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Addict
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: West Virginia
Posts: 192
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Freshly typed and ready for your eyes!
This is another attempt to humanize our fellow lifeforms. I feel I am more skilled to tackle this job now than iwas writing "The Cycle of Peaceful Spring," and here you go. Enjoy!
They Wander the World, Too
By Zach Hartman
Timmy the ladybug flew through the air frantically to escape the room of the human. He’d had a very small window of opportunity in which to get free, and he planned to fly home to his friends where he would entrance them with his heroic story…
Liz stepped lightly through the house to avoid disturbing anybody’s slumber. The start of spring always brought a fresh swarm of ladybugs to cover the side of the house, and they always found means of actually getting inside her home. She found them to be a peaceful lot, but they became pestilent when they turned aggressive, and their carcasses released a bitter and stale odor that filled the room for weeks. Liz hated that smell more than passing the natrium plant every day on her way to work. She vowed silently that she would destroy and remove the scourges before they could cause any trouble. She went to work with a grim satisfaction for her unholy task ahead.
A piece of the vinyl siding on the north side of the house had been slightly separated from the rest for years without any human taking notice; however, insects of all kinds managed to find the small hole just inside the separation. Through imperfect construction, a band of twelve ladybugs were chosen to officially explore and catalog the insides of the house. They took advantage of the hole and nested on the ceiling of the living room. The twelve held still, for one had seen a human approaching, and it is the natural defense to hold still and camouflage against one’s surroundings in the ladybug world. They went to their work as she strayed from view. This group gathered information, smells, tastes, dangers; just about anything they could from the huge castle. For the longest time they worked unaware of another human’s approach, and two had been captured before they could escape. The others were signaled to help, and, in a rage, the leader of the group flew to the human and attacked with his powerful jaws in an attempt to free his comrade. The other nine watched in awe and pride of their leader’s valor, but soon they were watching in horror as the human merely flinched under the leader’s greatest offense and countered with a simple yet fatally accurate swat of its giant paws. They fled with a terrible ferocity to try and find some sort of escape.
Charles looked at the two ladybugs in his little bug cage with a typical child’s curiosity. The seven-year old knew of his sister’s intentions to slaughter all ladybugs, and he had decided to take two of them, one male and one female, and use them to repopulate after his sister’s wrath, just like he had learned in Bible School. He felt a sting on his neck and swatted at the culprit. Guilt rushed into his mind as he realized he had just killed one of the bugs he was trying to save. In return, he would have tried to capture the others, but Liz had rushed in with a vacuum cleaner to wipe out the party. Instead of drawing any attention, Charles rushed to his room on the noble mission. He walked through the hallway to his room and sat the cage on the dresser. He gave his two new friends the names Timmy and Tammy, and in the cage he dropped many blades of grass freshly picked, for every child knows that a strict diet of grass is all that a bug needs to survive. He then placed a shoebox over the tiny bug cage so that he could be certain his sister wouldn’t find them.
Twelve had been reduced to two, and the newly dubbed Timmy and Tammy did not know how the others had fared against the giant human. The prison ceased its violet shaking suddenly, and its ceiling opened soon after. The one known as Tammy tried to escape, but he was crushed under the weight of the grass blades. They looked desperately for a way to escape, but the ceiling was closed, and soon darkness became all they could see. Stranded without food or water, Timmy and Tammy awaited their means to escape.
As is generally the case with young children’s plans, Charles forgot about his pets. The day after their rescue Liz entered Charles’ room with a laundry basket full of clothes. She slid the basket hurriedly along his dresser, knocking over an empty glass, a shoebox, and a baseball glove. She did not reach to pick anything up because they were none of her concern, and she gave them no second thought as she left the room.
Timmy and Tammy prepared for a long wait without any food, rationing their energy in preparation for an opportunity to escape. They sat still in the darkness, ever watchful. An earth-shattering slam preceded a violent tumble on the second day, shaking away the barrier that had shielded their eyes from the light. Timmy and Tammy had been jarred quite roughly, and while Timmy suffered little more than a broken leg, Tammy had cracked her hard carapace, bending the wing inside. Still, they bided their time, healing the injuries sustained over the course of their trial and awaiting an opportunity to escape.
On day three, Charles’ mother inspected his room while he was at a friend’s house. She sighed at the terrible state in which he kept his space and proceeded to clean it. She put away the clothes in the laundry basket and picked up the broken glass angrily. She saw the bug cage and peered inside, seeing two bugs unmoving, so she walked to the window and shook the dead bugs from the cage.
When a new human came into sight on the third day and picked up the prison, Timmy had no idea what to believe. He was trying desperately to conserve his energy, so he did not move very much, only enough to jar Tammy from his slumber. The prison moved toward the outside and both bugs became aware. The human overlords were feeding them at last! Oho! But the ladybugs had outfoxed them this time, for they could fly, and the humans had not seen this trick yet. The ceiling came open, and the duo braced themselves for flight.
Timmy and Tammy opened their shells, quickly flapping the wings cleverly concealed underneath the carapace. With a jump, Timmy was off and away in flight, but Tammy could not get proper leverage into the air due to his injuries, and he plummeted to the ground. Timmy had no choice but to leave him, flying frantically from the house…
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