Admiring Flora and Fauna
“Look, all I’m saying is maybe your human friends have told you where I can find samples of wildlife and plants to study. We’ve been here half a week already and I have nothing.” Leslie said to Imo. Gus had gone to bed, leaving the two of them alone for the evening.
“I think they did mention a park- Magnolia Blossoms Park. It’s supposed to be in Willow Creek, a couple of towns over.”
“There’s nothing closer?” Leslie asked. “We’ve only been here half a week. Do you really think we should be traveling to another town?”
“Look at it this way,” Imo explained. “If we do something weird, we don’t live in that town, so we just leave and that’s that.” Leslie nodded and smiled. That was actually a good plan.
“I don’t know.” Gus said. He’d just gotten up, and the two of them had swarmed them with this weird idea.
“Gus! I need to be able to do my job here. There’s nothing around here, I’ve looked.” Leslie pleaded between mouthfuls of food.
Sighing Gus agreed.
“Don’t worry, think of this a dry run. If we mess up, we just don’t go back.” Imo said smiling. Gus rolled his eyes.
“Fine. Now get out so I can can get ready.” Gus said with a sigh.
“Here we are!” Imo said as they stood at the park entrance.
“Yeahy…” Gus said unenthusiastically. There didn’t seem to be a lot here to do, unless you were 10 years old or less.
“It’s beautiful, I’m just going to go check it out. I’ll meet you guys later.” Leslie said his eyes wide and his head on a swivel. There was so much to do here.
“Give a shout if you get into trouble,” Imo said heading towards the tables. I wonder what games they have out?
Leslie had found a giant pond. It was teeming with different life forms. He’d read all about this in the dossiers. Looking through the plants at the edge of the pond, he finally spotted the creatures he’d read about. Kneeling down, he slowly inched forward. There was a lone one just in front of him. Taking a deep breath he snapped his arms forward and slapped his hands together over the creature. With a croak, the frog leaped out of the way, and jumped into the pond to safety.
Gus snorted and went back to his chess game. Imo had said this was strategy game for humans. It looked boring. So far most of his entertainment had been from watching Leslie trying to catch a creature. Snorting, he looked down and tried to finish this chess thing.
Tired of wandering, Imo came back to the main part of park. His stomach was rumbling, and it looked like Leslie was still going at it. That looks so boring, Imo thought. Spotting a BBQ Imo smiled and starting heading over. Now this is where the actions at!
He’d memorized the instructions from the dossiers, but obviously there was some skills involved. Imo was pretty sure it shouldn’t be smoking black like that. Just roll with it, he said to himself and kept going.
“Just eat it, quit being a baby.” Imo said goading Gus. Looking down at his plate dubiously, Gus picked up the food and gingerly took a bite. This isn’t so bad, but he still didn’t really like it. Imo rolled his eyes at Gus’ antics. He’d have to get eating down at some point. Besides human food wasn’t so bad. Gus managed to eat a whole potato, before he bolted from the picnic table, and ran towards the bathrooms.
Imo was sitting there watching Leslie, waiting for Gus to come back, when a blonde woman came and sat down at his picnic table.
“I am so famished,” she said, taking a potato. Then she proceeded to chat Imo’s ear off about absolutely nothing.
Gus hurry up!
“You think he’ll be done soon?” Imo asked Gus.
“No idea. Hopefully soon though. This game is stupid” Gus said, looking for his next move.
“It’s only stupid because you didn’t read how to play it.” Imo said as Gus made his move.
“Who says I didn’t read about it?” Gus said at Imo’s astonished look. Smiling smugly at Imo he sat back and looked around for Leslie.
“I’m just saying, when Leslie finishes, I found out about something fun we could do before leaving.” Imo said getting ready to mount his counter attack.
After a few more hours, Gus and Imo eventually collected Leslie from across the road. Still unsure about why he’d gone across the road, they’d listened as he’d babbled about weeds, frogs, and limestones he’d found around the park.
“This way dirt boy,” Gus said steering Leslie after Imo as they headed into a corner of the park.
“This…was…fun..?” Gus said panting on the floor of the roller rink.
“Ahhh!” Leslie seemed to yell in agreement as he lost his balance.
“Come on guys, it’s not so bad.” Imo said skating around them in circles. “It’s a lot of fun.”
“Yes, fun.” Gus said stuggling to get to his feet, just as Leslie fell. They were going to hurt in the morning, there was no doubt in Gus and Leslie’s minds.
