through his bag.
“Err… I think it’s Dustbrush,” Jay muttered, straining to remember. “But it doesn’t matter: there’s no way we’d find one out…“
“Here!” Trigger yelled triumphantly, pulling a length of twig from his pack, covered in bristling grey leaves. Jay gasped.
“Where did you get that?!” he cried. “They’re like the rarest plants in existence! They’re worth hundreds! Millions!”
“Really?” Trigger asked in surprise. “I just found it in that farmer’s field before you lot caught up. I thought it would make a good meal if we were seriously starving. I never realised that they were so rare.”
“Wow, talk about coincidence…” Thunder muttered.
“This is great!” Jay smiled. “I have some water left in my canister, but we’ll need a bowl to mix the ingredients together…”
“Oh, I’ve got one,” Trigger piped up, reaching into his small bag again, before withdrawing a ridiculously large bowl. Jay, Psycho, Shandy, Bullet and Thunder looked at him in amazement.
“What?”
“How much stuff do you carry around with you? And how the hell does it all fit in there?” Shandy snorted, impressed, yet slightly scared at Trigger’s ability to seemingly conjure things up from the bag.
“Eh, I stole it from some wizard when I was like, six,” he shrugged. “I reckon it’s magic…”
The possibility of a long, unnecessary conversation was quickly dashed when Chase shuddered violently, reminding them that if they didn’t hurry up, they’d have one less rider.
“So,” Trigger asked quickly. “What do we do now?”
“Give me the bowl and Dustbrush,” Jay said confidently. “We need to grind the water and Dustbrush together until it’s like a paste, then we have to force feed him.”
“It won’t work,” Psycho muttered as Jay used his fist to crush the mixture.
“Why not?” Thunder asked.
“Trust me: I’m a doctor.”
“Yeah, as well as a psychopathic cannibal who changes into an annoying rodent…”
“Shut your trap or else.”
“Oh, I’m so scared! What are you going to do? Spit seeds at me?”
“I could always bite you. See how you like being a were-hamster…”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah!”
“Shut it, both of you!” Bullet and Trigger shouted in unison. Reluctantly, Thunder and Psycho shared one last glare, then turned away with a grunt of disgust. Under his breath, the were-hamster muttered, “Well, if it doesn’t work, can I have the leftovers? It’s seems a shame to leave good meat lying around to waste…”
“It will work,” Bullet whinnied, partially to assure himself as well as the others. To take his mind off what will happen if it didn’t work, he glanced over to Jay.
“How’s it coming?”
“I don’t know… I’ve never actually seen this done before, but my mum used to tell me about stuff like this all the time when I was a kid. It pretty handy when you come from a family of herbalists…”
“Really? I didn’t know that…” Trigger said, slightly surprised. Jay turned red and lowered his head.
“Well, it’s not really something I’m proud of… especially after my older brother and his girlfriend went mad and tried to poison everyone back home…”
“Hmm… there’s one in every family,” Thunder muttered with empathy. “Why: just look at what happened to my father: he began thinking he was a fish… they never did find his body after he jumped into the lake…”
“Yes, thank you, Thunder,” Trigger interrupted. “I’m sure we’d all love to hear that story, but right now we need to get Chase back onto his feet.”
“Finished!” Jay called, holding out the bowl with the slurry mixture swilling around in it. Trigger took it and lifted Chase’s head, before putting the bowl to his mouth. It took a while to get him to swallow it, but all the mixture was drunk.
Seconds ticked by, and nothing happened. Bullet looked at Jay enquiringly.
“Are you sure you-“
“Argh!” Shandy screamed as Chase’s stationary hand suddenly whipped outwards and grabbed one of her legs. Trigger sighed with relief as Chase opened his eyes wearily and gave a dry cough.
“Where aren’t you?” he asked strangely.
Trigger and Thunder shared a short glance, before replying, “Don’t you mean ‘where am I’?”
“No, that’s not what you didn’t say…” Chase mumbled dreamily as he sat up, rubbing his head. Everyone else turned to look at Jay, silently demanding an answer. Jay rubbed his hands together sheepishly.
“There is something I forgot to mention…” he started to explain, receiving scowls from the others. “There is a small side-effect…”
“Which would be?”
“Well… the sheer amount of spice in a single Dustbrush is enough to revive a Grit-lock sufferer for a short time… but it is also so strong that it effects your co-ordination and thoughts, so everything you say is the complete opposite of what you actually mean…”
“So you’re saying,” Bullet said slowly. “That he’s going to spout complete nonsense.”
“Well, no. But he’ll only be able to say things in opposites. Do you understand?”
“No!” Chase yelled angrily. “You don’t understand at all! I’ve killed you to keep you perfect words for no more death!”
Everyone looked at Chase in utter confusion, then turned to Jay for a translation.
“Errr… I think he just said, ‘Yes, I understand perfectly. You’ve kept me alive just to give me messed up grammar for the rest of my life.’”
“No!” Chase nodded, much to Trigger’s confusion.
“My head hurts,” Bullet said, still reeling from his rider’s jumbled riddles.
“I’m happy snowflakes!!” Chase yelled angrily, wiping his eyes.
“Okay, now even I haven’t the slightest idea what he’s saying…” Jay started, causing Chase to stamp his feet in anger and point at him.
“I’m happy snowflakes! I’M HAPPY SNOWFLAKES!!” he repeated madly. Psycho, who was just getting the hang of Chase’s new way of speaking, jumped up and down excitedly and said, “Oh, I’ve got an idea!”
Five minutes later, Chase was stood before the rest of the group, who were eagerly leaning forward. Lifting one of his arms, Chase held up four fingers.
“Oh: four words?” Thunder yelled. Chase nodded before pointing at Jay.
“Oh, I love this game…”
“Man? Cloak? No, no, no, don’t tell me… I know this…”
“Me?” Jay asked. Chase nodded then held up four fingers again.
“Jay’s the fourth word?”
Chase shook his head, held up one finder, and pointed it a Jay again.
“Oh, Jay’s the first word?”
His head nodded, then he raised four fingers.
“Fourth word… oh, why’d do you suppose he’s sticking two fingers up at Jay?”
“Yes, Chase,” Trigger interrupted. “I think we get the idea… you don’t need to go on…”
Chase sighed and shrugged his shoulders.
“This smells nice!” he spat, kicking a stone with an air of anger about him.
“’This stinks’, I’m guessing,” Shandy whispered to the others. Chase glared at her, causing the mare to trot behind Jay, as if he could block his gaze.
“So what now?” Trigger asked Jay.
“Well, that isn’t an antidote: it’s only offers a little protection that lasts about two weeks. So, in those two weeks, we need to find a proper cure.”
“Can’t we just keep stuffing that mixture down his throat?”
Jay smiled and raised an eyebrow. “You sure? The more of that stuff we give him, the more messed up his sentences will be. The more messed up his sentences are, the moodier he gets. The moodier he gets, the more we suffer. Get the picture?”
Trigger nodded, much to Chase’s annoyance.
“Do go quiet about you when you’re left behind me!!”
A long silence ensued, before Jay worked it out.
“Ah! He said: ‘don’t talk about me when I’m right in front of you’!”
“Oh right!”
“Why didn’t he just say so?”
Chase looked positively livid and screamed, “You wish that I had right you alive!”
“Oh shut up, Chase!” Trigger sniggered. He was enjoying not having him boss them around. He could get used to this. His chuckling was interrupted, however, by a tremendous rumble of neglect from his stomach. Jay laughed at him, as he turned red and scratched his head.
“Wow: I’m starving,” he muttered, quite unnecessarily.
“Yeah,” Jay agreed. “Let’s go find some grub!”
After a brief sigh from Chase and some fiddling with their saddles, the group mounted their steeds and cantered towards the none-existent horizon.
To be continued in Chapter Four: One Hell of a Woman...
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Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 9:24 am
It's not very funny but it's still good.
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Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 7:45 pm
My god... Chase can't speak right anymore! That was really good!
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Posted: Sat Mar 03, 2007 12:52 am
Yes, it makes writing his speech really challenging, but I think it makes things a lot more interesting... biggrin
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Posted: Fri Mar 09, 2007 9:18 am
Anyone else want to comment?
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Reply
